A Speedy bit of serendipity turns Jenkins' draft night memorable

What was supposed to be the most festive night for Hofstra basketball in the last 10 years was turning into the most disheartening evening since Selection Sunday 2006. A crowd of several dozen, including most of Mo Cassara’s staff and returning players, gathered at Bogart’s, err, Bar Social for the NBA Draft and to celebrate the first round selection of Charles Jenkins.

Except…it didn’t happen. Those in attendance crept closer to the television and the silence leading up to David Stern’s announcement grew more anticipatory with every post-lottery pick, and the groans grew louder and more desperate every time a team took someone else. By the 27th pick, Jenkins was the best player remaining on the board, according to Jay Bilas (grrr), but he went unselected by the Nets, Chicago Bulls, the San Antonio Spurs and the Bulls again—even though he worked out for the latter two teams and both were enamored with him—as the first round ended.

The crowd began thinning out in a hurry once the first round ended. The impromptu draft pool—in which attendees picked Jenkins to go anywhere from 15th to 42nd—was abandoned. The picks began arriving at a faster pace, announced by Stern lackey Adam Silver, at least if a team submitted its pick while ESPN wasn’t in a commercial.

Jenkins remained the best player on the board for the first 13 picks of the second round. And once the Indiana Pacers—whom some mocks had selecting Jenkins as early as 15th overall—and Bulls passed on him again at 42 and 43, even Cassara seemed to begin losing optimism as he arched his eyes and glanced downward at his cell phone.

Another staff member got up disgustedly and declared he was leaving. “This is [expletive] unbelievable,” he said.

Charles Jenkins, the best player not to be drafted in 2011. The Flying Dutchmen, the best team to not go to the NCAA Tournament in 2006. It all made awful, perverse, we-are-doomed-just-like-the-ship-we-are-named-after sense.

Until Speedy saved us.

Finally, at 11:07 p.m.—64 minutes and 17 picks after Jenkins became the top player on the board—what remained of the crowd at Bar Social broke into loud applause as soon as the Stern lackey said “Charles…” signifying Jenkins had landed with the Golden State Warriors.

You know, the same Golden State Warriors for whom Speedy Claxton serves as a scout. You know, Speedy Claxton, the last Hofstra player to be drafted 11 years ago. The same Speedy Claxton who took in several games this season from a courtside seat and spoke at the year-end barbeque Apr. 30.

22 goes 44th to a team that employs Speedy Claxton. The night went from sour to serendipitous, just like that. As Jenkins highlights and footage of Hofstra fans celebrating in Newark aired on the flat-screen televisions, a small but spirited chant of “Charles Jenkins!” began. The staffer who got up to leave after the Bulls’ pick smiled broadly from the front of the bar, glad he stuck around for one more selection.

Rants about the Curse of Jay Bilas—oh sure, look what happens when he actually pretends to respect the CAA—as well as the paralysis by analysis that passes for draft day behavior by general managers in every sport and the possibility that Tom O’Connor was pulling the strings on this draft would have to wait. Thankfully. (Though our good friend Mike Litos properly hammered the dopes who passed on Jenkins and other CAA stars)

“I was a little concerned—I knew how much [the Bulls] loved Charles and when they didn’t pick him in the second round, it’s a little bit of a crapshoot,” Cassara said. “But I think it worked out really well. [The Warriors] need a point guard and you have a guy there, Speedy Claxton, in their war room who really knows Charles well and was able to speak to his abilities. I think he’s going to a great opportunity.”

Cassara said while the draft is always unpredictable, players such as Jenkins were particularly vulnerable this year because of the anticipated lockout in the NBA. Thirteen of the 60 selections were from outside the United States, including five of the last seven, and many of those players won’t be signed to contracts as teams spend next year scouting them and saving money.

“I’ve been through this with a handful of different players at different schools and I know how precarious it is,” Cassara said. “It’s not an American draft, it’s a global draft and [there are] players from all over the world that may not be on an NBA roster that get drafted and there are some guys who are not predicted to get picked that get picked. Different guys are left on the board and you never know what’s going to happen.”

That uncertainty has created a far different draft than even 11 years ago, and made it as big an accomplishment for Jenkins to get drafted at all as it was for Claxton to go 20th overall to the Philadelphia 76ers.

