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?
