What's plaguing Memphis, and why they needed a two hours team meeting after losing to Georgetown

The final buzzer sounded at just past 9 pm ET as No. 15 Georgetown put the finishing touches on a 70-59 victory over Memphis at the Verizon center, wrapping up what was a crisp, two-hour basketball game.

It wasn't until 10:45 pm, however, that Memphis head coach Josh Pastner finally emerged from his team's locker room in the bowels of the Verizon Center. For the second time in the span of 10 days, the Tigers had a team meeting in an effort to cure what ails them, this one lasting just 15 minutes less than the game itself.

"We just had a team meeting and needed to air a few things out," Memphis head coach Josh Pastner said after the game. "It was the right thing before we got to Christmas break. It was a good open discussion. I love those guys, no one in there is happy to be 6-5. Have we played a tough schedule? Darn right. But we're too good to be sitting at 6-5."
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The hiring of Luke Walton is an example of why Josh Pastner will be successful

Josh Pastner is a smart guy.

Like really, really smart.

You see, after he failed to lure Tim Grgurich -- an NBA assistant coach -- to join his Memphis program, he found himself in a bit of a predicament. It was half past August, and Pastner hadn't completed his coaching staff. He went far enough to say that he was strongly considering heading into the season with just two assistants on his staff.

Just about everyone with an opinion -- and a venue to voice that opinion -- urged Pastner to hire someone. Anyone. We said that he should sign some shlep to go around the country sitting in high school gyms with a Memphis shirt on to "scout" the kids the Tigers were targeting. Gary Parrish went a step further by saying that Pastner should hire the father of one of those recruits onto his staff. Package deals are still alive and well so long as the new coach ends up as an official assistant coach.


Pastner did us all one better. He hired Luke Walton. As in the son of Bill, current Laker forward Luke Walton.

That's genius.

And that's why its tough to picture a future where Pastner isn't running one of the best programs in the country.

Purely as a basketball coach, John Calipari isn't great. He's very, very good, but he's not Dean Smith. Or Bobby Knight. Or John Wooden. He's not the kind of hoops tactician that can revolutionize how the game is played. Think about it like this: if your team is playing for the national title and you can pick any coach in the country to be on the sideline during that game, where do you pick Coach Cal? Off the top of my head, he's behind at least Tom Izzo, Mike Krzyzewski and Brad Stevens. Maybe Jim Calhoun and Jim Boeheim as well. Is he taken before the Roy Williams' and the Billy Donovan's off the world? Would you consider him a better coach than a Jamie Dixon or a Bo Ryan, the kind of coach that can win despite being as a talent disadvantage?

What makes Coach Cal so successful is his ability to recruit. And that ability to recruit at unheard of levels is a perfect storm of Coach Cal's moxie and salesmanship on the recruiting trail, the zealots that make up Big Blue Nation and pack every home game, and his NBA Draft track record.

More importantly, however, is that Coach Cal has embraced things that other coaches haven't. He's outspoken about the fact that he wants his players on a fast track to the NBA. He came up with the idea of holding a pro-day for the guys from his program that were considering entering the NBA Draft this past April. The two Kentucky Legends games that he scheduled last week were so popular that Kansas has decided to piggy-back off of that idea.

In other words, Coach Cal understands what kids want, and he is creative and innovative enough in his recruiting to build a unique pitch to the players he targets.

The apple didn't fall far from the tree for the guy that replaced Coach Cal at Memphis.

Pastner has built a coaching staff that would rival any in the country in terms of their NBA experience. Luke Walton has played alongside Kobe Bryant, has been coached by Phil Jackson, and has two rings and played in the NBA Finals four times. Walton, who will be able to break his contract with Memphis as soon as the lockout is over, is probably trying to prepare himself of a coaching career after his playing career ends (which could be sooner rather than later, as he has been banged up the last two seasons). Walton was also a member of Arizona back when Pastner was still a spritely young assistant coach in 2003.

But Walton isn't the only guy on the staff with NBA experience. Damon Stoudamire, who played in the league for 13 years, and Jack Murphy, who was an advanced scout with the Nuggets, round out his staff. At 37 years old, Stoudamire is the oldest member of the staff.

The kids that Memphis targets are, generally speaking, going to have the potential to be NBA players. They are going to be competing with the best programs in the country for kids like Will Barton, Adonis Thomas, Jarnell Stokes and Archie Goodwin. By putting together a young staff -- a staff with significant NBA experience and extensive first-hand knowledge of the pro game -- Pastner has built an innovative and fairly unique recruiting pitch.