“I really believe if you were to take some of the players in the CAA this year—from [Denzel] Bowles to Jamie Skeen to Cam Long to Charles Jenkins to a Chase Allen—I think the way the draft operated 10 years ago, I think four or five of those guys get drafted,” Cassara said. “That’s just the nature of the beast, so to speak. I think it’s an even greater accomplishment for Charles. The draft today is a very different draft than when Speedy was drafted. Very different game, it’s become a much different focus. So I think it’s a real credit to Charles Jenkins and what he’s been able to do.”

Cassara’s phone began ringing as soon as Jenkins was drafted—one of the first calls he received was from Warriors assistant coach Mike Malone, a good friend of Cassara’s who is also a former coach at Worcester Academy in Massachusetts—and he fielded every call with equal parts relief and, pardon the pun, pride.

“I was thrilled for Charles—I’m thrilled for his family and I’m thrilled for our program, I’m thrilled for Hofstra,” Cassara said. “I think it’s a great day for everybody involved. It’s really the pinnacle of a lot of hard work over the last five years by everybody involved and he deserves a lot of credit. To be picked among the top 50 players in the NBA Draft is really an unbelievable thrill and I’m really, really happy for Charles.”

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Tonight's the night (to find the official NBA team of DD!)

Which uniform will Charles be wearing after tonight?

Egads, man, these mock drafts are more tedious than recruiting coverage. Charles Jenkins is going 15th to the Pacers! Charles Jenkins is going 30th to the Bulls! Charles Jenkins is going 42nd to the Pacers! Charles Jenkins is going 58th to the Lakers! Charles Jenkins isn't falling out of the first round! Charles Jenkins will be undrafted and forced to play for Jim Larranaga's son in the NBDL!

Finally, tonight sometime between 7:30 and midnight, we'll have an answer, and we better have the official NBA team of Defiantly Dutch. And please, Jeebus, don't let it be the Heat, Knicks or Lakers, because unless Jenkins clones himself and plays all five positions, I can't root for any of those reprehensible teams.

Anyway, if you're on Long Island, come down to Bar Social (or, as us old schoolers call it, BOGARTS) for the draft party hosted by Mo Cassara and Co. We'll be providing updates from and about the scene on Twitter, as opposed to my usual off-season malarky mis-mosh of Scrubs references and baseball rantings. The Chronicle is on site at Newark (covering the NBA Draft--something else I never got to do as a student, damn kids), so make sure to follow the sports staff's Twitter as well as the Twitter of crack sports editor Joe Pantorno as they bring you the latest news, rumors and information.

And we'll get back into some kind of flow here as well now that summer has begun. Sorry for the lack of updates, I have been absolutely slammed at work, which is good, because it means I can keep eating, and bad, because it means I can't blog. Ahh adulthood. Anyway, see all of you at tonight's #TeamJenkins party!

Defiantly Dutch Men's Lacrosse Tournament Q&A: Patrick Stevens

Good afternoon and welcome to the second annual Defiantly Dutch NCAA Tournament Lacrosse Q&A with Patrick Stevens! As I noted last year, I believe in transparency around here, and I’m a complete lacrosse amateur, so instead of fudging my way through a preview I figured I’d go straight to one of, if not the, best lacrosse writers out there and get Patrick’s take on the Flying Dutchmen’s game tomorrow against Johns Hopkins as well as the tournament in general.

Patrick is back among the ranks of the gainfully employed—he’s so good that The Washington Times not only brought him back this spring but the entire sports section it dumped a couple years back—so we’re especially appreciative of his time this week. Make sure to check out his blog and his Twitter for lacrosse updates the next three weekends.

The last time we chatted, you were one of us—a sportswriter not making his living in sportswriting. Now you're back in, and at your former employer to boot. So for those of us who were never rehired by our former companies—WHAT'S YOUR SECRET? And how surprised were you by the chain of events that led you back to the Times?

If only there was a secret. Suffice to say, it's a lot easier for such an unlikely event to occur if you're not dealing with a paper that's part of a ginormous chain interested only in maintaining unsustainable profit margins.

I think if you'd have asked me in November when there were initial rumblings of a restoration of a sports department, I'd have said there was no chance it would happen. By around the third week of January, I'd have said it wasn't terribly likely. And less than a month later, well, I was back in the fold. It's not something I spent much time with; trying to stay professionally relevant and paying the mortgage were far bigger priorities than keeping tabs on the internal machinations of the business that cut me loose on New Year's Eve 2009. But here I am, working after a 14-month hiatus.

