Lavin's fate depends on how ambitious St. John's wants to be
Steve Lavin Photo: Bill Kostroun
We know where St. John's will be heading in a couple of days - to Charlotte, NC, to an NCAA Tournament date with San Diego State, with a tantalizing rematch with Duke potentially lurking. But where is it going beyond that?
We know what the Johnnies are: a gritty team whose whole, as they say, is greater than the sum of its parts, dominated by seniors who want to keep their careers alive as long as possible. But here is something we don't know:
Is Steve Lavin in the same corner as those seniors, fighting to keep his eligibility intact, fighting to keep his career alive?
This would be an easier question, of course, if the past five years had been an abject disaster, if instead of three 20-win seasons there had been three 20-loss seasons, if instead of two NCAAs and two NITs the best St. John's had been able to do was buy its way into the CBI or the CIT for a token appearance.
It would be much easier, of course, if the past five years had been a runaway success, if there had been a couple of deep runs in the Big East Tournament, maybe a Sweet 16 appearance or two, if there had been nonstop success on the recruiting trail, if the future included a vast warehouse of talent to replace what's about to depart.
Such is the conundrum at St. John's, where Lavin has had a fine (though not fabulous) first five years on the job, where he has been a good (though not great) steward of the university's crown-jewel basketball program, where the next few days could (though in fairness they shouldn't) go a long way toward establishing Lavin's viability as the long-range keeper of the St. John's flame.
If it seems incongruous that we are discussing Lavin's future and his contract - which has one more year to run - on the doorstep of St. John's second NCAA bid in the past 13 years - both earned by Lavin - it actually is a good thing. After a long, sleepy era of irrelevance, St. John's matters again, beyond the finite borders of Union Turnpike and Utopia Parkway.
Part of that, yes, is this coincides with a profound downturn for the city's professional teams, but so what? Folks still author poems about the '84-'85 Johnnies, and they, too, took full advantage of a time when the Knicks were as unwatchable as the newest incarnation of "The Odd Couple."
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St. John's coach Steve Lavin exhorts his team earlier in the season.Photo: Anthony J. Causi
But part of it is that we have once again seen what a strong St. John's team can bring to the sporting cityscape. It's something that's been missing for so long, ever since the unexpected run to the Elite Eight back in 1999. That team, led by Ron Artest, fell three points shy of the Final Four and electrified the city. It was only 16 years ago. It feels longer than that.
Lavin deserves full credit for building the program back to where it can at least see those formerly glorious heights. But there remains a prevailing sense that the good Lavin has done should have been even better by now: more wins, more NCAA appearances, better recruiting classes, fewer non-qualifiers, fewer suspensions, fewer nights when he seemed perplexed diagramming Xs and Os.
What St. John's has is certainly better than what it's had. It was easy to fire Mike Jarvis, who pushed that '99 team and then opted for semi-retirement that invited chaos. It was easy to fire Norm Roberts, a good and decent man who restored much of the program's dignity but never could restore any of its glory.
Lavin? The only way it's easy for St. John's to squeeze that trigger is if it's prepared to back up such a transaction with a tangible assertion that it is forever abandoning its preferred status as feisty underdog and reaching instead for the hammer of alpha dog. Parting ways with a coach with Lavin's résumé is not unprecedented. Kentucky would do it. North Carolina has done it. Even Villanova, to name one St. John's contemporary, has shown the cold-blooded willingness to not let sentiment stand in its way.
Is that what St. John's wishes to be?
If so, there's nothing wrong with that, but then there needs to be instant upgrades across the board to its training facilities, to Carnesecca Arena, to its infrastructure, to every aspect of the basketball business plan.
It is a fascinating subject for so many people who care deeply about the Johnnies, who sport their St. John's gear all around town now, who fill talk radio and message boards like redmen.com with the kind of fervor and fury that fuel these splendid discussions. Funny thing, too: The most devoted diehards were doing that five years ago, too. It was just a smaller core then.
The last five years - Lavin's years - have grown that brand. Is that enough? Do you live with Lavin's shortcomings and with what inevitably will be a difficult period of rebuilding the next few years? Or do you hope - demand - for better than that?
St. John's has to figure out what it wants to be. Only then can it figure out what - and who - its head coach ought to be. For now, it's Steve Lavin. For now, that's good enough. Tomorrow and beyond? We will see.
http://nypost.com/2015/03/18/one-decision-st-johns-must-make-before-deciding-lavins-fate/
Steve Lavin Photo: Bill Kostroun
We know where St. John's will be heading in a couple of days - to Charlotte, NC, to an NCAA Tournament date with San Diego State, with a tantalizing rematch with Duke potentially lurking. But where is it going beyond that?
