The Celtics may be sitting atop the NBA standings, but the college basketball teams in Boston have had less success this season. Northeastern is sitting in the middle of the pack in the CAA, while BU and BC are struggling to stay out of the cellars of the Patriot League/ACC respectively. For those of you who forget the glory days of college hoops in Beantown we have a book for you to add to your winter reading list. “Boston Ball” by Clayton Trutor tells the story of 3 future Hall of Fame coaches (Jim Calhoun at Northeastern/Rick Pitino at BU/Gary Williams at BC) who all began their legendary careers in the same town at the same time. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to chat with Clayton about whether Boston is a pro or college sports town and the importance of recruiting.
Your book is about a trio of future Hall of Famers (Jim Calhoun at Northeastern/Rick Pitino at BU/Gary Williams at BC) who all became head coaches more than 40 years ago and unknowingly invented “Boston Ball”: was it just a coincidence that they all employed a similar style at the same time in the same city, or do you think there is something more to it? I think it is largely coincidental but 1 think that they all excelled at recruiting players capable of playing fast. These schools weren’t landing the era’s top big men like Bob Lanier or Bill Walton. These coaches had to build the game around speed.
Do you feel that the success of these 3 future national champions was based primarily on their coaching ability, or their recruiting ability, or their desire to embrace the 3-PT shot, or other? The three-point shot came a bit later. Pitino embraced it thoroughly at Providence to deal with his team’s size disadvantage. This was like his adoption of the press at BU to fend off larger opponents.
What role did the “Pittsburgh Connection” have on the success of any/all of these coaches? They were all excellent recruiters, but the Pittsburgh Connection was a Northeastern phenomenon. A Northeastern alum was part of the Pittsburgh’s “Upward Bound” program and helped send players east from Pittsburgh. The Huskies got many of their top players during that era from Western Pennsylvania, but after Calhoun left for UConn in 1986, it seems to me that John Calipari, a Pittsburgh guy, got a lot of those guys at UMass. Pitino was able to head north and find players in Canada. Gary Williams had a recruiter named Kevin Mackey who brought in several future NBA players from Connecticut like Michael Adams and John Bagley.
What impact did Howard Garfinkel’s 5-Star Basketball Camp have on Pitino as a player/coach? It is hard to find a coach who is more defined by his relationship to Five-Star than Pitino. He went there as a teenager when it was held in the Poconos. He was part of the Five-Star family, and it later gave BU legitimacy as a basketball school.
How did BC basketball survive the roller coaster of joining the Big East in 1979 followed by the revelation of the point-shaving scandal in 1980? The “Anatomy of a Scandal” piece in Sports Illustrated came out in February of 1981. It involved three players who were all gone by 1979 and none of them were recruited by Davis or Williams. Their teams kept put their heads down and went to 4 Sweet 16s in 5 years while winning a pair of Big East regular season titles. I never got to interview Tom Davis, but my impression is that it had a tremendous impact on him. One of his players (Rick Kuhn) was severely punished and sentenced to 10 years in prison, which seems to be one of the reasons that Davis left BC in 1982.
How hard was it to get African-American players to come to Boston so soon after the city’s notorious busing crisis of the 1970s? I think that it was very difficult and had a significant impact on recruiting at all of the schools. Gary Williams said that even if the players did not recall the busing crisis their parents certainly did. There were fears about what they would encounter, and some guys were afraid of straying too far off the beaten path.
How did Bostonians feel about their local high school talents (like future Georgetown star Patrick Ewing) who decided to go to out-of-state schools? It depended where you were: the people in Cambridge did not necessarily t have any affiliation to BC or BU. Boston is thought of as a “college town” but it is not a typical college town because there is not one school that dominates the landscape. Boston has a lot of colleges that appeal to students and alumni, but everyone agrees that it is a pro sports town.
How did those school gyms of the 1980s compare to those of today? BU and Northeastern are still playing at the same gyms. BC went from the Roberts Center, a place that several of my interviewees described as feeling like a “bowling alley” to Conte Forum. It does not have great sight lines and is not a particularly intimate setting. It is very much a multi-purpose arena.
How did the basketball coaches feel about being at schools known more for other sports like BC (football) and BU (hockey)? I think it had the biggest impact at BU. Jack Parker’s BU hockey team won several national titles and had the two most significant players on the 1980 US Olympic hockey team (Mike Eruzione and Jim Craig).
Who do you consider to be the best Boston player from that era: Michael Adams/Reggie Lewis/Gary Plummer/other? I would take Reggie Lewis. I asked people at Northeastern about him and they said that from the first time he stepped onto the court they knew that he would become the greatest player in school history. Michael Adams, John Bagley, Gary Plummer, Tony Simms, Mark Halsel and so many others were great, but I think Reggie was the most outstanding player, which is why I wanted him on the cover of my book.