There were a lot of bubble teams for a precious few slots. What made Hofstra stand out from the field?

Two things stood out. One, Hofstra had four top-20 wins (Colgate, Harvard, Princeton, Massachusetts). The Pride didn't do anything terribly fantastic, but they'd built up a decent resume against borderline tournament candidates. Selection committee chairman Dermot Coll said Colgate was probably the last team out. It's safe to say Hofstra's head-to-head win played a role in determining who played on for at least another weekend.

The other thing is Hofstra didn't do anything to demonstrate it clearly wasn't a tournament team. The Pride's two losses came against Delaware, which won the CAA tournament and earned a ticket to Duke this weekend. Colgate lost to Vermont and Binghamton. Harvard fell to Albany and Dartmouth. Massachusetts stumbled against Albany. Those are all setbacks against sub-.500 teams.

In short, Hofstra had more good days against decent teams than the rest of the bubblers, and no bad days against middling or worse opponents.

In the eyes of the committee, do you think it helped Hofstra that Johns Hopkins and Army dropped HU, and not vice versa?

I think that played zero role whatsoever. The schedule you play is the schedule you play. It's worth pointing out one of the games Hofstra added this year was Colgate— a victory that was probably the difference for the Pride getting in.

The VCU analogy is an obvious and not very compatible one to make, but is there anything about Hofstra that has you thinking they can go from the last team in to the Final Four?

I covered Hofstra's loss to Maryland in last year's tournament and came away believing the Pride would be a sneaky possibility for the Final Four if they got the right draw. The regular season didn't change that, even though none of their victories carry much weight (the Pride didn't beat a team in the 16-team field). The attack is superb; Jay Card, Jamie Lincoln and the underrated Stephen Bentz will be difficult to contain.

That said, matchups mean a lot at this stage of the game. The Hopkins defense isn't the same porous outfit it was a year ago. Oh, and the Blue Jays have won 15 straight home postseason games dating back to 1992. I like Hofstra's chances to win at home in the quarterfinals—but it's going to be awfully tough to get there.

But first of course us huge lacrosse fans just worry about Saturday! So, umm, what does Hofstra have to do to beat this John Hopkins guy?

It should come as no surprise these teams have more than a few similarities, considering Hofstra coach Seth Tierney worked for Hopkins coach Dave Pietramala for several years before taking his current gig on Long Island.

So the easy way out is to say Hofstra needs to do the same things Hopkins does—run a patient and crisp offense, find a way to either get close shots or open lasers from the wing, win faceoffs and limit the opponent to one or two shots at most on a possession—except do it better.

Issue No. 1 out of that whole bunch might be the faceoffs. If you're looking for a national most improved player, look no further than Hopkins' Matt Dolente. Only a year ago, Dolente was an illegal procedure magnet, but a change in the faceoff rules and his own advancement as a player have helped him become one of the Blue Jays' most dangerous weapons. He may well win more draws than he loses, but Hofstra needs to keep possession as close to a 50-50 split as possible. Give Hopkins a three-goal lead, and Dolente combined with a steady defense will make it tough for anyone to rally.

Knowing what you know of the two programs, has this turned personal between Hofstra and Hopkins, or is it just business?

At this time of year, it's just business. Given the schedule Hopkins plays (Princeton, Syracuse, Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland), its scare in barely making the tournament last spring and its utter inability to win on Long Island—0-for-4 since 2006, including three setbacks at Hofstra—it's tough to blame the Jays for nudging the Pride off the schedule.

Hopkins' last two tournament games have ended very, very poorly. Hofstra has a record 17 appearances without a final four trip (Rutgers is a distant second with nine). The postseason provides its own incentive.

Who is your pick to lose to Hofstra in the national title game? (Or, if you want to be really daring, which non-Hofstra team will win it all?)

I seem to recall picking Syracuse to win it all last year, only to have it blow up in my face on the first weekend. Don't think I was alone on that, though.

Here's the thing: It feels as wide open at the start of the tournament as I can remember. Maybe not in the first round—I think at least half and maybe three-quarters of the opening weekend will be littered with clunkers. But I'm not sure the difference between 1 and 9 is all that great, and it wouldn't stun me if there's some bracket chaos much like a year ago once the quarterfinals hit.

