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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 11, 2009Michael TrangheseNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK JOHN PAQUETTE: A bunch of you have asked for a chance to talk to Mike and, you know, I thought this might be the best practical way to handle a lot of the stuff and talk to Mike about his last tournament here as Commissioner and, Mike, unless you want to say something. COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: Not really. I'll answer questions. Q. Mike, you went the other way after the ceremony at halftime in the first game. What was going through your mind when everybody was out there and all the ADs and everybody? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: Truthfully, to get me the hell off the court. I'm not good at that kind of stuff. People know me. I have difficulty -- I think I've spent my life trying to make things better for our coaches and our players so, you know, I have a lot of friends out there in particular our Presidents, to be there, meant a lot to me, for them at that time to do that. You know, I told myself coming here I wasn't going to get into this reflective mode. I don't want to get emotional about it because I don't want to take away from the tournament, because this has a chance to be, in terms of the level of play, as good a tournament that's ever been played in this building. In fact, I was talking yesterday to Louie Carnesecca and John (Marinatto) and Chris Mullin about the level of play. People say it's just the best year. To me, the best year is '85 because we're ultimately judged by what we do at the end of the year. But in terms of a level of play in the recent season, it's just been so many great games and so many players -- I think the reason is besides coaches, we've got so many four-year players in this league. You don't get a lot of four-year players. Take a look at the rosters of our teams, four-year players all across the board, and I think that's one of the big reasons why we are so good and why I think we have a chance to really do damage in the tournament. Q. Just put it harshly, will the tournament be a disappointment because the Big East Conference has been so strong? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: I never looked at it that way. I'd like to us win a championship because they're hard to win. I think we've got a number of teams that could win. It's not like I'm going to wake up and lose sleep over it. You'd be disappointed. I think we have teams capable. It's hard to win, but I just think we've got three of the best 7 or 8 teams in the country, so I think we've got a chance. I was talking to Jimmy Calhoun about it yesterday. It all depends. It's where you get matched, who you play. When you have big players like Thabeet and DeJuan Blair, wins become an important part. That's a big part of the tournament because you know when our teams come out on the floor they look and see three officials that they know. Trust me, our coaches know tendencies. They understand what officials might or might not do and you get in the NCAA tournament, you're seeing people you've never seen before. If you ever talk to coaches, that's one of their great, great fears is when -- I've seen it. I'll go see a coach before the game, and it's like Bobby Huggins getting ready to play Duke. I go back to him and he says, "Look, who are these guys?" He didn't know. Bobby did not know who they were. I said, "Bobby, he's from the PAC-10, he's from here." "Oh, God", he said. "That's it, Bob, don't worry about it." Q. Mike, you mentioned 1985. That year the Final Four, was that the year that you knew and maybe Dave knew this league had made it, it or was it even before then? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: No. This sounds crazy. I mean Kevin McNamara and Billy Reynolds from Providence are here. Dave Gavin was the smartest man I've ever been around. Before the league formed in -- we had talked about it for so long and just, you know, I said, "Dave, why don't you do it?" He said, "The time is not right, but when we do it we've got a chance to be really good." I think the only question was, is it going to take two years, three years, four years? I saw the look in Dave the day that Patrick Ewing announced he was going to Georgetown. We're going to New York now and now we're going to be good. You can't predict '85. It hasn't happened since. It may never happen again. Getting three teams in the Final Four is just -- it's incomprehensible to me. I know how hard it is. The thing that amazed me about that, most people forget, Boston College got beat in the semi-finals in overtime by a point by Oklahoma with Waymon Tisdale. If they had won that game, I bet my life they would have beaten Memphis because when Villanova played Memphis they pressed and trapped, and Memphis turned the ball over a sill I don't know how many times. Boston College was a better trapping and pressing team than Villanova. Gary and I talked about it. We went ahead might have had four teams. You go back and look at Georgetown and Villanova and St. John's. They came very close to losing on the way there. You got to get lucky, make a free throw, somebody blows a whistles; it goes your way, it doesn't go your way. Q. You're not going to get totally away from the Big East. I'm guessing you're going in the crowd now and then? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: I'm a fan. That's what my wife asked me. "Do we still get tickets?" I say, "Yeah, we'll be okay, we'll get in" (laughter). Q. Coach. Given the wear and tear and the grind, maybe about teams going forward in the post-season, is that a problem? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: You're playing here on Saturday, home Saturday night. That's why we moved this tournament back to Saturday. That's one of the things that people forgot. You don't have any idea what a dogfight it was to get this tournament back to Saturday night. One of the things I'm most proud of. We were playing on Sunday afternoon and our Presidents were talking about the inconvenience of the fans. I said we have to get back to playing it Saturday night to give our teams another day of rest but I wanted to play at night in this city because there's nothing like Friday and Saturday night in the city. That was also the same year that we went to the ESPN and got our tournament from start to finish on ESPN. First year we did it was '96. We get the Allen Iverson, Ray Allen final. One of the four, five best games ever played in this tournament, Mike so, yeah, kids are pretty resilient, though. Give them two days off, they're ready to play. Q. Mike, what challenges does the Big East face as you leave, that are the challenges of the future? