Tag: Penny Hardaway

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Sports Tiger Blue

Signature Season Nears for Memphis Tigers

Penny Hardaway (photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

If you track the last half-century of University of Memphis basketball, you’ll find a lot of success on the hardwood. You’ll also find what amounts to a signature season in virtually every decade. In 1973, Larry Finch, Ronnie Robinson, and Larry Kenon took an unforgettable Tiger team all the way to the championship game before falling to mighty UCLA. The 1985 Tigers returned to the Final Four in Keith Lee’s final season. In 1992, a sophomore sensation by the name of Penny Hardaway led an overlooked Tiger squad to the Elite Eight. Then in 2008, freshman Derrick Rose and a group of veteran stars went 38-2, losing an overtime heartbreaker to Kansas for the national championship. Four decades . . . four signature seasons.

Then, we had the 2010s. Nary a losing season, but also nary a signature season. The Tigers reached the NCAA tournament four straight years (2011-14), but never advanced to the second weekend (Sweet 16). Tubby Smith’s two years as coach (2016-18) were as awkward as Josh Pastner’s final two. Penny Hardaway — the greatest living Tiger legend — took over the program in 2018, but needed four seasons to lead a team to the Big Dance.

And what a dance it appeared to be for the 2021-22 Tigers. After beating Boise State in the opening round, Memphis led Gonzaga — the top-ranked team in the country — by 10 points at halftime before falling, 82-78, last Saturday in Portland. A lengthy tournament drought is over, but it’s now been 13 years without a Sweet 16 appearance for Memphis. And 14 years, really, since something we could call a signature season in these parts.

That special season is coming. If the Tigers’ battle with the Zags isn’t enough to convince you, consider their two beatings of the Houston Cougars, one by 10 points at Houston in February, the other by 14 points at FedExForum in March. The Cougars, you might be aware, play Villanova Saturday for a chance at a second-straight Final Four appearance. The Memphis Tigers are “there” without quite being there. Back, but not entirely.

After the Tigers handled Houston in their regular-season finale on March 6th, Hardaway noted the culture change that took place around his team as they reeled off 10 wins in their final 11 games. “We understood what the mission was. The way we could lock in, we weren’t looking ahead. Every game: 1 and 0. Staying in the moment, putting ourselves in a position to compete. We locked down, and relied on one another.”

We relied on one another. Are there any five words that more honestly capture the meaning of a team? The meaning of a team’s mission? The Tigers came up short of the program’s goal — certainly Penny Hardaway’s goal — this winter, but there seems to be a template now in place, one the coach and his returning players can utilize in seasons to come.

Not every player will return, of course. Jalen Duren — the American Athletic Conference’s Freshman of the Year — will be playing in the NBA a year from now, a sure lottery pick in June’s draft. Another freshman, Josh Minott, is departing for the professional ranks. The NCAA transfer portal is open for any and all other Tigers to move on should they feel greener pastures lie elsewhere. That portal is just as open for Hardaway to add an impact player or two for the 2022-23 campaign.

As for adjustments, Hardaway would be wise to emphasize the value of November and December to a college basketball team. A four-game losing streak after the Tigers opened last season with five victories made the rest of the schedule a climb to respectability and seriously compromised chances Memphis might land a seed higher than ninth for the NCAA tournament. Secure those non-conference games, then flex muscle in AAC play and you have the makings of, yes, a signature season.

We now know what a decade without a signature season in Memphis feels like. When will we enjoy the next one? You can be sure of this: We’ll recognize it when it happens.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Dancin’ Time for Memphis Tigers

Alex Lomax (photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

Ahhh. Now this feels like March. Thursday in Portland, the Memphis Tigers will play Boise State in the first round of the NCAA tournament. The game will take place just shy of eight years since Memphis last played in the Big Dance (a second-round loss to Virginia on March 23, 2014). It’s hard to imagine in these parts, but there are Memphis high-school kids with virtually no memory of the Tigers playing in college basketball’s showcase. After all, it was two American presidents and a pandemic ago. 

In this season’s spirit of renewal, a few not-so-random thoughts on the Tigers’ return to Madness: 

• Just how long was the Tigers’ seven-year drought without a dance card? You have to go all the way back to 1972 to find such a dry period. Then Memphis State, the Tigers did not qualify for the NCAA tournament for 10 years, from 1963 through 1972. In 1972, though, only 25 teams qualified for the tournament. Without a conference championship, a program had little chance of competing for the big prize. Today, it’s a 68-team field. As many as six or seven teams from hoops-rich conferences like the ACC, SEC, or Big 10 make the field. There was no tournament in 2020 as the pandemic took hold, but the Tigers’ seven-year absence from this event is just about as long as we can take.

