Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 8

MTOW: Then there was the charge that he was your friend, and we’ve gone over that. But did you reach out or contact, either directly or indirectly, other coaches before you made the decision to bring Jeff in here. Was he the only person that you considered?

RW: No we considered a lot of people. And let me clear up, Jeff was an acquaintance. He was not a friend, as I define a friend. We never did one thing socially together. Our wives never did anything together. I don’t know that they even knew one another. So we happened to be distant colleagues at the same school. But I don’t think I was ever in is office and he was never in my office. He may have known my name and I knew his name. But that was about as far as it went. The whole allegation that Jeff and I were good friends and Northwestern is just false. We were colleagues. We were acquaintances. We never did one thing socially together.

MTOW: So you did not make the move to not retain Dino Gaudio with the expressed purpose of going out and getting Jeff Bzdelik.

RW: Absolutely not, absolutely not. Once the decision to make a change was made, there were 10 people on our list. I think there were 10. It was eight to 12, somewhere in that vicinity, that we did extensive work on. So no.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 7

MTOW: To take a new direction, why not start completely over? Why retain some of the staff.

RW: They’re good coaches. And Jeff had complete latitude as to who he could hire. The only thing that I asked him to do was talk to our coaches. I told our assistant coaches that the new coach would talk with them, and interview them, but it was completely up to him whether he would hire them or not. I was not going to put any pressure on him whatsoever to retain the former coaching staff. And when he interviewed them, he came right down to my office and said `Jeff and Rusty are really good people and they are really good coaches. And Walt does a great job.’ So he didn’t hesitate to pull that trigger. He was really excited about them. And today he is more excited about them than he was then. So that has been a relationship that has really been built and continues to be built. They’re really good coaches. I think everybody in the country would tell you that Jeff Battle is a very good coach. And no one knows this, but Rusty had a chance to be an assistant coach in the NBA, and maybe the youngest assistant coach ever in the NBA. It was a long time ago, but the general manager of the Bulls called me and wanted to know how he could get Rusty to become an assistant coach rather than a player at 24 years old, or whatever it was. And he said `He’s going to be a great, great coach.’

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 6.

MTOW: So you see no connection between people not understanding the move in the first place to the reaction to what’s going on right now?

RW: I think it’s two different issues. I really believe that people who are saying they don’t understand the move last spring, if we were winning right now that would be different. You have to dig deep to determine `Is Jeff doing what needs to be done to build this program to where we want it to be?’ It goes much deeper than the embarrassing loss at Georgia Tech, or to the losses to teams that don’t have the names on the front of their chest that you would expect Wake Forest to lose to. It goes much deeper than that. I wish all of our fans could be exposed to the program and you and I are exposed to the program – have the opportunity to go to practice, see what’s going on at practice, have the opportunity to see the interaction of the players to the coaching staff, the relationships that are being built. I wish our fans could see that. Unfortunately, they don’t have that opportunity.

MTOW: Would you be in this situation right now, talking with me and talking post-game and having your fan forum, if it had been presented better in April. Do you think it went OK?

RW: I was honest. I don’t know. The fans will have to determine whether it was presented successfully. All I can be is be as honest as I can as to the reasons for decisions being made. I was. If that wasn’t good enough, I don’t know of any other way to do it.

MTOW: You’ve been here 19 years as an AD and in that time you’ve built up tremendous capital with your fan base, the way I see it. You hired and retained Jim Grobe and you got Deacon Tower built. I saw very, very little criticism of you at all. Did you recognize that you were going to have to invest, or spend some of that capital to make this move. Because again you weren’t getting rid of a coach who was 31-61. You got rid of a coach who was 61-31.

RW: I recognized that there would be some who disagreed with it. But again, I have to make the decisions that I feel are best for our program and university. So it didn’t bother me, or I shouldn’t say that. Everybody likes to be liked. But that should not be the purpose of our decision. The purpose of our decision should be something completely different from one’s person welfare in terms of being liked or not liked.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 5

MTOW: A lot of people have asked me why was Dino let go and I said `well, the basis of the decision that you gave was late-season and post-season performance.’ And I asked you this in April, Jeff’s late-season and post-season record was not good. At Air Force, the one year he made the NCAA Tournament he lost in the first round, to a higher seed. And the next year they were ranked and then they lost a bunch of games down the stretch and ended up in the NIT.

RW: And went to the Final Four of the NIT.,

MTOW: They did, but see there’s nothing there to pin that on. A plus B to me didn’t equal C.