Blue-chip high school players want to be turned from talented youths to successful pros.

Who better to do that than a 13-year NBA veteran point guard, a current NBA forward that has spent years learning from Kobe Bryant and Phil Jackson, and a guy that was paid to evaluate NBA talent for a living.


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Memphis, Josh Pastner avoid a violation

Josh Pastner and the Memphis Tigers sidestepped a recruiting violation over the weekend.

You see, while a longshot, Memphis is still in the mix for the Class of 2012's No. 1 recruit Shabazz Muhammad. But according to an interview with the Duke website Devil's Illustrated from the summer of 2010, Memphis was "calling and calling and calling" Muhammad. Since it was before the start of Muhammad's senior season, Memphis should have only been allowed to call Muhammad or his family once a month. Kyle Veazey of the Commercial Appeal explains:

Muhammad's claim that the Tigers were "calling and calling and calling" prompted a question from the NCAA's Basketball Focus Group, an arm of the enforcement division formed in 2008 to gather information and explore potential violations in the sport.

[...]

The U of M's most significant response to the BFG came in an Oct. 28, 2010, letter. In it, the school acknowledged its staff had made multiple calls to Muhammad's father, Ron Holmes. But since Holmes is a high school and AAU coach, the U of M says, the calls were permitted under a pair of two-decade-old interpretations of NCAA rules that allow calls to coaches who are parents if the calls are about evaluations and not soliciting the son to sign with the school.

The U of M said its staff wasn't talking to Holmes about Muhammad but about other prospects or topics.

Once again, we are given a glimpse of the inanity of the contact rules in college basketball. Memphis is quite obviously -- or was, at the time -- pursuing Muhammad. But since his dad is a basketball coach in the high school ranks, the Tigers (as well as any other team smart enough to find that loophole) had a way around that one-call-per-month rule.

The fact that Pastner was able to find that loophole before anyone else is a major part of the reason that he has proven to be a quality recruiter throughout his career as a coach. But the fact that such loophole's exist is a major part of the problem when it comes to the NCAA's rulebook. That rulebook is 434 pages long. There are thousands more rule interpretations that can be found in the NCAA's LSDBi database. The complexity of the NCAA's by-laws breeds the quirky loopholes that coaches have been exploiting for so long.

The arguments for changing the way the NCAA currently regulates contacting potential student-athletes have been so exhaustively written about, it feels silly to rehash them. But I will. Everyone has caller ID and no one has a problem with allowing a call to go to voicemail if you don't want to talk to that person. Everyone has unlimited texting plans. With smartphones that have email, facebook and twitter, there is no practical difference between a text message (which are limited by the NCAA) and an email, facebook message or direct message on twitter (which are not).

And the kids that are being recruited -- the 16 and 17 year olds on the cutting edge of technology -- are going to be the best at using these social networking tools. They can ignore a phone call with the best of them.

Hopefully, the NCAA follows through on their proposed changes to the deregulation of recruits communicating with coaches. (UPDATE: As Dan Wolken pointed out to me on twitter, in investigating these phone calls, the NCAA proved they didn't even know their own rule.)


Memphis also had to answer questions about how they were able to get Muhammad and current Minnesota forward Trevor Mbakwe on campus for unofficial visits, but no violations were found in either of those instances.
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Josh Pastner should fill his allotment of assistant's

This post can also be found at Beyond The Arc.

Josh Pastner would be foolish not to hire a third full-time assistant to his staff.

College basketball coaches are robots. Between the time they spend recruiting, watching film, designing practice schedules -- you know, doing the things that coaches do -- and making sure to spend time with their families, most of these guys are already running on a handful of hours of sleep a night during the season.

Pastner has a reputation for being a workaholic with an aversion to rest. If he decides to be the "head coach and assistant", as he told Jason Smith of the Commercial Appeal, it will be like setting the deck so the guy with the big stack of chips flops a full house.

"I'm not going to hire someone just to hire someone," Pastner told Smith. "If we've got to go with a smaller staff, we'll deal with it. Everyone's got to pick up more responsibility and get the job done."

I'm sure that the Memphis staff can manage building game plans and running practices and winning games without an extra member on the staff. But what about recruiting? During the season the season, the Memphis coaching staff still has to get out on the road and watch the kids they are recruiting.