If the talent's close, I'm less inclined to worry about who can win four straight so much as who can win four one-game playoffs. In short, I'd veer toward the most prepared team, and that's more likely to be Hopkins than anyone else in the field. I'll take the Blue Jays over the Cuse in the title game, with a revived Virginia bunch and Duke also appearing in the final four.

GREAT FRIDAY!!!!

As first reported by Defiantly Dutch (always wanted to say that), Jim Larranaga--Mr. CAA, Mr. Would Never Leave GMU Because He Loves It Too Much--is gone. That's right, the "class" of the CAA is leaving for Miami. MIAMI. I would say he left for the Towson of the ACC, but I don't want to insult Towson. Ego and a desire for Shaka Smart-like money will make a man do crazy things, like napalm a career's worth of goodwill and finish things out in MIAMI.

I am going to enjoy the living hell out of this, and later today or tonight, I'll dig up some of those great self-satisfied emails I got after Larranaga ran up the score last January and during Hofstra's second coaching search 50 weeks ago, and give Google a good workout for Larranaga quotes about how he could never leave Mason, and I'll post them here. Because I am going to enjoy the living hell out of this.

The CAA is a far classier place today than 24 hours ago. Bye Jim! Say hi to Tubbs for us, and enjoy your makeover!

(Also, I am taking applications for my new CAA enemy)

No fooling, our long national nightmare is over: The End of CBI Craziness

The CBI deserved to be decided on this wretched excuse for a basketball court.

The CBI dragged it out as long as freaking humanly possible, but finally, blissfully, humanely, the worst postseason tournament in the history of sports is over after Oregon edged Creighton, 81-79, in the winner-take-all third game (really, CBI? A best-of-three?) last night in Oregon.

And of course it ended on April Fools Day in appropriately disorganized and foolish fashion. According to the Twitters, Oregon scored the tie-breaking basket with two seconds left after Creighton was called for a backcourt violation. Apparently, it’s impossible to see the midcourt line at the new and of course hideous-looking Phil Knight-funded Matthew Knight Arena, as you can see—or not see—up above.

On the bright side, Creighton, you were spared winning the CBI. So take solace in that.

Alas, unfortunately for those of us who are looking at the CBI Craziness trends, the Oregon win allowed John Templon to edge out Hofstra graduate Jaymes Langrehr for the Son of CBI Craziness championship. Last year’s winner, VCU Pav, is off watching the Final Four this weekend, so therefore this year’s winner will get to watch HIS alma mater in the Final Four this time next year.

Enjoy your alma mater’s Final Four trip next year, John, and enjoy the damn prize that I have to muster up now. John’s title and his prize are well-earned—or as well-earned as anything about the CBI can be—after he picked Oregon at the start of this wretched abomination and correctly guessed three of the CBI’s final four teams as well.

Nobody picked Creighton initially—that’s what happens when a pool consists almost exclusively of fans of Hofstra, the CAA and the Atlantic 10—so Jaymes almost took advantage of our very CBI-like second chance semifinal picks to swoop in from fifth place and steal the “crown.” But it was not meant to be, and for that he should be relieved. Other than that whole Hofstra not going to the Final Four thing next year, that is.

Here are the final standings of Son of CBI Craziness. Let us never speak of the CBI again, except to mock it incessantly.

SON OF CBI CRAZINESS STANDINGS

THE BLISSFUL END

John Templon 43

Mike Brodsky 28

Nick Mazzarella 21

Craig Smith 18

Jaymes Langrehr 16

Gary Moore 15

Dominic Pody 14

Rick Vizzi 14

Raphielle Johnson 13

Chris Crowley 12

Elise Manicke-Russell 12

P.J. Harmer 10

Jerry Beach 7

Joe Suhoski 6

THE REAL WINNERS

These awesome people didn’t take advantage of the semifinal second chance and re-pick the rest of the bracket, and for that they have my utmost admiration. Notice my wife is in there. Told you she was the smart one.

Lee Warner 8

Michelle Beach 6

Mitch Merman 6

Lori Chase 5

Geoffrey Sorensen 5

Christian Heimall 4

Rob & Todd (JMU Sports Blog) 4

Victoria Rossi 3

Thank goodness that’s over. Let’s go VCU—though I can’t shake this feeling that Butler is the Rams’ biggest challenge yet, if only because the ultra-cool Bulldogs won’t fold like USC, Georgetown, Purdue and Kansas did at the first sign of trouble. Either way, no matter what happens, you know the media bore head coach of a certain Virginia-based school that also bears a three-letter acronym and made the Final Four as an 11 seed will be yakking about it. It’s almost enough to make me pine for the days of CBI Craziness. Almost.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

DEFIANTLY DUTCH EXCLUSIVE: NCAA grants Charles Jenkins another season of eligibility!