• It’s been even longer — 13 years — since the Tigers advanced to the tournament’s second weekend, the Sweet 16. Memphis won at least two tournament games four straight years, from 2006 to 2009, reaching the regional finals (“Elite Eight”) three times (2006-08), and the 2008 championship, where the Tigers lost to Kansas in overtime. The program enjoyed a similar four-year run from 1982-85 (the Keith Lee years), reaching the Sweet 16 each season and the Final Four in ’85, where they lost to Villanova in the national semifinals.

• Penny Hardaway is the ninth coach to lead Memphis to the NCAA tournament. He appeared as a player in the 1992 and ’93 tournaments, helping the Tigers reach the Elite Eight as a sophomore. No Memphis coach made it to the Big Dance in his first season at the helm. It took Penny four.

• Larry Kenon scored 34 points in the first round of the 1973 tournament, setting a single-game Memphis record that stood for 36 years. Roburt Sallie — hardly a name that rolls off the tongue of Tiger fans — found his range in the opening game of the 2009 tournament and scored 35 points to establish a new standard.

• The Tigers will be led by a point guard who grew up in Memphis and wears number 10 on his jersey. For fans with some mileage on their tires, this should look familiar. Andre Turner led the Tigers to the NCAA tournament four consecutive years (1983-86), hit a game-winning shot on their way to the 1985 Final Four, and established a career assists record (763) that will never be broken. If Alex Lomax conjures the Little General this month, their could be a lot to celebrate.

• How unique was freshman Jalen Duren’s 21-point, 20-rebound performance in the quarterfinals of the American Athletic Conference tournament? In four full seasons as a Tiger, the great Keith Lee never had a 20-20 game. Ronnie Robinson had three in three seasons. Larry Kenon remarkably had seven 20-20 games in his only college season, helping the Tigers reach the 1973 Final Four. Enjoy Duren in the Big Dance. He’ll be dunking lobs in the NBA a year from now.

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Sports Tiger Blue

New Season for the Memphis Tigers

Landers Nolley II (photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

Rarely does a single game change a college basketball season, much less one played in mid-February. But this may well have happened last Saturday, when the Memphis Tigers upset the 6th-ranked Houston Cougars in Texas. In ending Houston’s 37-game(!) winning streak at the Fertitta Center, Memphis earned its first road win over a top-10 team in 17 years and its second over the country’s 6th-ranked team this season. (Alabama occupied that ranking when the Tigers beat them at FedExForum in December.) For a program that hadn’t beaten a top-10 team since 2014, the 2021-22 campaign has gained a measure of significance, but a return to the NCAA tournament remains the goal. Getting there would end an eight-year drought and change the trajectory of Penny Hardaway’s still-young college coaching career. The Tigers took a significant stride toward a Big Dance ticket by beating Houston.

Three truths we discovered in Saturday’s win:

• The Tigers have a “Big Three.” NBA championships tend to be won by teams with headline trios. Think recently of the Miami Heat (LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh) or the Golden State Warriors (Steph Curry, Kevin Durant, and Klay Thompson). The Tigers’ victory at Houston established the team’s prime players, once and for all, as Landers Nolley, DeAndre Williams, and Jalen Duren. After missing four recent games with a knee injury, Nolley returned to the starting lineup for the first time since late December and led Memphis with 20 points, hitting four of five three-point attempts. (It’s a good time to remember Nolley was a first-team all-conference selection after the 2020-21 season.) After missing six recent games with a back injury, Williams looked healthy against Houston, scoring 13 points with four assists and three steals. Then there’s Duren, the team’s star freshman and the American Athletic Conference’s top rebounder and shot-blocker. Duren had 14 points and 11 rebounds against the Cougars, his third consecutive double-double.

• For the Tigers’ rotation, tight makes right. Hardaway sent 11 players to the floor in the first half against Houston. (The Cougars led by three points at halftime.) But over the game’s final 20 minutes, he stuck with his starting unit: the big three, plus Alex Lomax and Lester Quinones. Among reserves, only senior Tyler Harris played as many as 11 minutes. Depth is overrated in college basketball. There are four media timeouts every half. Players get “breathers” every time someone takes a free throw. Hardaway has finally landed on the starting five that appears capable of winning big games in March. It’s the players’ responsibility to avoid foul trouble and the coach’s responsibility to play them every minute he can.

• Free throws win games. Memphis fans didn’t need Saturday’s win to learn this lesson. It was delivered like a kick in the crotch near the end of the 2008 NCAA championship. Memphis teams have not been known for hitting free throws consistently, or in big moments. This year’s squad entered the Houston game shooting 66 percent from the foul line . . . 321st in the country. (Houston was 320th.) When Williams was fouled on a heave as the shot-clock expired with 1:35 left in Saturday’s game, the Tigers led by only three points (56-53). Williams made his three free throws, and the Tigers, as a team, connected on 10 more — without a miss — over the game’s final 90 seconds to make the final score (69-59) look like an easy victory. They’re called “free” for a reason. 