Why not use that third assistant's position to hire someone strictly for recruiting purposes? He doesn't have to speak in practice. He doesn't have to help break down film. All he really needs to do is take four or five Memphis shirts on the road with him and show up at some high school games during the season. Let the kids like Jarnell Stokes or Archie Goodwin -- you know, those really, really good high school seniors that are considering Memphis -- know just how interested you are.

Not having that third assistant on the road recruiting during July already put them at a disadvantage. Its like playing pick-up at the park -- if you show up with three of your friends, you aren't going to play 5-on-4. You'll pick up a fifth even if he does look like this.

Gary Parrish has a better idea. He says that Pastner should hire the father of one of the recruits they are chasing. As long as it is to one of the three official assistant positions, its legal to hire a father to sign his son.

Either way, Pastner would be silly not to take advantage of that third assistant's spot.
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Josh Pastner doesn't want to play Tennessee

Josh Pastner made some waves on Monday during an interview he gave with Josh Ward and Will West on WNML-AM 990.

"I have no desire to play Tennessee," Pastner said. "I don't think it does us any good. I'm just being honest with you. For us, it’s a game that, I don't know why we play it, but we play it because the athletic director wants me to play it and he’s my boss and what he says goes."

After taking a three-year hiatus, the Vols and the Tigers have played every season since 2005-2006. They are currently scheduled to play this season and in 2012-2013, but beyond that the series is in doubt.


For Pastner, the issue comes down to recruiting. He wants to own Memphis, which is a hotbed of high school hoops. Proof? The YOMCA AAU program just won the 16U Peach Jam while the 17U team made it to the finals, where they lost to BABC and their seven high-major prospects. The current Tiger team has seven Memphis natives on the roster -- including star point guard Joe Jackson and starters Chris Crawford and Tarik Black -- while the jewel of their 2011 recruiting class, Adonis Thomas, is another hometown star.

Simply put, Pastner doesn't want to give Tennessee any kind of advantage recruiting the city.

And while that is understandable, in practice the Vols haven't had much success recruiting in the city. Only two players have signed with Tennessee from Memphis. One was Dane Bradshaw, a career-role player. The other was Chris Jones, who backed out of his LOI when Bruce Pearl was fired and is now headed to Florida to play at a JuCo.

Its silly to be arguing about this.

One game played every other year between Memphis and Tennessee in Memphis is going to have zero effect on recruiting. None. If a kid from Memphis -- which may be the tightest basketball community in the country -- really wants to play in front of Memphis fans, he will sign with Memphis. That's a fact.

But its also true that Tennessee and Memphis wasn't exactly a huge rivalry until Bruce Pearl and John Calipari came to town. Prior to that, the big game every season was against Louisville, when the two programs were bitter Conference USA rivals. That game has been renewed, which makes one wonder whether, with the loaded non-conference schedule that the Tigers always seem to play, the Tennessee game has become expendable.

It would be a shame to see a game as entertaining for the fans as Tennessee-Memphis is to be lost over recruiting issues.

But as long as the Memphis-Louisville rivalry continues, I'm sure that Tiger fans will be fine.
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Josh Pastner broke a rule recruiting Trevor Mbakwe

Trevor Mbakwe, a 6'8", 240 lb, power forward who has spent time at both Marquette and Miami-Dade CC, was supposed to provide Minnesota with some size, strength, and energy up front.

Mbakwe never was able to step on the court for Minnesota, however. You see, he is facing some pretty serious assault charges in Florida stemming from his time at Miami-Dade, and as they did with Royce White, Minnesota refused to allow him to play until the legal situation is cleared up.

His court date is August 23rd.

But that hasn't stopped Mbakwe from asking Minnesota for a release from his scholarship pending an NCAA waiver that would allow him to play elsewhere next season. One of the places he has been recruited by is Memphis, who will be loaded in the back court next season, but could use some front court depth.

Tubby Smith knows about this recruitment.

He also knows that Josh Pastner has committed a violation during the process.

You see, coaches are only allowed to watch recruits play at NCAA-certified events, events like Nike's Peach Jam or the AAU games being played out in Vegas this weekend. Mbakwe has been playing in the Howard Pulley Pro-Am in St. Paul, which he is allowed to do. But Pastner, on July 13th, went to see one of those games, which he is not allowed to do.

It is a relatively minor violation that Memphis has already reported to the NCAA and Conference USA. It seems to have stemmed from a miscommunication or a misunderstanding of the rules. Pastner called Smith to inform him of the violation.

I'd be surprised if the Tigers even got a slap on the wrist for this.