We know what the Johnnies are: a gritty team whose whole, as they say, is greater than the sum of its parts, dominated by seniors who want to keep their careers alive as long as possible. But here is something we don't know:
Is Steve Lavin in the same corner as those seniors, fighting to keep his eligibility intact, fighting to keep his career alive?
This would be an easier question, of course, if the past five years had been an abject disaster, if instead of three 20-win seasons there had been three 20-loss seasons, if instead of two NCAAs and two NITs the best St. John's had been able to do was buy its way into the CBI or the CIT for a token appearance.
It would be much easier, of course, if the past five years had been a runaway success, if there had been a couple of deep runs in the Big East Tournament, maybe a Sweet 16 appearance or two, if there had been nonstop success on the recruiting trail, if the future included a vast warehouse of talent to replace what's about to depart.
Such is the conundrum at St. John's, where Lavin has had a fine (though not fabulous) first five years on the job, where he has been a good (though not great) steward of the university's crown-jewel basketball program, where the next few days could (though in fairness they shouldn't) go a long way toward establishing Lavin's viability as the long-range keeper of the St. John's flame.
If it seems incongruous that we are discussing Lavin's future and his contract - which has one more year to run - on the doorstep of St. John's second NCAA bid in the past 13 years - both earned by Lavin - it actually is a good thing. After a long, sleepy era of irrelevance, St. John's matters again, beyond the finite borders of Union Turnpike and Utopia Parkway.
Part of that, yes, is this coincides with a profound downturn for the city's professional teams, but so what? Folks still author poems about the '84-'85 Johnnies, and they, too, took full advantage of a time when the Knicks were as unwatchable as the newest incarnation of "The Odd Couple."
Modal Trigger
St. John's coach Steve Lavin exhorts his team earlier in the season.Photo: Anthony J. Causi
But part of it is that we have once again seen what a strong St. John's team can bring to the sporting cityscape. It's something that's been missing for so long, ever since the unexpected run to the Elite Eight back in 1999. That team, led by Ron Artest, fell three points shy of the Final Four and electrified the city. It was only 16 years ago. It feels longer than that.
Lavin deserves full credit for building the program back to where it can at least see those formerly glorious heights. But there remains a prevailing sense that the good Lavin has done should have been even better by now: more wins, more NCAA appearances, better recruiting classes, fewer non-qualifiers, fewer suspensions, fewer nights when he seemed perplexed diagramming Xs and Os.
What St. John's has is certainly better than what it's had. It was easy to fire Mike Jarvis, who pushed that '99 team and then opted for semi-retirement that invited chaos. It was easy to fire Norm Roberts, a good and decent man who restored much of the program's dignity but never could restore any of its glory.
Lavin? The only way it's easy for St. John's to squeeze that trigger is if it's prepared to back up such a transaction with a tangible assertion that it is forever abandoning its preferred status as feisty underdog and reaching instead for the hammer of alpha dog. Parting ways with a coach with Lavin's résumé is not unprecedented. Kentucky would do it. North Carolina has done it. Even Villanova, to name one St. John's contemporary, has shown the cold-blooded willingness to not let sentiment stand in its way.
Is that what St. John's wishes to be?
If so, there's nothing wrong with that, but then there needs to be instant upgrades across the board to its training facilities, to Carnesecca Arena, to its infrastructure, to every aspect of the basketball business plan.
It is a fascinating subject for so many people who care deeply about the Johnnies, who sport their St. John's gear all around town now, who fill talk radio and message boards like redmen.com with the kind of fervor and fury that fuel these splendid discussions. Funny thing, too: The most devoted diehards were doing that five years ago, too. It was just a smaller core then.
The last five years - Lavin's years - have grown that brand. Is that enough? Do you live with Lavin's shortcomings and with what inevitably will be a difficult period of rebuilding the next few years? Or do you hope - demand - for better than that?
St. John's has to figure out what it wants to be. Only then can it figure out what - and who - its head coach ought to be. For now, it's Steve Lavin. For now, that's good enough. Tomorrow and beyond? We will see.
http://nypost.com/2015/03/18/one-decision-st-johns-must-make-before-deciding-lavins-fate/
