For the rest of our Preseason Coverage – CLICK HERE
All this guy does is turn programs right round, baby, right round! Louisiana Tech was 12-15 in 1998, then Keith Richard shows up and goes 19-9 in 1999. ULM was 12-19 in 2010, then won only 24 games over the next 4 years due to some NCAA sanctions against the program for problems that occurred prior to Coach Richard’s arrival, and after the sanctions were lifted last year he won 24 games and made it all the way to the CBI championship series. Some people just throw their alma mater a few bucks around the holidays, but after returning to Monroe he helped rebuild the program from near-scratch, was named 2015 Sun Belt COY, and created a defense that did not allow a single opponent to score 75 PTS all season. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to chat with Coach Richard about dealing with sanctions and playing great defense.
As a player at (what was then known as) Northeast Louisiana in the 1982 NCAA tourney (the 1st in school history) you scored 4 PTS in a 7-PT loss to Iowa: what was the mood like in the locker room at halftime when you had a 1-PT lead, and what was the reaction like in the locker room after the final buzzer? I was the starting PG and it was the 1st time that our program had ever made the tourney, so it was obviously a great moment to get there and was a big deal. We played well in the 1st half and felt that we could hang with them, but our starting SG got poked in the eye and never really returned. It was disappointing to lose but still a good feeling to play well on national TV.
In the 1991 NCAA tourney as an assistant at your alma mater you lost to eventual champion Duke: where does that Blue Devils team of Grant Hill/Bobby Hurley/Christian Laettner rank among the best that you have ever seen? They were very good and 1 of the best of all-time, but we played well in that game too. They were very athletic on the wings even though Hurley/Laettner got most of the pub. Our wings were also athletic…but ours were 6’3” and theirs were 6’8”! Our starting PG Casey Jones guarded Hurley all night long, and after the game Hurley said some nice things about the job that Casey did.
In the 2002 NIT as head coach at Louisiana Tech, you had a 67-64 loss at Villanova: after winning your 1st 19 games that year when holding your opponents under 70 points, why were you unable to make it 20 in a row? I do not remember that game in particular, but we might have had a little foul trouble. We stormed back at the end and had a shot at the buzzer to tie it. That was probably my best team at Louisiana Tech, which was our 1st year in the WAC back when it was 1 of the best leagues in the country. Our team could have played in the NCAA tourney.
After winning a total of 24 games during your 1st 4 years as head coach at your alma mater, the NCAA lifted all sanctions against the program (due to previous poor academic scores that occurred prior to your arrival) and you were able to win 24 games last year: how big a deal was it to finally have a full slate of scholarships/practices/etc.? The scholarship reduction was the biggest deal to me: that is why the NCAA handed down such a penalty. Once we were able to get them all back over time it made a big difference. We lost 5 scholarships during my 1st 2 years, and you cannot hit a home run on every single recruit. You have to be almost perfect to succeed: that does not even count injuries/redshirts/etc. The 1st 3 years we would not even find out about how many scholarships we would get until May so we were really stagnant in recruiting, but we did a great job academically.
Your team ranked in the top-15 in the nation by allowing only 29.7 3P% and 38.8 FG%: what is your secret for having such a great defense? Recruit some long/tall players! When we 1st got our scholarships back we were so inept at so many positions and were not tall/athletic. The 1st thing I told my guys is that the only things we had to worry about were length/athleticism because we were getting killed by the other teams in our league. Last year’s team was the result of our recruiting efforts: across the back line we were 6’7”/6’9”/6’10”, which is pretty good for the Sun Belt. That allowed us to alter (even if we did not block) shots and then rebound them, and our guards could chase our opponent’s best perimeter scorer within their half-court offense. We did not make any great change in defensive philosophy: we were just a good defensive team.
You finished the year by being named Sun Belt COY: what did it mean to you to receive such an outstanding honor? The honor was nice but what was most pleasing to me was the fact that we turned it around on the court and our community really supported us. Our attendance improved throughout the year: our program won a lot of games in the 1980s/1990s but had fallen on hard times since then.
In the final game of the 2015 CBI you had a 1-PT loss to Loyola-Chicago: how close did you come to winning the game, and what did your team learn from that game that you think will help them this year? We had a near-capacity crowd in a white-out game, which is something that I have not seen since I was an assistant coach. Loyola is a very good team: we were very close to them in talent and we were both solid teams. Both of the games were close and each team had their moments but we just fell a little short. They had some of the best guard play that we had seen all year, so while I was initially disappointed, I was proud of our run in the CBI and having the 3rd-biggest turnaround in the country. It gave us a tremendous amount of experience and our confidence has really soared during our summer workouts.
You return 4 starters from last year: how crucial is all of that experience going to be to your team’s success? We have 9 guys returning from last year and 4 new guys, but what has stuck out to me is our returning players. In the past our new recruits looked better than our veteran guys, but this year the returning guys look better, which is how a program is supposed to be. They look like they belong and have talent, so they will be critical.
Your non-conference schedule includes games against Minnesota/Penn State/West Virginia: which of these games do you feel will present your biggest test? There is not 1 game that stands out, but we have a 7 or 8-game stretch that includes those 3 teams and several others, mostly on the road, so we will have to be ready to play and do so a little ahead of schedule. We also need to be patient regardless of how those games come out because I like our team and I do not want us to get sideways if that stretch does not go the way we want it to go. We just have to make sure we keep our heads up and keep getting better.
What are your goals for the upcoming season, and what are your expectations for the upcoming season? Going into last year we were picked 7th but I wanted to finish in the top half of the league, which I thought was a good goal for us and a good step in the right direction. This year my personal goal is to just have another “good season”, whatever that means, but I do not have a particular number of wins in mind. Obviously it would be nice to win a conference title but I just want to have back-to-back winning seasons. We have not done that here since 1994, which surprises a lot of people including me. Our program went to the NCAA tourney 5 times from 1984-1991 so I just want to build on what we did last year. We have to develop some winning consistency instead of just being a 1-year wonder and then dropping back into the pack. The players might say different things but I do not have a problem with that.