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Josh Pastner is addicted to his crackberry

Josh Pastner, despite having been a head coach all of one season, pulled in one of the best recruiting classes in the country.

Joe Jackson, Jelan Kendrick, and Will Barton headline a seven man class with three five star, two four star, and two three star recruits. Depending on how this group of kids can blend with returnees Will Coleman, Angel Garcia, and Wesley Witherspoon, its not impossible to think that the Tigers could make a run to the tournament's second weekend.

That's what a great recruiting class can do for you in this day and age. It can turn an NIT team into a contender to make the Sweet 16.

Geoff Calkins of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal shed a little light onto how Pastner was able to land that recruiting class. You see, Pastner had a daughter, Payten Sydney Pastner, last week.

And what did he do with his phone?

And, yes, to answer the obvious question. Pastner did take his cell phone into the delivery room. But he had it on vibrate. That's progress, right?

"I had to keep in touch," he said.

OK, but did you call any recruits?

"I did," he said.

So much for progress.

"I also told them where I was calling from," he said.

So that's how you do it.

Hopefully, when Payten gets old enough to google herself, she will understand when she comes across articles like this.
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Maybe Memphis won't miss John Calipari as much as we thought

Josh Pastner came into Memphis with the reputation of being a great recruiter, but this is starting to get absurd.

It started with Will Barton back in June, as Pastner went into Baltimore and snagged the talented 6'6" wing and his brother Antonio.

Next came point guard Joe Jackson, a Memphis native who was all but guaranteed to be a Tiger since the first time he picked up a basketball, who committed early in November.

Both Will Barton and Jackson are top 15 recruits nationally. Put them on the court with Elliot Williams, Will Coleman, and a healthy Angel Garcia, and you got yourself a top 25 team.

But Pastner was far from done.

No doubt Pastner is smiling after this past week.
(photo credit: The Hoops Report)

In October, another Memphis native, 6'4" swing man Chris Crawford who was an AAU teammate of Jackson, committed to the Tigers as well.

But the real fireworks started on signing day last Wednesday. The day kicked off with Pastner landing a commitment from 6'8" forward Hippolyte Tsafack before inking both Barton's and Jackson to their LOI's.

Then on Saturday, another top ten recruit, 6'6" wing Jelan Kendrick from Atlanta, called an impromptu press conference to announce that he had signed a letter of intent with Memphis. This was a big surprise to the recruiting world, as Kendrick had been emphatic that he was bypassing the fall signing period. But Kendrick played with Jackson and Crawford for the Memphis Magic AAU team that won the Adidas Super 64 tournament in Las Vegas, and was convinced by the success they had over the summer that he would have a shot at a national title.

Pastner still wasn't done. Just this afternoon, Tarik Black, a 6'7", 230 lb power forward out of Memphis that also happened to be a member of the Memphis Magic, announced his intentions to play for the Tigers.

All told, Pastner's recruiting class consists of three five-star, two four-star, and two three-star recruits. Assuming everyone returns to school, take a look at this line-up:

• PG - Joe Jackson
• SG - Elliot Williams
• SF - Will Barton
• PF - Tarik Black
• C - Will Coleman
• Bench - Angel Garcia, Hippolyte Tsafack, Jelan Kendrick, Antonio Barton, Roburt Sallie, Wesley Witherspoon, Chris Crawford
  

Pretty talented, huh?

Could the Memphis Magic Elite be the second coming of Michigan State's Flintstones?

With a roster depleted by defections and injuries, next season may not come soon enough for some Memphis fans.
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Joe Jackson to commit tonight

Well, that's at least what his facebook status is saying. And as you know, Jackson loves dropping hints on Facebook.

So where is Jackson headed? While his final three is coming down to Tennessee, Kansas, and his hometown Memphis Tigers, just about everyone believes he will spend next year playing for Josh Pastner.

Which begs the question, as asked by Gary Parrish: is there a better recruiter out there than Pastner? And yes, that includes John Calipari.

You see, if Pastner he will have two top 10 recruits from the class of 2010 committed to Memphis (the only school that can say as much), the other being Baltimore's Will Barton.

Now, I have been known to get a bit excited when it comes to exaggeration, but before any Kentucky fans out there disagree with me, remember this fact. Whether or not they have been scrubbed from the record books, Coach Cal has reached two Final Fours. His teams, especially of late, have churned out first rounders. Scandals and rumors aside, he is easily one of the top five coaches in the college game today.