Much remains to be gained in a season suddenly captivating for longtime Tiger fans. A pair of road games this week — at Cincinnati Tuesday and at SMU Sunday — could go either way, and a pair of losses would toss Memphis back on the infamous “bubble” when it comes to NCAA tournament consideration. But a pair of wins, then strong showings at home to end the regular season could make the AAC tournament not so critical for the Tigers’ chances at an at-large berth. A mercurial team has won five games in a row. And on a special Saturday afternoon in Houston, that team raised its ceiling for achievement considerably.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Penny’s Perspective

Penny Hardaway (photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

Embarrassing.

That was the trigger word. Last Thursday, a reporter asked Penny Hardaway if he was embarrassed after his Memphis Tigers’ latest disappointment, an eight-point loss to SMU that left the team — once ranked 9th in the country — 9-8 for the season. The fourth-year basketball coach forgot about the lights, cameras, and recorders, and let it be known how he felt.

“Stop asking me stupid f*****g questions about if I feel like I can do something. … I’m coaching really hard, my boys are playing really hard. I’m not embarrassed about nothing.”

It was hard to witness, knowing Hardaway’s stature in this town. Since taking the job in March 2018, Hardaway has brought dignity and composure to almost every public appearance. He’s been angry, frustrated, impatient. His teams, to date, have under-performed. But he’s kept himself together under a spotlight no other Memphian would welcome. That composure cracked last Thursday. [Hardaway apologized via Instagram on Friday, at least “to my school, to the players and to our fans.” No mention of “this media” that stirred him so the night before.]

Consider the word embarrassing and its association to Hardaway in the context of basketball. This is a man who, as a player, performed in the NBA Finals, All-Star games, the Olympics. Rarely was he embarrassed in sneakers and shorts on a basketball court. He took up coaching a decade ago and did nothing but win at the middle school and high school levels. There was nothing embarrassing about winning three state championships at East High School. (The James Wiseman controversy surfaced later. Depending on your view, that qualifies as embarrassing for either Hardaway or the NCAA.)

A revealing detail about Hardaway’s angry reaction to the “embarrassing” question: It came after he said this: “Right now, we aren’t fighting hard enough. This isn’t a Memphis team.” This isn’t a Memphis team. Those five words are the equivalent of … embarrassment. One standard (Hardaway’s personal success, now connected to the historical success of the Memphis program) exceeds the current standard, enough for the coach to disassociate his current players with the very brand (the University of Memphis) they represent. If Hardaway isn’t embarrassed, he wouldn’t want to acknowledge the other emotion his comments suggest: shame. “My boys are playing really hard” … but against SMU, at least, they aren’t a Memphis team?

A Memphis team showed up at Tulsa Sunday, the Tigers erasing a 13-point halftime deficit to win their first game on the Golden Hurricane’s floor since 2012. Memphis played shorthanded again, with DeAndre Williams, Landers Nolley, and Jalen Duren all nursing injuries. Star turns from Tyler Harris and Josh Minott off the bench were enough to beat the American Athletic Conference’s cellar dweller. Hardaway could, metaphorically speaking, catch his breath and say all the right things about a road victory.

The coach’s job will likely grow heavier, because the current team (now 10-8 and 4-4 in the AAC) is a long shot for the NCAA tournament. Missing the Big Dance would make it eight years in a row, half of those on Hardaway’s watch. His comments last Thursday night were Hardaway’s first confession that he understands and feels the pressure of history on his beloved alma mater. It was the rare chance for those who watch, analyze, and discuss a hometown hero to see and hear what that hometown hero thinks from his own perspective. 

Athletes — and coaches — are rarely their best in front of cameras after a loss. Penny Hardaway will surely have better moments (and better press conferences) in the days to come. The best athletes are able to forget poor outings and regain peak performance. An embarrassing press conference? Coaches and communities as attached as Hardaway and Memphis forget those, too.

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Sports Tiger Blue

When the “Smoke” Clears

Emoni Bates (Photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

It appears the 2021-22 Memphis Tigers will leave their mark on the history books. Or maybe we should call it a scar. Unless they manage to win the American Athletic Conference tournament in March — and thus qualify for the program’s first NCAA tournament in eight years — these Tigers will lead conversations about the most disappointing teams in U of M history. A team that opened the season ranked 12th in the AP poll — and many felt that position wasn’t high enough — is currently 9-7 and nowhere near the Top 25. Worse, the Tigers are merely 3-3 in the AAC (despite wins over Wichita State and Cincinnati). Six AAC teams have fewer league losses, with Houston (4-0) at the top of the standings.

