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Marketing and University Communication UW-Green Bay, CL 815 2420 Nicolet Drive Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 (920) 465-2626 E-mail: hildebrs@uwgb.edu Last update: 2/11/08 |
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In
the News Archive - Year:
February 7, 2008 The Long-Shot Coach By Karen Crouse
At the end there was much dancing, as the Washington State men's basketball team that is coached by Bennett defeated Oregon for the first time since 2001. For his parents, the result took some of the sting out of the Green Bay Packers' loss to the Giants in the National Football Conference title game that night.
Dick Bennett, 64, who began the reclamation project at Washington State that Tony has been entrusted with finishing, said, "For the W.S.U. fans who have been long-suffering, it was a really big win."
For Bennett, it was another peak in a roller-coaster ride that has recently taken a few precipitous dips. Since that victory over Oregon, the Cougars have lost their last two games — to California and Stanford — and three of their last four. After ascending as high as No. 4 in the national rankings on the strength of a 14-0 start, Washington State has fallen to No. 17 in the current Associated Press news media poll.
With two games at home this week — against No. 5 U.C.L.A. on Thursday and Southern California on Saturday — the Cougars (17-4, 5-4) have a chance to get back on track. In the competitive Pac-10, the Bruins have a one-game lead over No. 9 Stanford, with the next six teams in the standings separated by one game.
"We can't lose sight of the big picture," Bennett said this week in a telephone interview from Pullman, Wash. "Where we've come from to where we are now is still quite a jump." He added, "We were all sick when we dropped those games against Cal and Stanford. But we don't have time to lick our wounds with U.C.L.A. and U.S.C. looming."
Another week, another trip down a path that nobody, least of all Bennett, charted.
There was a time when following his father and older sister, Kathi, who coached Wisconsin-Oshkosh to a Division III national title in 1996 and Indiana to a Big Ten title in 2002, held no appeal to Bennett. In 1992, as a pure-shooting senior coached by his father at Wisconsin-Green Bay, Bennett confided to his roommate, Ben Johnson, that he did not know what he wanted to do after his playing career but he knew one thing for sure: he would not become a coach.
"I was like, that's the last thing I want to do," Bennett said. Johnson remembers the conversations they had on the subject. "We both vowed never to coach," he said. "We wanted nothing to do with the stress of the job and all the highs and lows."
Johnson laughed. As he spoke, he was standing courtside at Pauley Pavilion, U.C.L.A.'s home court, after a Cougars practice on the eve of their game against the Bruins last month. Somehow, some way, Johnson ended up as an assistant coach, and the 38-year-old Bennett is his boss.
After finishing college as the N.C.A.A.'s career leader in 3-point percentage at .497, Bennett, a 5-foot-11 guard, was drafted in 1992 by the Charlotte Hornets at No. 35 over all. He saw himself playing in the N.B.A. for at least 10 years, but he could not coax more than three seasons out of his body.
"People will never know how hard Tony worked to get to the N.B.A.," Johnson said. "It was an obsession. He worked so hard to get to that level, I think when he got there his body broke down."
A chronic foot injury kept him from playing for the Hornets for most of 1994-95. With an eye toward returning to the N.B.A., Bennett left for New Zealand in 1996 to play for the North Harbor Kings.
His second year there, he became a player/coach. Bennett got by with a little help from his wife, Laurel, whom he had met at church in Charlotte. Because it was hard for him to monitor everything as he ran the floor, he handed Laurel a notepad and told her, "If you see anything, jot it down."
In 1998, Bennett stopped playing for the Kings but kept coaching them. After the 1999 season, he returned to the United States. He agreed to become the manager for his father's Wisconsin team so that they could spend time together.
That season the Badgers advanced to the Final Four, and during the magic carpet ride that was the N.C.A.A. tournament, Bennett fell under coaching's spell. "It bit me a little bit," he said. "If that team hadn't been successful, I don't know. Who knows what I might be doing now?"
His father was known for breathing life into moribund programs. After winning 173 games at his first stop, Wisconsin-Stevens Point, Dick Bennett moved to Wisconsin-Green Bay in 1985. He guided the team to its first N.C.A.A. berth in 1991 with a team that included his son.
After guiding Wisconsin-Green Bay to two more N.C.A.A. appearances, he left for Wisconsin. In his fifth season there, the Badgers advanced to the Final Four. He resigned during his sixth season, citing burnout.
In 2003, Dick Bennett was lured back to coaching by the irresistible challenge of pumping life into a Washington State program that was coming off a last-place finish in the Pac-10. He took along his son, who served as an assistant the first year and the associate head coach the next two before taking over the program.
Bennett had a first-rate mentor in his father. In the late 1990s, Sports Illustrated polled 115 college coaches and asked them the question: "If you could go to one coaching clinic, whose would it be?" Dick Bennett tied for third with Bob Knight, behind Mike Krzyzewski and Rick Majerus.
Tony Bennett is similar to his father, but he is not his father's clone. Although he inherited his emphasis on defense, Tony Bennett is far less outwardly emotional. But Dick Bennett cautioned against being fooled by his son's benign appearance, saying: "I've seen him in practice unload. He's got that nasty side in him, that intensity that most good athletes and coaches have."
Johnson, who has been an assistant at Washington State since 2004, said of Bennett, who is called Coach Dreamy by his legion of female fans: "He's a hybrid of the N.B.A. meets college basketball meets George Clooney."
Washington State, which returned four starters this season, is a reflection of its coach inasmuch as it plays tenacious defense, shoots well from beyond the 3-point arc (41.4 percent in conference games) and shows great poise. In the 81-74 loss at U.C.L.A. that knocked them from the ranks of unbeaten, the Cougars fell behind by 11-1 but rallied, closing to within 3 points of the Bruins in the final seconds.
They fell behind the Ducks by 12-2 before pulling away to win, 69-60, leading Dick Bennett to say: "I sometimes question him on what's going on at the start of the game." He would like to see the Cougars be less like their even-keeled coach and more revved up.
Dick Bennett still marvels at his son's career arc. "I didn't think he'd go into high school or college coaching because he had seen enough of it," he said.
It was suggested to Dick Bennett that he was being hard on himself. After all, if he had made coaching look like pure drudgery, his children would surely have steered clear of the family profession.
Bennett laughed. "Either that," he said, "or they said, 'We can do better.' "
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