Josh Pastner?

He's a 31 year old former assistant that has never been the head coach of a team. Ever. Not even a single game.

And he's on the brink of landing his second five star recruit for next season.

That's impressive.

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Will Barton commits to Memphis, Gary Williams loses another local stud

Since taking over the Memphis program in April, Josh Pastner has not had the easiest go of it.

First, John Calipari gutted the Tigers 2009 incoming class. Then, top 20 recruit Latavious Williams, who Pastner got to commit to Memphis, said he may be reconsidering his decision. To top it off, Shawn Taggart, who would have been the Tigers top returning scorer and a focal point of this season's offensive attack, decided not to return to Memphis for his senior season.

And need I mention this little SAT scandal?

Well, things may be turning around for Pastner as he got a commitment from consensus top 10 recruit Will Barton, a 6'6" wing from Baltimore and the top ranked shooting guard in the class of 2010.

Lake Clifton's Will Barton has committed to Memphis.
(photo credit: Baltimore Sun)

Pastner also got a commitment from Will's brother Antonio, another guard in the class of 2010.

While many assumed that it was a foregone conclusion that Will would sign with John Calipari at Kentucky, it seems that Pastner's interest in both Barton's was a deciding factor in their decision (Antonio is a three-star recruit). Barton, who commited during a visit to Memphis for the Tigers Elite camp, was scheduled to visit Kentucky next weekend, but the Wildcats staff had yet to offer a scholarship to Antonio.

There is more to this story, however, as Gary Williams lost another top-tier recruit from his own backyard. College Park, Maryland, is all of 20 minutes from Baltimore, where the Barton's hail from.

One of the more rampant internet rumors last season was that Gary Williams was on the hot seat at Maryland. He has had a string of seasons where the Terps performed below expectations for a team that reached two Final Fours and won a national title this decade. That, and a public tiff he had with his athletics department, seemed to signify that the end was near for Williams.

Williams cooled that talk momentarily as the Terps finished the year strong, making a push at the end of the season (which included a win over UNC) and eventually reaching the second round of the NCAA Tournament. But with Greivis Vazquez possibly staying in the NBA Draft and the odds of Williams landing Lance Stephenson (Maryland is on the short list of schools he is still looking at) looking slim, losing a recruit like Will Barton (who, like Stephenson, had Maryland on his list of possible destinations) is just another strike against the fiery coach.

The DC Metro area is a hot bed of college basketball talent. Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant, Michael Beasley, Ty Lawson, and Sam Young (and many, many others) all are originally from the area.

But Williams has been unable to land any of the top tier players from the region of late. While guys like Adrian Bowie (Greenbelt), Dino Gregory (Baltimore), and Sean Mosley (Baltimore) are all talented players capable of competing in the ACC, they are a far cry from being a national player of the year favorite (as Melo, Durant, and Beasley all were).

There is no question that Williams is a fantastic coach; you don't win a national title if you aren't. But great coaching only gets you so far in this day and age. The teams with the most talent, and thus the best recruiting, are the ones that put banners in the rafters.

Simply put, great coaching will win you a game (like Maryland knocking off UNC or Michigan State this past season). Solid coaching with an uber-talented roster will win titles.

Whatever the reason (some have speculated that it is the loss of assistant coaches like Billy Hahn), Gary Williams had been unable to land the star prospects in southern Maryland, and it could end up being his downfall.

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JOSH PASTNER LANDS FIRST RECRUIT: In today's Morning Dump, we linked an article that said that Latavious Williams, a top 20 recruit according to Rivals, would make his college decision today.

He did, electing to attend Memphis.

And if you believe Adam Zagoria, Lance Stephenson could be on his heels.

It is a big addition for Josh Pastner, who had the recruiting class he stood to inherit gutted by John Calipari. As it stands, the Tigers line-up will probably look something like this (assuming Shawn Taggart pulls his name out of draft consideration):

• F - Pierre Henderson-Niles
• F - Shawn Taggart
• F - Wesley Witherspoon
  
• G - Roburt Sallie
  
• G - Willie Kemp
  
• Bench - Latavious Williams, Angel Garcia, Doneal Mack
  

Jeff Goodman also expects Pastner to go hard after Noel Johnson, a top 100 recruit recently released by USC.

While Memphis looks like they are once again going to have issues on the perimeter, the Tigers will once again have an excellent front court. Expect another top 25 campaign and C-USA title in Memphis, especially if Stephenson and Johnson sign.

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