Colleges: ‘Eaters flying high
UC Irvine’s three-game journey through the CollegeInsider.com men’s basketball tournament, including Sunday’s semifinal at Coastal Carolina, will top the 12,000-mile mark.
Visits to Grand Forks, North Dakota, Lafayette Louisiana and Myrtle Beach, S.C. will collectively log a tad more miles than a round-trip commute from Irvine to Moscow, Russia.
But further success in what UCI Coach Russell Turner is calling the mid-major final four, would be yet another milestone along the road to the program’s remarkable resurgence under Turner and his staff.
The Anteaters (27-9), who took Louisville to the wire in their first NCAA Division I Tournament appearance last season, have produced program-bests in victories, national postseason tournament wins (two), nonconference triumphs (14) and road wins (12) this season.
UCI also shared the 2016 Big West Conference regular-season crown, after having won the conference tournament last season and the outright Big West regular-season crown in 2014. It also reached the conference tournament title game in 2013.
Also unprecedented are four straight national postseason appearances, including the CIT in 2013 and the NIT in 2014, as well as four straight seasons of at least 20 wins (92 in all during that span). The 2013 CIT first-round win over High Point was the program’s first in a national postseason tournament since 1986.
Turner, in his sixth season, continues to become more visible on the national radar, which keeps his name circulating in discussions about other coaching jobs. When Stanford, where Turner was an assistant under Mike Montgomery, hired Jarod Haase to take over for Johnny Dawkins on Friday, UCI supporters expelled a sigh of relief.
But rumors surrounding other openings, such as Pitt, continue to include Turner as a viable, even coveted option.
Turner had a widely publicized flirtation with George Mason after last season, which helped him get a contract extension and a healthy raise to remain at UCI through the 2017-18 campaign.
Turner is cautious about addressing the possibility of a move up the coaching carousel, instead choosing to relate prudent thoughts about his happiness at UCI and his optimism about continuing to build the program.
He was forthcoming Friday about having received inquiries of interest from other schools, and he politely declined an opportunity to guarantee he’d be back at UCI next season.
“I have a good situation here, I like my team and I like what is coming and that’s that,” Turner said. “I’m in a good spot.”
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•The trip to Coastal Carolina, on an approximate 24-hour turnaround since arriving home from Louisiana, puts Turner in a familiar spot.
“We have been traveling, but we’re on spring break, so we’re doing what every college kid does during spring break,” Turner said. “We knew we were probably going to play on the road in this tournament, so that’s what we’re doing. We’ve been to a couple places most of the guys on the team haven’t been. [Coastal Carolina] will be another one, though it won’t be for me. Myrtle Beach, S.C. is a place I vacationed every year as a kid. They call it the Redneck Riviera, so it will be fun to take our guys there for spring break.”
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•Turner is hopeful that 7-foot-6 junior center Mamadou Ndiaye, a first-team All-Big West performer and a two-time conference defensive player of the year averaging 12.2 points and a team-best 7.1 rebounds per game, will play after missing the Lafayette game with an injury to his left lower leg.
“He wanted to play in our last game and he was medically cleared to play,” Turner said. “But out of an abundance of caution, we didn’t play him. I wanted to make sure that things seemed exactly right and if that’s the case, then we may have him [Sunday].”
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•A victory Sunday would set up a title-game matchup Tuesday against either Columbia (23-10) or New Jersey Institute of Technology (20-14), who meet in the other semifinal on Sunday at Columbia.
Regardless of the matchup, UCI could receive a home game in the tournament that determines home sites after each round.
Attendance has been known to factor heavily into such decisions and UCI has an advantage in that department over both NJIT and the New York Ivy League school.
UCI’s average attendance in 13 home games this season was 2,979, and a more-robust 3,341 during eight conference home games. The Bren Events Center seats 5,000.
Columbia’s Francis Levien Gymnasium has a 2,500-seat capacity and the Lions averaged a mere 1,503 in 20 home games (2,248 in eight home conference contests). But in two CIT home games, only an average of 1,267 spectators have been on hand at a venue at which walls border both baselines.
NJIT plays at the 1,500-seat Fleisher Athletic Center, at which a wall is directly behind both benches and the scorer’s table, leaving no room for spectators on one side of the court. The Highlanders’ biggest home crowd was 1,383 for the CIT quarterfinal win over Texas Arlington on Thursday and its average home attendance in 18 games was 944, including a low of 400.
NJIT, however, has played all three CIT games at home, including wins over Boston University and Army.
Should the Highlanders face UCI on Tuesday, it will be slightly less imposing than its season opener: an 87-57 loss at Kentucky on Nov. 14.
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•Turner said he is gratified to still be competing into late March. But he was among those puzzled about not receiving a bid to the more prestigious NIT.
“I wasn’t expecting the NIT [after falling in the Big West Tournament semifinals to Long Beach State, which the ‘Eaters had swept in two regular-season conference games, including a 23-point trouncing at UCI],” Turner said. “But I was surprised that another team from our league [Long Beach State] was chosen in front of us. That didn’t quite feel right, but that’s the way the ball bounces. We’re thankful we were included in the CIT and we are where we are.”
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•Orange Coast College spokesman Doug Bennett said the school’s appeal of a one-year postseason ban for all sports in the 2016-17 school year will likely be considered when representatives convene at the governing body for state athletics’ annual convention Wednesday and Thursday in Ontario.
Bennett said the California Community College Athletic Assn. has yet to invite representatives from the school to present their case before the appeals committee, a decision at the sole discretion of the CCCAA.
