University of Minnesota Athletics
Pitino Blog: Back to School
9/14/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Good morning Gopher fans,
This time of year is always one of my favorites. I love being able to make it to as many Gopher football games as our schedule allows us to. Not to mention the opening of US Bank Stadium and the hosting of the Ryder Cup at Hazeltine will be fun for everyone. The Twin Cities will be on full display for the whole country to see. It's amazing some of the sports venues we have locally. Of course I will always be biased to Williams Arena!
We have had two one-hour practices so far since school has started. NCAA rules allow us two hours of basketball a week per player and six hours of strength and conditioning. Once September 30th hits we can practice and strength train 20 hours a week. Our strength coach Shaun Brown will have a different roster to deal with this season than last year. We are much bigger and stronger than years past. We will play inside to out a lot more this year than last season. I have a feeling our front court with be tough to handle. Along with two hours of practice, my staff and I will travel around the country and do in-home visits as well as bring recruits to campus for official visits. Recruiting continues to go well. Our staff did a great job with bringing in Michael, Eric, Amir, Brady, Akeem, Reggie, and Davonte. With limited scholarships it's important to get the right fit to build off of last year's great class as well as complement a team that only has two seniors in Darin and Akeem.
Before we move forward I have to give props to our guys for the great job they did this summer in the classroom and in the community. They had a team GPA of a 3.2 and our freshmen obtained a 3.8 in the classroom. Dupree McBrayer was also named Student Athlete of the Month. I'm very proud of our players to say the least.
This summer we launched a new program that we called Gopher P.R.I.D.E. (Personal Responsibility In Developing Excellence). We came up with this program as a way to educate our student-athletes more about a variety of topics on and off the court. Speakers consisted of Walter Bond, John Thomas, Sandra MacDonald, Target HR employees, members of the Aurora Center on campus, Kris Humphries and Kevin Eastman. We will continue to bring speakers in this fall to impact our team. They also have participated in several community service opportunities locally. I was especially proud of our players' behavior at the Create a Memory Foundation at Target Field In August. Before we arrived we asked our players to stay and few hours and engage in the kids. They stayed all night, much longer then we required, and participated in games with hundreds of underprivileged kids in the Twin Cities. Coach Kevin Eastman, former assistant for the Los Angeles Clippers and Boston Celtics was our most recent speaker. It was great to see our guys locked in and taking notes the whole meeting. These guys are very eager to learn and grow. Coach Eastman said several times, "the best are the best for a reason." I also loved his message about not being interested in talking about where he has been, but more importantly, excited about where he is going as a person. Hopefully that message sunk in.
We recently released our full schedule for our fans to see. A common theme we heard was that our fans wanted more marquee games at Williams Arena in the nonconference. I am excited to say that Arkansas and St. John's are two historic basketball programs who will visit the Barn in November. We also travel down to Tallahassee to play a talented Florida State in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge. A game I really enjoyed playing last year was at the Pentagon in South Dakota. We will play a very talented Vanderbilt team there on December 3rd. It's a great opportunity for Gopher fans who don't get to come to campus to see us play. It's an awesome environment!
Of course our conference schedule is always extremely challenging. Opening with four of six on the road will be daunting. The key, as always, is protecting our home court. Let's get back to making the Barn one of the most feared places to play in the Big Ten. It's our responsibility to give our loyal fans something to be proud of again. Many stuck by us last year. That is something we greatly appreciate.
Two new guys who I was unable to evaluate in the summer time were Akeem Springs and Reggie Lynch. I expect both to make an immediate impact. Reggie catches everything down low. He has a very unorthodox but effective offensive game, as well as great shot blocking timing. I am very excited about Akeem Springs! When I explain certain things to him in practice he picked it up like a pro. He's older, experienced and has a Big Ten ready body. Both Reggie and Akeem should play major minutes.
I try to hold back and contain my excitement for this team because I know talk is cheap. I would prefer to let our performance on the court do the talking. With that being said I find it extremely difficult to not dream big with these guys. We have the talent, size, length, and experience to make noise in this monster of a conference. We know last year was unacceptable on and off the court and we are confident this will be a major step forward. It is my responsibility to get this done. I welcome the challenge!
We are looking forward to working with the great producers of our in house Raise the Barn series to provide an inside look into our program this fall. They do an unbelievable job. We are trying to be as creative and innovative as possible. Should be a lot of fun to see what ideas they come up with.
I am excited to announce the hiring of Ed Conroy, formerly the head coach of Tulane and Citadel. Ed is a basketball lifer who has 26 years of coaching experience. He will be great for staff chemistry with Kimani, Ben, and Ryan as well as provides a different perspective that will be helpful for me on a daily basis.
We are also excited about playing in US Bank Stadium next year. That will be a great opportunity for our team, as well as our fans to watch us play in one of the nicest stadiums in the country. Speaking of nice facilities, it has been fun watching Athletes Village grow right in front of our eyes. I have a great view outside of my office and I can say it's going to be a game changer. Every program is going to be impacted immensely. Recruits have been blown away by the renderings.
Basketball season is around the corner. Stick with us Gopher fans. Brighter days are ahead!
Go Gophers,
Richard Pitino