The Tigers’ latest face-plant occurred last Saturday at East Carolina, when Memphis blew a 10-point lead over the game’s final three minutes and lost by a single point on a buzzer-beater. The game came down to the Tigers defending an in-bounds play with a single second left on the clock. They didn’t. The ECU crowd stormed the court and the Tigers flew home, tail firmly tucked between their legs. Again.

These Tigers rarely play at full strength. Covid protocols and injuries have reduced coach Penny Hardaway’s once-too-deep roster to as few as six or seven scholarship players at times. Perhaps the Tigers beat the Pirates last weekend if DeAndre Williams and Landers Nolley had played. Surely they beat Tulane on December 29th had Williams and freshman sensation Emoni Bates not been sidelined. (They lost by a single point.)

But the limited roster isn’t an excuse, not as measured over the course of a full season. The Tigers faced Georgia with the Bulldogs down their top guard. The Bulldogs won the game. Good teams adjust their tactics and find ways to win. Even bad teams, like Georgia, must do this now and then. The first and most important skill in sports is being available. Staying healthy. Suiting up on game day. Players unable to perform when the lights glow should not be considered championship caliber.

How are we to measure Hardaway at this point? Since he took the job in March 2018, the best skill Hardaway and his players have displayed is swagger. He and they want “all the smoke.” It became a social-media rallying cry, a mantra of sorts for a program emerging from the lost chances of his predecessors, Josh Pastner and Tubby Smith. Pastner led the Tigers to the NCAA tournament four years in a row. But he was skewered for not doing more with the rosters he loaded with prime talent. Smith spent two awkward winters in Memphis, winning more games than he lost, but with junior college transfers leading the way. Penny Hardaway would erase all that disappointment. He would bring “pros” to Memphis, as John Calipari did for a glorious four-year run of late-March basketball. But swagger without results is merely posturing.

There’s one more disturbing variable to this season’s mess (so far): the Larry Brown factor. The Hall of Fame coach joined Hardaway’s staff as somewhat of a Yoda to Hardaway’s Luke Skywalker. He would bring wisdom and the attention to important details — be it development of players or in-game strategy — that should make Hardaway the best Division I coach he could be. Well, if Brown has been a positive factor, it means the Tigers would be worse than 9-7 without him. This is not math Penny Hardaway wants to calculate in quiet moments.

There are 12 regular-season games to play. Maybe DeAndre Williams is the difference, and when (if?) he returns, the Tigers will find a groove. Seven of those games are at FedExForum, where Memphis has secured big wins over 6th-ranked Alabama and Cincinnati. Should the Tigers go 10-2 the rest of the way, would a 19-9 record attract an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament? I wouldn’t bet on it, not with those losses at Tulane and East Carolina (and UCF). Hardaway, Brown and friends must treat the next six weeks like training for the AAC tournament (March 10-13 in Fort Worth). Hardaway has seen an under-performing group rally to win a tournament in Texas (the 2021 NIT). Why not win another one in 2022?

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Sports Tiger Blue

Memphis Tigers: Wreck and Recover

Jalen Duren, Penny Hardaway, and Emoni Bates (Photo by Larry Kuzniewski)

Penny Hardaway was in a dark place, and visibly, during his postgame press conference on December 10th. The basketball coach had just witnessed his Memphis Tigers’ fourth consecutive loss, to Murray State, in what should be a place of comfort, FedExForum. I asked Hardaway if he’d ever felt so low in his basketball life.

“There’s so much going on in our country,” he replied, after shaking his head. “Four losses in a row is devastating, but it’s not life and death. My faith in God; I understand what’s going on. We have to weather a storm. I’ve never been here, but I know I’m a fighter, and I’ll figure it out.” When “life and death” are mentioned — with allusion to the ongoing pandemic — during a discussion about a basketball game . . . it’s a dark place.

Just four days later, the Tigers played 40 minutes of furious basketball and upset the 6th-ranked team in the country, the Alabama Crimson Tide. It was the program’s first win over top-10 competition since March 2014 and the biggest victory in Hardaway’s four seasons as a college coach. 

Four days after the big win, though, with fans already in the stands at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, the Tigers’ much-anticipated clash with Tennessee was cancelled when Landers Nolley and Tyler Harris tested positive for Covid-19. Making matters worse, we learned the majority of Hardaway’s roster had not been vaccinated. By the time the Tigers returned to play on December 29th at Tulane, two starters (Jalen Duren and DeAndre Williams) were sidelined for Covid protocols along with a third (Emoni Bates) with a hand injury. Memphis lost (by a single point) to the Green Wave, a team that will not finish in the top half of the American Athletic Conference standings.