RW: I understand why you can say that. His last year at Colorado, you look at the program that he built at Colorado, and when he went there it was a very difficult situation. Every year they improved. The last year, what did they win, four out of their last six conference games? This year they’re doing very well. He’s built three different programs. If you look at UMBC – and I know that’s a long time ago, but he was a coach and he went into a Division II program and he’s told they’re going to go Division I. He built a very good Division I program, but he left before he could reap the dividends of that program and what he put into that program. He was there at Air Force for two years, and as Gregg Popovich told me, they had the best two years at Air Force in the history of the school. And Gregg Popovich is an alum of Air Force, so he took great pride in that. I don’t know if I want to say he built that program. He had two very good years when they’ve not had very good years at Air Force. And then he went to Colorado, and he built that program too to the point that this year they’re pretty daggone good, and they’re potentially an NCAA Tournament team. He did the same thing at Denver, so I guess there are four places that he really built a program. At Denver, in his first year they won 16 or 17 games, whatever it was, and the next year he won 44. The third year they started out very well and were 13-9 and then went into a losing streak. I think he’s built four programs. I think he’s been a program builder. He’s not been around long enough to reap the dividends of what he established as the culture and the foundation. I’m convinced he’s going to be around here long enough to experience those dividends.

RW: I did ask you this in April, and you recognized this—that it’s a feeling or a hunch that you have to go on as far as his post-season performance. And what are you basing that hunch on, that feeling that belief that he will be the kind of coach whose teams will be better down the stretch? Because again I go back to that was the basis for you making the move away from Dino.

MTOW: I think if you look at Jeff’s record, that has been the tradition, that his teams continue to improve throughout the year. I think our team is improving individually more than as a team right now. I think we have individual players improving and we need to put it all together as a team. I think that has been Jeff’s history and there are many reasons for that, I believe. I’m not concerned when we are capable of really finishing strong and going to the tournament and being a factor in the tournament, that Jeff as the ability to lead us there.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 4

MTOW: Why did the culture have to be changed?

RW: I didn’t say it had to be changed. I said build the culture that will allow Jeff to be successful. Coaches build cultures that allow them to be successful. Other coaches may have had different cultures here that allowed them to be successful. What I am telling Jeff is don’t accept the previous culture, That doesn’t mean it was a bad culture. It simply means that it may not fit Jeff, and what we want is for Jeff to build the foundation and the culture that will allow him to be successful.

MTOW: Did you see Dino being able to build a culture that you wanted at Wake Forest?

RW: Dino built a culture that allowed him to be successful for Dino.

MTOW: But that was not the direction you wanted to go?

RW: I’d really rather not talk about Dino. I want to talk about what the future is.

MTOW: I think a lot of people did not understand why the move was made in the first place. That’s what I get from a lot of fans. And I base that on the fact that here was a guy who was 61-31, and that’s success. That’s how we judge success, by record. A lot of people don’t understand why the move had to be made. Are you hearing that?

RW: No, not at all. In fact I’m getting the opposite. When it is mentioned, and it is not mentioned often, it is `I understand the reasons for the change,’ and then they go on and make their statement about whatever they want to discuss.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 3

MTOW: The problem I’m hearing from readers is not the 0-5, but the degree of these losses. People don’t have any frame of reference in their experience of being a Wake Forest fan. Most of them weren’t around during the Bob Staak years. You have to go back to Bob Staak to have any frame of reference, to lose to the nonconference teams they’ve lost to, and the margin of the losses. You have to recognize that as well.

RW: It’s a fact of life of what we’re dealing with. It is the result of a number of things. It’s the result again, of losing your starting center, losing your starting point guard, having very few minutes coming back, if you will, and the fact there is a new system now too. So if you throw all that together, the inexperience, the number of freshmen that we’re playing, and a new system, maybe both on and off the court, that’s a heck of a transition for anybody to be going through, let alone an extremely young, inexperienced team.

MTOW: How has the reaction complicated what you and Jeff are trying to do?

RW: It doesn’t change what we’re trying to do whatsoever. It doesn’t alter the approach that we are taking, or that Jeff was taking. Sometimes you just have to have thick skin. If you know that you’re right, and you know that you’re building the type of program that will eventually be successful, and you’re willing to be patient – which I am – then it hasn’t changed a thing. There are things that it changes. I’m spending a little bit more time on my email, responding to fans. I’m talking to you right now. There are those types of things, so in terms of time, yeah there’s a little bit more time devoted to it. I’m probably spending more time with Jeff, just talking about things than I normally would be.  But it hasn’t changed the direction of the program. It hasn’t changed the belief in the program. It hasn’t changed my belief in Jeff at all. I am more committed to his system and program than I was at the beginning of the year when we were 0-0. You go to practice and I go to practice, and I see the types of practices that he runs. I see the relationships he has with the players. I see how they respond to him. All of that eventually is going to give us some real dividends.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 2

MTOW: What are you short-term and long-term goals at Wake Forest for the basketball program?

