Baylor: Scott Drew on ESPN

Baylor Rises From The Ashes...

I had to post this article from today's New York Post:

BAYLOR RISES FROM THE ASHES

March 18, 2008 — WE see the same scenes year after year, March after March, and it can be easy to grow immune to them. CBS trains its cameras on a handful of basketball teams, and we get to be Big Brother, watching their reactions. The small schools always respond joyously. The top seeds play it cool. The spurned shake their heads.

And then there was Sunday night, with 64 of the 65 teams already announced, when Greg Gumbel revealed the final invite. And it was a few seconds later when we saw the first true upset of March. We saw the Baylor Bears looking as happy, as triumphant, as any team will across the next three weeks, including the ones who'll cut down nets and hoist trophies.

"It's like when you're a parent, and you see your sons and your daughters acting happy," Baylor coach Scott Drew said yesterday, his voice still landscaped by his own celebrations. "That's what gets you the most."

We hear all the time about how sports, and how this tournament, is a haven for redemption, for second chances. Baylor proves that. Because there never may have been a team, or a school, that suffered such profound self-inflicted wounds.

And lived to tell about it. Lived to thrive, in fact.

"The great thing," said Drew, "is that when you have so much work to do at a place, the way we had so much work to do here, you can never worry about second-guessing yourself because your time is so monopolized, 24 hours a day, seven days a week."

The wreckage Drew inherited when he left Valparaiso in the summer of 2003 was so vast, so repulsive, that few could understand why he'd even consider the job.

Former coach Dave Bliss had overseen one of the most surreal collegiate calamities of all time. One player, Patrick Dennehy, had been murdered. Another player, Carlton Dotson, wound up pleading guilty to the killing, and is serving 35 years. And then it turned out Bliss, one of the real beauties to ever work a sideline, had tried to engineer a cover-up, painting Dennehy as a drug dealer, a scam that unfurled when an assistant taped the whole sinister plot.

There isn't another school that can point to that kind of apocalypse, not St. John's with Mike Jarvis' unscrupulous reign, not St. Bonaventure and its welding-certificate/player walk- out exacta, not even SMU football, which had its season canceled in 1987 and still hasn't recovered 21 years later.

The NCAA considered a death-penalty judgment against Baylor, wound up forcing the Bears to cancel its entire non-conference schedule two seasons ago. The day that news broke, on June 28, 2005, is the day Drew remembers as rock- bottom. He'd already tried to clear the graveyard of the ghosts, he'd recruited kids willing to buy into his fresh approach, and now they were forced to pay for Bliss' sins, all of them.

"Telling our guys, having to look them in the eye, that was the worst of it," said Drew, who developed his coaching chops working under his father, Homer, at Valpo. "That put us so far behind that by the time we did start playing it was like having to open your Christmas presents in February and then being disappointed with what you got."

In some ways, that 4-13 record might have been just as astonishing as the 21-10 mark they have now.

Now here they are, just two years later, a No. 11 seed, a date Thursday with Purdue in the West Region. They are led by guard Curtis Jerrells, one of six regulars who go back to that abbreviated 2005-06 season, who knew all about the darkness. And now get to see what the other side looks like. They aren't the best team in the brackets. But they are the best story.

"I don't see how anybody outside could totally appreciate how devastated and how far down it was here," former Baylor football coach Grant Teaff said earlier this winter, and he's right.
But now everyone can see the Bears rise. Before the first ball has been tipped, the tournament has its first winner.

Sports: Baylor's AMAZING Victory!

Ok, forgive me if you are thinking, "Hey... you just wrote about Baylor." However, for those that don't really know (or care!), an amazing event happened last night: Baylor beat Texas A&M. Baylor, ranked # 25 in the AP, beat Texas A&M, ranked # 18, 116-110. Now... just to add a little more to this... Baylor not only beat the Aggies in College Station. They beat them in 5 (FIVE) Overtimes!

To put that into perspective... the game, which normally lasts a maximum of 2 hours, went over 3.5 hours. Baylor had 5 players foul out of the game. And while there are 3 referees, the game ended with only 2. One of the refs had to leave due to cramping.

This was the longest game in Baylor, A&M, and Big 12 history. The most overtimes in a game was 7, and that was in 1981! And you know what? The BU/Aggie game wasn't on TV. I watched it last night over the internet. It was amazing. It was like watching a Rocky movie... 2 sluggers going after it. Don't just take my opinion. Check this out: Andy Katz, a writer for ESPN, has a lot to say about it. Not only that, but click the video on the right to see how crazy it was:

Link

For those that are Baylor fans, you'll love this article from Katz:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=3211589

If I was only a student right now... can you imagine the craziness? I've seen YouTube videos (just enter Baylor Bears basketball) and you can see how crazy the fans have been. Would I actually burn my couch in the middle of the street? There's video that some did just that.

Now, if you want to see ESPN's interview with our coach, Scott Drew, check this out. It's awesome:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGYWWRyURwc

However, the best thing I can show you is this: The players arriving back on campus after their bus ride back from College Station.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNZ-IMUoktA

These are exciting times for the Baylor Bears. They really could make a movie about this program...

Article: Baylor Bears Basketball

I'm a bit stunned these days. My Baylor Bears are 15-2, ranked #25 in the national polls, and tied for first in the Big 12! This is the team, as many of you know, that endured a terrible tragedy a few years ago when it was hit by murder and illegal activity. Here is a link explaining the entire scandal:

Link

Those that have followed Baylor for so many years were shocked. How could that have happened? Would the program survive?

In response, the University imposed major sanctions on itself. They limited recruiting... newly-hired coach Scott Drew had to get players who were already on campus playing intramural games. When the NCAA came through with their sanctions, we weren't allowed to play any non-conference games for one year. It was dreadful.