It’s been that kind of season so far for a Tiger team now 1-1 in AAC play after an impressive win at Wichita State on New Year’s Day. A league championship (regular season or tournament) is all but required for a berth in the NCAA tournament. Can a seven-year Big Dance drought be boxed up and left for the history books? Or will the 2021-22 Tigers become chapter eight in an “era” no Memphis fan will celebrate years from now?

Three observations for the Tigers’ two-month push for national relevance:

• Memphis is best when Hardaway squeezes the rotation. Seven players absorbed 91 percent of the minutes in the upset of Alabama. Those seven players: Alex Lomax, Lester Quinones, Landers Nolley, Tyler Harris, Bates, Duren, and Williams. Much was made about the depth of the Memphis roster entering the season. Hardaway has a pair of players — Johnathan Lawson and Sam Onu — redshirting this season that could start for other AAC programs. But a basketball team must play as a unit to perform at optimum capacity. We saw a strong, seven-man unit beat the Crimson Tide by 14 points. To try and force nine or ten players into that “unit” . . . it’s impossible.

• Minutes for Minott. Freshman forward Josh Minott made virtually no impact in the win over Alabama (two points in four minutes of playing time). But in hockey terms, Minott was one of the Tigers’ three stars (along with Duren and Williams) in the victory over Wichita State: 15 points, six rebounds, and a pair of steals in just 19 minutes. Minott gained playing time against the Shockers by virtue of Lomax sitting out with an ankle injury. When Lomax returns, Minott must remain a sixth (or seventh) man. He brings too much for peripheral status.

• No more second-tier surprises. The loss at Tulane and the win at Wichita State might each be considered surprise results, so they’re a wash. But the Tigers cannot afford to lose any more games against lesser competition, and there’s a lot of lesser competition on the AAC schedule. The league favorite, Houston, is down a pair of rotation players. Cincinnati comes to FedExForum this Sunday for a nationally televised showdown. A conference championship is there for the taking. The kind of accomplishment that turns darkness into light.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Tiger Trauma

Jalen Duren (Credit: Larry Kuzniewski)

Penny Hardaway had the table set for a winter of feasting on the hardwood. To take the metaphor further, the University of Memphis basketball coach had a pair of top-five recruits to serve as the meat and potatoes for his 2021-22 team, a healthy number of veterans to provide vitamins and minerals, and for dessert, a Hall of Fame assistant coach, here to sweeten Hardaway’s game-day tactical skills. Year four of the Coach Hardaway Era merely needed to seat the guests.

Then along came Iowa State. And Georgia. And Ole Miss. In a matter of nine days — and not yet officially winter — the Tiger table was toppled.

How bad are things, truly? How close to the panic button should Tiger fans have their fingers? There’s no getting around it: Losses to the Cyclones, Dawgs, and Rebels shouldn’t have happened, not if you look at the respective rosters “on paper.” If Memphis can’t beat teams like Georgia (2-5 and missing its point guard), the Tigers will not be playing on the second weekend of the NCAA tournament … the minimum expectation for this year’s team.

Forget tactics and strategy, though. Here are three intangibles the Memphis Tigers must confront and consider if their season is to be salvaged.

Ego. Every member of the Tigers’ rotation was the star of his high school (or AAU) team. And every member of the Tigers’ rotation is not as good at basketball as he thinks he is right now. Same goes for the head coach, or he wouldn’t be examining film from a three-game losing streak. Among this group of nine or 10 men, who can suppress his ego over the next three months for the better of his team’s mission? Can Emoni Bates and Jalen Duren forget their current NBA stock (it’s falling), and work at being more valuable to the Tigers’ cause when no one besides their teammates and coaches is watching? Can senior DeAndre Williams give up playing time for a freshman (Josh Minott)? Can fundamentals — crisp passing, floor spacing, moving without the ball — take priority over “highlight plays”? Can the city’s most popular basketball presence acknowledge shortcomings long enough to improve the atmosphere surrounding his team? These are big questions for the winter ahead.

Patience. This seems counterintuitive. A quarter of the Tigers’ regular season is history. If a 5-3 team aspires to play in the NCAA tournament, it needs to get better right now. But here’s the uncomfortable catch: Memphis will not play its best basketball of the season this Friday when Murray State visits FedExForum. And that shouldn’t be expected. The assignment from the coaching staff must be to play better basketball than they did in last Saturday’s loss at Ole Miss. Steady improvement will bring wins, not every game, but in several games … if the improvement is steady. And this is where the Tigers face their largest mental challenge. Young men are impatient. Teenagers like Bates and Duren don’t know how to spell the word. Performance equals reward … that’s the world young basketball stars know and understand. But that’s not reality for the Tiger team currently taking the floor. This is a group that must climb a ladder toward success, toward its best group effort. We won’t see it in December, but might we in March?