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: Well, we're so big that we have to pay attention to the size of our membership because every time somebody talks about expansion they seem to have their eyes towards us. Plus, we have schools that play football, big time college football and schools who don't and therefore their days and times can be different. I think in reorganizing we've done a great job of really integrating our people. Today, we had a Presidents' meeting, all 16 schools. I can tell you we spent 40 minutes today talking about the whole championship series. We've really made a concerted effort to take our football issues and talk about them in front of everybody. The thing that's interesting it's really helped -- really allowed our so-called non-football playing schools to feel more engaged. We don't have clandestine meetings. You got to work at it. John knows this is the biggest challenge. Our size is a challenge. But, you know, our coaches, you all hear they complain it's too hard, it's too big. I tell them, there are a lot of benefits to it. We're the conference in this building playing. It's the best tournament in the country because it's in this building, in this city. Nobody else has that. Coaches are talking about splitting. I told one of the coaches, fine, where do you think you're going to go play your tournament? Why don't you go play in Cleveland if you want? They're going to lose that. Secondly, they all complain we're getting unbelievable players. It isn't by happenstance. Louisville is coming in here now, Marquette is coming in here, you know, and the old standbys, Villanova and Georgetown are still here. We're so good and competitive. The thing that's struck me the most and I don't think the coach will admit it, I think they are scared silly because if they slip, they're not going from 1st to 3rd, they're going from 1st to 8th or 9th. I think they're scared and work harder than they ever worked. They know if they slip up what's going to happen. It's driving us to recruit better. We have great players coming into this league next year. This is like the third, fourth year we're bringing in players and, you know, we still have to recruit against the Carolinas and the Dukes and that's hard a lot of times, once you get past those couple of schools. I mean we're beating people for players. It's hard for people to come in this city now and get players out of this city. It's because of all the our people here. Every 10, 11, 12 year old kid is watching us. For those of you who aren't New York, we've all struggled with what I call a season-long presence in New York. This deal we made with SNY, I'm so pleased with that deal and basically people talk about the Big 10 television network. We've got Georgetown, a Big East network in New York City. We had 80 basketball games on, 25 football games on. This is what's going to influence young kids to play in the city. Where do they want to go? Why would you want to go anywhere but in this darn building and play? I think we're starting to see the benefits of that. JOHN PAQUETTE: Cleveland is a very nice city. Q. Mike, I was just wondering if could you give us an update on where the bowl stuff stands right now. COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: Close to getting it done. I don't know what I want to tell you because, you know, I haven't even told our people much. I just said trust me, you know. We're working at it. You know we're in the middle of this basketball tournament but we're talking to a lot of people. In fact, we've got some of our bowl partners here as guests. Football teams do come to Madison Square Garden. Q. I just wanted to go back to the New York issue. How important is it for the future of this league for schools like St. John's and Seton Hall to up their level of play and success? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: I think it's important for them. First of all, I think it helps us. The better we get in New York -- my theory in New York is the better the teams in New York are, translates to more ink for the Big East Conference in New York. That's always been the way. Because you struggle for space in New York because of the competition with the pro league. Nothing is perfect but -- we're not going a away because the New York teams haven't won a high level. It clearly would help if all of a sudden there was a significant improvement in the three metropolitan programs simply because we're in the media capital. It would help. Q. Mike, throughout your history in the Big East, you have a favorite team and a favorite player? COMMISSIONER MIKE TRANGHESE: Chris Mullin was always my favorite player. The thing I loved about Chris is when he played -- John and I talked about it. I mean earlier in the year I heard people talk about how physical the Pitt-Connecticut game was. What I really wanted to do was bring everybody back about 20 years ago, come in this building when Georgetown with Patrick was playing St. John's with Chris and everybody else. Those were physical basketball games. The thing I admired about Chris, he used to get the crap kicked out of him every night by everybody. In four years of watching Chris Mullin play I never saw him complain or whine. He was my favorite player. Not the best player. The best player and most influential player in this league was Patrick. Favorite teams? I don't know. I loved the Seton Hall team in '89 because I was a staffer and traveled with them. I cried after that game for P.J. because we got -- I think they got a bad official call at the end of the game. What I admired most about P.J., who I love to death and all the years I've known P.J. never once have I heard him complain about the call. Never once. I never heard him talk about it, I never heard him complain about it. It was a tough call. John (Paquette) was there at Seton Hall. He and I talked about it, but P.J. doesn't. I think the Providence team in '87 -- I'm very bias about Rick Pittino. I think it's a flat out joke the last two years of the Hall of Fame voting that Rick Pittino hasn't been a finalist. It's dominated by the NBA. You look at Rick's history of accomplishment, three teams in the Final Four, three different teams, National Championship and also when the 3-point line was introduced in 1987, virtually every coach in the country said this is the dumbest rule we've ever seen. The coach that embraced it and utilized it and made it part of the game is Rick Pittino. He took the Providence team to the Final Four and I will tell you that is by far the least talented team to ever make the Final Four in my lifetime. There was not a lot of talent on that team. It was because Rick embraced it. I think that, you know, he was in the NBA so you get this -- he wasn't successful in the NBA. He wasn't an unsuccessful coach. He was an unsuccessful General Manager. There's a distinct difference. I also remember '84, the -- '85 the thing I also remember is when Villanova won the National Championship, the first people to congratulate the Villanova people were the Georgetown people. John (Thompson) and Frank Rienzo and all those people. Those are the kind of things that I remember. JOHN PAQUETTE: We're getting close to the game time. End of FastScripts |
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