Get that number 22 down from the rafters. Charles Jenkins isn’t done wearing it.

NCAA president Mark Emmert told Defiantly Dutch in an exclusive interview last night that he has decided to grant Jenkins—who became Hofstra’s all-time leading scorer during what was believed to be his senior season—another year of eligibility.

“Actually legislating the NCAA and punishing people is boring work—why do you think Yahoo! Sports and its five-man operation kicks our ass?” Emmert said. “So I was procrastinating and I stumbled across those Charles Jenkins Facts on Facebook and they cracked me up. You Hofstra alums are some funny bastards. And I decided it would be a shame to see a page like that go mostly silent.”

Emmert also said he felt he owed Hofstra something after the Brad Kelleher debacle. Kelleher was ruled ineligible for the first 40 games of his Hofstra career because he played with professionals in his native Australia.

“We really screwed you guys with Kelleher—I mean, really, really screwed you guys,” Emmert said. “Enforcing piddling rules at smaller schools while letting the big boys get away with far worse stuff go on at the big boys is our Viagra. If Jay-Z even drove BY Hofstra Arena, we’d give you the death penalty so fast, it’d make Eric Dickerson’s head spin. But man, we really let you have it there with Kelleher. So this is our olive branch.”

Emmert added, though, that the NCAA would not give back the year Kelleher lost and that it planned to vacate Hofstra’s entire 2010-11 season because Kelleher allowed his girlfriend to buy him lunch on the final day of the fall semester. Kelleher’s meal card had expired.

“Kid should have known how expensive it is to eat at Hofstra,” Emmert said. “That compromises his amateur status. Plus I hate AC/DC. So damn loud. Rock and roll ain’t noise pollution—my ass it isn’t. Blow up your video—I wish. Three chords this, guttural scream about a sexual entendre that. A little variety never hurt anybody, dudes.”

Emmert said the impending lockout in the NBA also played into his decision. “It would be a shame to have a kid like that sitting out next year,” Emmert said. “So why can’t we benefit one more time from his free labor?”

Reached by phone, NBA commissioner David Stern cursed and said he no longer felt any urgency to negotiate with the players union. “Looks like I can’t fix the lottery for the Nets so they can get Jenkins,” he added.

Asked if Jenkins could eventually get a sixth season of eligibility—or more—Emmert said he wouldn’t mind seeing the Hofstra star play long enough to take over some of the most hallowed records in NCAA history. At his current career rates, Jenkins would need another 59 games to break Pete Maravich’s all-time scoring record (3,667 points), 54 games to break Dickie Hemric’s mark for most free throws made in a career (905), 102 games to break the steals record held by John Linehan (385), 155 games to move past Bobby Hurley atop the assist charts (1,076) and 198 games to surpass J.J. Redick’s record for most 3-pointers (457).

“Pistol Pete has been the all-time leading scorer long enough, don’t you think?” Emmert said. “Nobody’s ever heard of the free throws or assists guys and nobody likes Duke—except us—so we may in fact welcome Charles back for many years to come.”

The answer may be found in a unique clause inserted into the contract Mo Cassara signed. Dubbed “The Jenkins Clause,” it doubles Cassara’s salary if Jenkins ever leaves.

Reached for comment last night, Cassara could only utter a Homer Simpson-like series of deliriously happy giggles. Other CAA coaches and executives weren’t as thrilled.

“Mass confusion right now for Hofstra about who’s going to inbound,” William & Mary coach Tony Shaver said. “David Imes can run the baseline. Imes hands to Jenkins. Down to three. Down to two. With one Jenkins fires GOT IT!! CHARLES JENKINS AT THE BUZZER! HOFSTRA WINS 81-78!”

“Are you serious?” Old Dominion coach Blaine Taylor said. “Shoot, and after Wyoming hired its new coach too. That Jenkins is all horse and no hat.”

“Way to ruin my week,” VCU coach Shaka Smart said.

“Did Towson replace me yet?” Pat Kennedy asked.