RW: First of all I think we need to recognize that Jeff has been dealt a very difficult hand. When you look at it, we lost our starting center. We lost our point guard. We have our point guard back now but it is the middle of January when he comes back and he’s a freshman. There’s going to be some growing pains with him as a point guard, but I think you can see there is great potential there too. As a result of losing your starting center, your starting point guard, we have a couple of people playing positions that they’ve never played before. They didn’t play these positions in high school. They didn’t play these positions in their college career. So that combination, just those four factors, center, point guard, center now that was recruited to play another position and a point guard – I think C.J. has done an unbelievable job at point guard for never having played there. He’s thrown himself into it. He’s giving his best effort. For never having played there he hasn’t gotten frustrated for having to play a position that is foreign to him. I think he’s done a commendable job. So all of that needs to be factored in. I asked Jeff the other day, what team in America could lose their starting center and their starting point guard, in all probability – even though he’s a freshman – and be very good. I don’t know of any. Those are the two most important positions in the lineup. So overcoming that would be a real challenge. Furthermore we’ve got a bunch of freshmen. Jeff doesn’t talk about that as an excuse. He talks about a young team. But we are really young. But beyond that we’re inexperienced. Even our veteran guys aren’t very experienced. If you look at statistics, we have the fewest number of starts coming back in the ACC. The only person who had started a game for us was C.J. So we tend to forget all that when things are going badly. We can’t forget that. That is a fact we are dealing with. So considering all of that, we’ve asked Jeff to build a foundation for future success, and build the culture that he needs to be successful in. That means building a culture on the court, and off the court. What are the expectations of the players? What does he expect of the players? And don’t back down from what your expectations are. Make sure you are true to your expectations, because what happens this year is going to be the culture of this program throughout Jeff’s career. And every decision that he makes needs to be for long-term success – not `I need this guy for this game so I’ll overlook that little faux pas or shortcoming.’ Deal with it. And he’s done a superb job of dealing with absolutely every issue that has come up both on and off the court.

Ron’s Take on the Basketball Program: Part 1

MTOW: So why did you invite me over to talk this afternoon?

RW: I just want to give my impressions of what is going on and why it is going on, and what our short-term and long-term goals are and our vision for the program. There are a lot of people who understand exactly what is going on. But a lot of the vocal folks don’t understand. So we just need to reach out to people and make sure that they understand that there is a process to this and we are moving in the direction that we feel is important.

MTOW: Do you believe the reaction has gone beyond what you might generally expect from the kind of start that you’ve had?

RW: It hasn’t been vicious or anything like that. Fans are passionate about their team and we want them to be passionate. As I’ve said many times, I would be much more concerned if I weren’t hearing every once in awhile from fans. Apathy is the worst thing that can happen to an athletic team. So no, it hasn’t been over the top at all. The fans who are concerned are reasonable in their approach, for the most part. So it’s not been anything that would be shocking or even surprising.

MTOW: How much of that is the specific issue, and how much of it is the times?

RW: I think it’s a combination of things. It’s the issue for sure. It’s the times when people feel that they have an avenue to express themselves and they seize that. And people are accessing blogs more than what they have in the past. A year ago, how many people read your blog? I didn’t hear anybody talking about your blog a year ago. I hear it now. So people have access and they have the opportunity to participate. It’s easy to participate. Just go to the blog and type a comment in. That’s pretty easy to do.

My Hour With Wellman

After Jeff Bzdelik met with the media following Wake’s 94-65 loss at Virginia Tech, he was walking down the tight corridors of venerable Cassell Coliseum with Ron Wellman by his side. I was walking behind the two, anxious to get to the Deacons’ locker room but not so anxious as to feel compelled to squeeze past them on my way there. I’m glad I didn’t, because the scene was worth the trip across Fancy Gap.

Bzdelik is clearly blue, his shoulders sagging and his head down. Wellman, talking with Bzdelik in low soothing tones, turns and gives his coach a literal pat on the back, bucking him up. It was a poignant moment of two men trying the best they can to get through the hardest of times. People can reasonably argue that the two men have made mistakes. People can argue Wellman didn’t hire the right man to replace Dino Gaudio. And they can argue that Bzdelik should have this team further along than it is.

That said, it’s at least clear to me that these two men are doing what they can to make the best of a really bad situation. Part of that effort has been the outreach to fans and media that Wellman has been conducting this week, the appearance with Stan and Dinger on the post-game ISP radio broadcast after the loss to Duke, the interview with me yesterday afternoon, the Fan Forum scheduled for noon Friday. He’s bucking Bzdelik and the program up, or at least attempting to. And personally, I always appreciate an opportunity to spend an hour with Ron Wellman and ask him some of the questions that you’ve been asking me.

The piece in this morning’s Journal, unfortunately, didn’t do justice to our conversation. Space is at such a premium that it forces me to condense and summarize to the extent that so much is lost. So that’s another way that the blog, which is not confined to the same space limitations, comes in so handy.

For the next couple of hours I’m going to be trotting out the interview verbatim, breaking it up into bite size pieces. I found it interesting. Hope you do as well.

Monday, January 24, 2011

How About a Chat?

Can’t imagine anything worth talking about pertaining to Wake sports these days, but if you come up with something please feel free to participate in the on-line chat scheduled for Tuesday at 1 p.m. I’ve done about four or five of them now and they’ve always been fun. If interested you can find the link to the chat on http://www.journalnow.com. Hope to hear from you tomorrow.