Resolve. The Tigers’ next three games — Murray State, Alabama, and Tennessee — will be more challenging than the last three. Yikes. Memphis could enter conference play (December 29th at Tulane) with a record at or below .500. The Tigers will not likely reappear in the Top 25 until they reel off a few wins against American Athletic Conference rivals. And this is the key to everything. If Memphis can win the AAC (regular season or tournament), the Tigers will play in the Big Dance. Coaches picked them to finish second (behind Houston). The way they’ve looked of late, a top-three finish would be a surprise. So surprise the world. No one relishes being overlooked — the dis, the snub — more than a Memphis Tiger. It’s part of the culture that sticks to this team, one season or coach after another. Can Penny Hardaway and his band of talented players keep their eyes on the AAC prize? The Tiger basketball program has yet to raise AAC hardware. However painful their last three games may feel, this Memphis team can still make history.

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From My Seat Sports

Penny Saved

Penny Hardaway (Brandon Dill)

Exhale, Memphis.

It appears there will be a Year Four of the Penny Hardaway Era 2.0 at the University of Memphis. After exchanging winks with the NBA’s Orlando Magic last month, the living face of Tiger basketball retains his office at the Laurie-Walton Family Basketball Center on Getwell. As a statue of Larry Finch is literally rising outside that facility, Hardaway continues his quest to return a long-proud program to a place where far more than an NIT championship will be celebrated.

How close did Hardaway come to leaving? When an interview is part of the equation, that’s close enough for Tiger fans, boosters, and sponsors. Enough to raise blood pressure, even as the Mid-South summer seems to slow movement of any kind to a lazy crawl. Hardaway had some very special seasons as a player with Orlando — he was twice named first-team All-NBA and helped the Magic to the 1995 Finals — so a fit exists, even if it crosses a couple of basketball generations. Having never coached a game in the NCAA tournament, Hardaway’s credentials for an NBA job — on paper — may seem thin. But he would sell tickets and sponsorships in Florida just as he has here in Memphis.

Some have insisted Tiger basketball would be fine had Hardaway left. It’s an institution, larger than any individual, larger even than The Guy. Finch himself received a pink slip (after 11 seasons as head coach) on the concourse of The Pyramid. Legends expire, particularly in a time where patience is nonexistent, where popularity is today’s Twitter trend, where a game-changing recruiting class spends no more than a season together. Had Hardaway left, well, next man up.

I’m not sure that would be the scenario here in Memphis, not with a premature farewell from Penny Hardaway. Think about how much Hardaway loves University of Memphis basketball, how much he adores his hometown. He could live anywhere in the world he chooses, but has kept a home in the Bluff City. When he was named head coach in 2018, there was a “finally!” feeling at the Laurie-Walton press conference but, more generally, throughout the city. We had Our Guy, and Our Guy had embraced us. If he had left after only three seasons, and with nothing to show but that NIT hardware? Over the course of a lifetime, you’ll have people give up on you, or seek greener pastures. And you move on. But when that perfect match — you know it’s perfect — proclaims things aren’t right? That kind of cut leaves a scar.

So exhale, Memphis. And back to work for Penny Hardaway. Instead of trying to rebuild the Magic (Orlando finished 14th among 15 Eastern Conference teams last season), Hardaway will study his own revamped roster — bye-bye Boogie Ellis and D.J. Jeffries, hello Johnathan and Chandler Lawson — and plot a course toward the Tiger program’s first Big Dance since, gulp, 2014. Instead of chasing the Milwaukee Bucks, Atlanta Hawks, and Philadelphis 76ers, Hardaway must close the gap with the University of Houston. (The Cougars reached the 2021 Final Four, remember.) That’s Penny’s challenge, really, in summation. Do for Memphis what Kelvin Sampson has done in east Texas. And frankly, it’s a lower hurdle to leap than the one (the many) he’d face in the NBA.

Penny Hardaway is still Our Guy. As he reaches a life milestone — Hardaway turns 50 on July 18th — the “kid” from Binghampton remains the personification of all that is wonderful about Tiger basketball. Temptations are part of the mix for a man with Hardaway’s profile. But making the right relationship work brings rewards of a rare and distinctive kind. There’s reason to believe University of Memphis basketball is getting closer to such a prize.

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From My Seat Sports Sports Feature

Transfer Nation

Penny Hardaway (U of M Athletics / Joe Murphy)

Let’s be glad there’s no such thing as an NIT championship parade. How awkward would that have been? Before Penny Hardaway’s Memphis Tigers could deliver their 2021 trophy to the Laurie-Walton Family Basketball Center, nearly half of Hardaway’s nine-man rotation announced their intentions to leave the program. Sophomores Boogie Ellis, D.J. Jeffries, and Damion Baugh will transfer and freshman Moussa Cisse is dipping his toes into the NBA draft waters, though not hiring an agent just yet. Even one of Hardaway’s two four-star recruits for next season — Jordan Nesbitt — departed for Saint Louis University after enrolling at the U of M for the spring semester. Exhale. And deep breaths. The 2020-21 Tiger season is over . . . and so is that team, with an exclamation point.