The other night I watched "We Are Marshall." It's a fantastic story of how the team literally rose from the ashes with the support of the school and community. I highly recommend it. That story reminded me a little of what Baylor has gone through these past 5 years. Waking up and reading this article this morning (on the front page of the Dallas Morning News) was a great way to start the day. Enjoy...

Baylor's men's basketball team enjoying resurgence
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Chip Brown

Scott Drew and his Baylor basketball team caught an 11 a.m. flight from Omaha to Dallas on Sunday and then made the hour and a half bus trip from Dallas to Waco watching the western 3:10 to Yuma.

Looking around, Drew saw something after a Big 12 road game he hadn't seen since 2004.
"Broad smiles," Drew said.

The Bears snapped a 25-game road losing streak in Big 12 play Saturday night with a 72-70 victory at Nebraska. The Bears improved to 15-2 and 3-0 in the Big 12 – tied with Kansas (18-0, 3-0) for first place.

It's Baylor's best start since the 1945-46 season, when the Bears started 24-2. The 3-0 league start is the best since 1997-98, when the Bears started 5-0. Baylor hasn't been ranked since 1969, but that could be next.

"There have been so many firsts," Drew said. "One day we won't have those firsts to worry about. But it sure is nice to be knocking those down."

Drew is fully aware his team is only three games into the conference season and has a treacherous five-game stretch ahead – at Texas A&M (Wednesday), Oklahoma, at Texas, Texas Tech and at Kansas. He is in no mood to say his program has fully recovered from the dark days of 2003.

That was the year Baylor basketball player Carlton Dotson was charged with murdering teammate Patrick Dennehy. Then-coach Dave Bliss also tried to cover up improper tuition payments by insisting – in a recorded conversation – that an assistant coach portray Dennehy as a drug dealer.

NCAA sanctions resulted in Drew taking over a team that could only play conference games in the 2004-05 season.

The players Drew convinced to join him in trying to rebuild the Baylor program are finally growing up. The Bears count on three juniors – forward Kevin Rogers of South Oak Cliff and guards Curtis Jerrells and Henry Dugat – as well as senior guard Aaron Bruce.
Sophomore guard Tweety Carter is the school's first McDonald's All-American. Freshman guard LaceDarius Dunn was a top-50 national recruit from Louisiana, who is second on the team in scoring (12.3 ppg) behind Jerrells (13.0 ppg).

What may be most impressive about this team is that it is 5-0 when trailing at halftime this season, including erasing a 20-point deficit at South Carolina on Dec. 19. The Bears overcame a five-point halftime deficit against Nebraska on Saturday night.

"Last year, we were in a number of close games and lost them," Drew said. "But our guys saw we could be competitive with anyone. They knew if they put the time in the gym, that this year could be our year."

The game that may have changed everything, Drew said, was a 74-69 loss to Texas in the quarterfinals of last year's Big 12 tournament. The Bears blew a 20-point lead in their final game of the season.

"Everyone was devastated, very dejected," Drew said. "The hunger from not carrying that game out carried over to the summer and improving their games. We had some confidence coming out of that experience."

The Bears continued to build that confidence by winning the Paradise Jam, an eight-team tournament in the Virgin Islands in November with wins over Wichita State, Notre Dame and Winthrop.

It was the first time Baylor won a tournament that included at least eight teams since the 1968-69 season.

"I think we've just got a swagger," said Bruce, who withdrew his name from NBA draft eligibility to return for his senior season. "We know that we've gone through a lot of tough times and a lot of really testing games. We're starting to get older, more experience, so we know just how to handle ourselves in certain situations."

Added Dugat, "We have the veterans and the depth we need to get things done."
Baylor leads the Big 12 in 3-point field goals made per game (9.12) and 3-point field goal percentage (.410). When the Bears get hot from outside, they are one of the toughest matchups in the league, because guards Bruce, Jerrells, Dugat, Carter and Dunn can all hit from beyond the arc.

"Baylor has some of the best 'spurtability' of anyone in the Big 12," said Iowa State coach Greg McDermott, whose team lost to Baylor, 74-67, on Jan. 12. "They can score so quickly. We burned every timeout trying to stop their runs, and it still didn't work."

Added Oklahoma State coach Sean Sutton, who lost in Waco, 79-71, on Jan. 15: "Outside of Kansas, I think you have to look at their five guys as the best collection of guards in the Big 12.
"They can put so much pressure on your defense," Sutton added. "All five of those guys are capable of going out and scoring 20 points on a given night."

Baylor gave up second-half leads in its only two losses, to No. 8 Washington State and Arkansas. Against the Cougars, Jerrells and Dunn went down with injuries. Against the Razorbacks, Baylor shot itself out of the game by continuing to gun from 3-point range despite repeated misses.

The Bears have gotten off to a 3-0 league start with Jerrells locked in a five-game shooting slump. He has hit only 2-of-18 from beyond the arc (11 percent) in that stretch, missing 14 in a row at one point. But his teammates have picked up the scoring load. Chemistry is strong. So is leadership.

Carter was due to sub in for Dugat against South Carolina because Dugat was struggling. But after Dugat scored back-to-back baskets, Carter voluntarily walked back to the bench from the scorer's table and sat down.

"It's an unselfish group," Drew said.

Drew sold his players during recruiting on making Baylor an "elite Big 12 program." Still, Drew doesn't talk about the NCAA Tournament with his players.

"With inexperience, you tend to look at the big picture too much and look at things beyond your control," Drew said. "Every team wants the same thing – to go to the postseason. We've really tried to focus on the next game and stay away from talking about the tournament. So far, that has served us well."