It has been 15 years since the Rattlers made the NCAA tourney but they had a nice stretch back in the day when they made it 3 times during a 9-year stretch from 1999-2007. The coach responsible for 2 of those 3 tourney appearances was Mike Gillespie, who led the 2007 team to the school’s 1st 20-win season in almost 2 decades. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to chat with Coach Gillespie about playing for a Hall of Fame coach and winning an NCAA tourney game in 2004. Today is Coach Gillespie’s 71st birthday so let us be the 1st to wish him a happy 1!
You played basketball at DePaul for Hall of Fame Coach Ray Meyer: what made him such a great coach, and what is the most important thing you ever learned from him? My dad played for Coach Meyer in the late-1940s: he was a really good player. I actually started at NC State for 1 year before transferring to DePaul. Ray was a tremendous teacher of fundamental skills: the 1 thing I learned was his attention to detail in teaching.
1 of your teammates was future NBA 1st round pick Bill Robinzine: was he the best teammate you ever had? Bill was a heck of a player but was never recruited. His dad also played at DePaul…but Bill Jr. was actually there on a band scholarship! He really blossomed during his sophomore year and was an unbelievable athlete. In 1982 he committed suicide in his car, which was very sad.
In 1991 you became coach at Tallahassee CC, where you went 258-56 in 10 seasons including back-to-back 30+ win seasons in 1996/1997: how were you able to be so successful, and what is the biggest difference between JC basketball and D-1 basketball? I started the program from scratch: no ball, no uniforms, no nothing. We were nationally-ranked during each of my 10 years there. I wish I could say that it was the coaching but I was blessed to have some really good players.
You moved to Florida A&M in 2000 despite the fact that the school had suffered through many scandals, and you ended up working for 5 presidents and 5 ADs during your time there as coach: why did you decide to take the job, and what impact did all of those administrative changes have on your program? Before I got there they had 11 straight losing seasons as well as a low graduation rate. It was always my dream to be a D-1 coach and I did not have to move because I was already in Florida. I had to bring in around $300,000 each year so our non-conference schedule was full of “guarantee games” that we just did not have a chance of winning.
Take me through the 2004 NCAA tourney:
Terrence Woods scored 21 PTS in a win over Lehigh: what did it mean to you to win a game in the tourney? To be the 1st coach in school history to win a tourney game was an amazing feat. We entered the conference tourney as the #5-seed and then Terrence hit a shot at the buzzer for a 1-PT win over Hampton en route to being named conference tourney MVP. I honestly thought we were better than Lehigh and it was a great thrill to beat them on national TV.
Woods scored a tourney-school record 24 PTS in a loss to #1-seed Kentucky: did he just carry your entire team that season, and what was the reaction like when you got back to campus? We went to the shoot-around in Columbus…and there were about 15,000 Wildcat fans in the gym. It was 60-52 at the half, which was the highest scoring 1st-half in tourney history. Terrence got knocked down after every shot and was dehydrated at halftime so he only made a couple of shots in the 2nd half. We were a 30-PT underdog but only lost by 20. Coach Tubby Smith later told me that the reason his team was upset by UAB in the following round is because they spent so much energy trying to beat us.
What are your memories of the 2007 NCAA tourney (Clif Brown scored 32 PTS including a career-high 6 3PM in an 8-PT win by Niagara)? We won our conference tourney after tourney MVP Brian Greene converted an alley-oop in the final seconds to beat Delaware State. The NCAA had a rule that we could not play against a team we had already played that year. We had played #1-seed Florida in December so they put us in the play-in game against Niagara that Tuesday. We never even got to step on campus to enjoy the win and just ran out of gas. I had 8 guys from Chicago so I wish they would have sent us to Chicago to play Kansas.
You were twice named MEAC COY: what did it mean to you to win such outstanding honors? It is nice to be recognized by your peers, especially when you fight and battle. I was proud to represent the school.
In 2007 you were hired to be coach of the Jacksonville Jam of the Premier Basketball League, but the owner suspended operations in February 2008: why did you take the job, and how did it feel to get shut down before you could really get going? We played 9 games after starting practice in November. We only had 1 player get paid during the season but not a single guy quit the team. The league itself suspended play and the owner did not get the financial backing he had hoped for. I was lucky to have such loyal players.
You have been running basketball camps for over 30 years: what makes your camp different from other camps, and what do you hope to do in the future? I teach skill development and spend an unbelievable amount of time trying to study the game even though I am over 70. I want to give the kids the utmost attention to details to help them become the best players they can be. I love to teach/coach, which is what I have been doing my whole life. My dad Gordie was the all-time winningest coach in the history of college baseball (1893 wins) and was still coaching at St. Francis (IL) at age 85!