Such is life in college basketball today. Forget the players; teams themselves are one-and-done. All of them. Something we’ve come to know as the transfer portal has created all-but-unfettered free agency in the sport, with more than 1,000 players “entering the portal” this offseason. And yes, two of those players — swingmen Davion Warren and Earl Timberlake — are already headed to Memphis. So if you’re doing the math, Memphis has subtracted five players (should Cisse actually enter the NBA draft) and added two for year four of the Coach Penny era.

There’s no need for grinding teeth or screaming into the Twitterverse over the roster volatility. The NCAA has, for generations, exploited talented athletes for financial gain, most glaringly the “March Madness” telethon each spring that crowns basketball’s champion. If we’ve reached the point where players can at least choose — without penalty — their program(s) of choice after actually experiencing life as a cash cow, it’s a better, more honest world. Makes the job of a coach and his recruiting staff a fiery gauntlet, but hey, that’s why they’re paid the big bucks.

• Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game would have been a nice look in Atlanta this summer. Scheduled to be played six months after the great Hank Aaron’s passing, the Midsummer Classic would have made for an uplifting salute to an American legend and a warm welcome-back as vaccinations allow more and more fans to actually enter stadiums. And considering Georgia voters changed the legislative branch of our government by sending two Democrats to the U.S. Senate, the showcase sporting event might have been seen as a “thank you” from an under-represented segment of our population. Aaron would have appreciated that.

Alas, the All-Star Game will not be going down to Georgia. With those new Senators still decorating their offices, the Peach State’s legislature enacted bills that serve as restrictions on voting. (Don’t you dare provide a voter a bottle of water!) So MLB yanked the All-Star Game and will stage the event in Denver. The decision was made quickly by commissioner Rob Manfred, but surely with loud whispers in his ears from corporate sponsors not thrilled about pouring millions of dollars into a state so bold-faced in its anti-democratic legislation.

Get used to this. The most powerful force in the United States of America is money. No man or woman, no voice or column, no march or protest will get things done in this country like the mighty dollar. It’s the one variable that can swing, yes, legislation. Piss off the “liberal media,” that’s fine. Only so many ears (and wallets) CNN (an Atlanta company!) can reach. But find yourself on the wrong side of the table from Coca-Cola (an Atlanta company!) or Budweiser, with millions of baseball fans in the mix? Those campaign donations will drop like a batter with a fastball to the chin.

No one wants politics mixed with their sports entertainment. But sports entertainment breathes the oxygen of American business. The mix has already been made. Major League Baseball simply used its All-Star Game as the most recent — sorry for this — hammer for change.

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Sports Tiger Blue

Tiger Hoops: 2020-21 Season Review

CREDIT: U of M Athletics / Joe Murphy

Having missed out on a berth in the NCAA tournament, the Memphis Tigers will join 15 other teams for a version of the National Invitation Tournament. All games will be played at a pair of arenas in metro Dallas.

It wasn’t supposed to go like this. When Penny Hardaway met a throng of boosters and media at the brand-new Laurie-Walton Center on March 20, 2018, he did not mention a four-year plan. There was no three-year runway toward contention for championships, be they conference or, ahem, national. “People are telling me to be patient,” said Hardaway three years ago. “But I’m not built that way. I’m not wired that way. I’ll go for it all or none at all.”

These are wacky times, and that goes well beyond the world of college basketball. But the history books will note that Hardaway — a certifiable hardwood legend in these parts — is the first Tiger coach to end three consecutive seasons without an NCAA tournament appearance since Wayne Yates, way back in the late 1970s (1977-79 to be exact). Sure, a pandemic is in the mix. There was no NCAA tournament in 2020. (Hardaway’s second team would not have made the Big Dance, not without winning the American Athletic Conference tournament, which was also cancelled.) But three years without March Madness in Memphis, Tennessee? On top of the four Madness-free years that preceded Hardaway’s arrival? It’s the longest drought for this proud program since a ten-year dry spell that ended with the Final Four run of 1973. Ouch.
U of M Athletics / Joe Murphy

All-conference swingman Landers Nolley II.

The Tigers played the Houston Cougars — the number-two seed in the NCAA tournament’s Midwest quadrant — to the buzzer twice in the span of six days this month. The notion that a tournament bracket can be filled with 68 better teams is ludicrous. But it’s never about what your team did when your “bubble” status bursts. It’s what your team didn’t do.

The Tigers didn’t beat a “Quad 1” team this season, a team from the upper tier of overall rankings as determined by strength of schedule and location of games. This is problematic for a team that doesn’t play in a “Power 5” league in a season the AAC didn’t exactly stuff the Top-25 rankings. Memphis only had two Power-5 opponents on its schedule. The Ole Miss game was cancelled due to positive COVID results in the Rebel program, and the Tigers lost to Auburn.

The Tigers didn’t get to play eight games — eight games — because of the pandemic. Four were cancelled because of positive tests in their opponent’s camp and four were cancelled because of positive tests in the Memphis program (including games against both AAC tournament finalists, home games with Cincinnati and Houston). Five or six more wins would have added some shine to the Tigers’ 16-8 record. Based on what we saw in Texas (twice), a win over the Cougars at FedExForum would not be a stretch. A second win over Wichita State (Memphis beat the AAC regular-season champs by 20 points in January) would have captured the right kind of attention.

Consider Boogie Ellis the personification of the Tigers’ near-miss this season. The sophomore guard tied the first Houston game with a three-pointer inside the game’s final 10 seconds, only to watch the Cougars’ Tramon Mark heave in a bank shot from 30 feet as time expired. Last Saturday, Ellis scored 27 points, his long-distance marksmanship fueling the Tigers’ second-half comeback from 12 points down. But Ellis missed six of ten free throws, vanishing points that could have made the difference in another game decided in the final minute of play.

“It’s hard to accept,” said a disconsolate Hardaway after the AAC semifinal loss. “Having the game won, knowing what’s at stake, and not being able to pull it through. We had a chance to knock them out a few times, and just couldn’t.” Hardaway acknowledged an uneven start to his team’s season, one that didn’t include transfer DeAndre Williams for the first seven games (the Tigers went 4-3 without him). “We started off very slow,” he said. “Just couldn’t get our footing. And it took us a long time to come together as a team. When we got our rhythm, we had the COVID pause, but we came out of that playing really well. We were locked and loaded for this tournament. It’s heartbreaking.”

Heartbreak inevitably turns to hope over the course of a long offseason. And there’s reason for optimism in the Tiger program. The team’s entire nine-man rotation could return for the 2021-22 campaign. As you’re sketching lineups, though, keep in mind that the transfer portal has brought an element of free agency to college basketball. Remember Tyler Harris? Lance Thomas? Where would this year’s team have been without Williams (the team’s most impactful player, from Evansville) or Landers Nolley (an all-conference honoree, from Virginia Tech)? Subtraction and addition are larger equations now, particularly in a sport where merely one or two solutions (at the right positions) can transform a team.

From Hardaway’s heralded 2019 recruiting class, Boogie Ellis and Lester Quinones have established themselves as 30-minute guards on game nights. D.J. Jeffries didn’t take the same strides forward as a sophomore, but could be a game-changer if he can score consistently. Malcolm Dandridge improved both his body and game in his second year at the college level, and Damion Baugh is a capable ball-handler off the bench if Hardaway chooses to attack with a smaller unit. With Moussa Cisse manning the middle — the AAC’s Freshman of the Year — the Tigers have a defensive eraser and, at times, an offensive threat to feed the ball. Assuming Alex Lomax fully recovers from the ankle injury that sidelined him this month, next year’s Tigers will have senior leadership in the form of a player Hardaway has groomed since middle school.
U of M Athletics / Joe Murphy

Moussa Cisse, the AAC’s Freshman of the Year.

To all the veterans, you can add the country’s 6th-ranked recruiting class (according to 247 Sports), led by a pair of four-star prospects: Jordan Nesbitt (a scoring wing from St. Louis, already with the program) and Josh Minott (a small forward from Boca Raton, Florida, who will push Jeffries for playing time). Among Hardaway’s concerns as he enters his fourth year at the helm, depth of talent isn’t one. Can as many as 11 strong players mesh as a unit, though, and sacrifice (minutes played) enough to get this program back where so many feel it belongs?

Should you have concerns about the Tiger program — seven years — don’t let the coach’s motivation be one. Shortly after he was hired in 2018, Hardaway shared some perspective on how very much he, personally, wants to win a championship — the national kind — with his alma mater. This is a man, remember, who did not win a title as a player at the high school, college, or pro level. He does, though, own an Olympic gold medal (won in 1996). “That gold medal was something we were supposed to do,” said Hardaway in 2018. “We had the best players in the world playing for one team. We’ve [now] got to do what’s not expected. They’re not expecting us to win a national championship here.”

The best advice from parents far and wide: No one should challenge you more than you challenge yourself. Every member of the Memphis Tigers’ roster and coaching staff is coming to grips with that philosophy by one measure or another. Go ahead and win the NIT. It wouldn’t hurt. Then count the days ’til November and another chance for a proud program to fully regain its footing on the national stage.