“Good luck getting that free throw record, the CAA Tournament is still held in Richmond and it’ll outlast you, Charles!” CAA commissioner Tom Yeager said. “It’ll outlast everything and everyone! RICHMOND!!!”

“Does anyone want to talk to me about winning four games and getting to the Final Four as a mid-major 11 seed?” George Mason coach Jim Larranaga said. “Anyone? I’m Roger [bleeping] Bannister, Neil [bleeping] Armstrong and Roger [bleeping] Maris for crying out loud. But this isn’t about me, it’s about VCU and the CAA. Of which I’m the Jonas [bleeping] Salk.”

As for Jenkins, he was unavailable for comment. He spent yesterday driving the baseball team to William & Mary, serving as bullpen catcher for the softball team during its practice, negotiating Cassara’s contract and getting his degree from Hofstra Law School.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Contract extension makes Mo the man for Hofstra

Charles Jenkins is gone, but Mo Cassara will remain a Lions' Den favorite for years to come after signing a contract extension today.

Three of the season’s lowest points convinced Jack Hayes that Mo Cassara was the school’s long-term answer at head coach. Two of the season’s most exciting moments convinced Cassara that Hofstra was the home an itinerant basketball coach had been seeking.

The two men who reached the same conclusion via different methods needed little time to cement Cassara’s future at Hofstra. The school announced Thursday that it had signed Cassara to a five-year extension taking him through the 2015-16 season. The extension comes with a raise that will put Cassara into the top half of CAA coaches in annual compensation (that sound you just heard was George Mason drafting another press release announcing another extension and raise for Jim Larranaga).

Cassara, whose original deal at Hofstra was for four years, signed his new contract a day before the anniversary of Tim Welsh’s hiring, a coincidental capper to a year that turned out nothing like expected and much better than expected, all at the same time.

“I did not think of that,” Hayes said with a chuckle Thursday afternoon. “You try to handle these situations as best as you can, and in looking back now, I feel that the university made a good decision and I think everybody is happy with the decision to hire Mo as the head coach. As you look back now, over a 12-month period it’s been an excellent situation and one that we wanted to make sure lasts for a long time.”

A year ago, Cassara headed to the Final Four in Indianapolis hopeful he’d join Welsh on Long Island but still nursing the wounds from the surprising dismissal of Al Skinner’s staff at Boston College and uncertain what he would do next.

“I remember flying out here to the Final Four last year essentially thinking or hoping that I was going to go with Tim but really, essentially, without a job and not really knowing that much about Hofstra and not knowing about the opportunity and not knowing what I really wanted to do and, ultimately, still trying to figure out what happened at Boston College,” Cassara said tonight as he drove back from a dinner in Houston. “It’s amazing what happens in a year. You try to do the right thing and you work hard and you surround yourself with good people and I think a lot can be accomplished.

Cassara, thrust from the third assistant’s role into the head coaching position when Welsh resigned following a DUI arrest last Apr. 30, finished second in the CAA Coach of the Year balloting (urge to curse rising) after leading the Flying Dutchmen to a 14-4 conference mark and a share of second place, the program’s best finish since moving to the CAA in 2001-02 and two games ahead of Final Four participant VCU.

The Dutchmen finished 21-12 after falling to Old Dominion in the tournament semifinals and losing to Evansville in the first round of the CBI, but a season that ended shy of the ultimate goal left everyone associated with the program excited about what Cassara and his staff had begun to build.

In addition to piecing together a 20-win season out of a thin and injury-depleted roster that featured just two players—Charles Jenkins and Greg Washington—who had started a game for Hofstra prior to this year, Cassara’s tireless efforts to reach out to fans via social media and other more traditional means helped the Dutchmen draw almost 700 more fans per game this year (3,073) than last year (2,410). The Dutchmen also played to their first two sellout crowds since the 2006-07 season.

“Mo did a great job and showed that he can coach and that he can recruit and that he can certainly energize a college campus,” Hayes said. “At the end of the regular season, as we sat there tied at second at 14-4 in the conference, we knew we wanted to do something.”

Hayes said he was particularly impressed by how Cassara got the Dutchmen to respond to and bounce back from disastrous trips to Puerto Rico, Iona and Wright State. The Dutchmen went 0-3 in the Puerto Rico Classic, where they opened and closed the trip by getting blown out by North Carolina and Nebraska and blew a 13-point lead against Western Kentucky in the final four minutes of the middle game, but won their next four games upon returning home.

A 25-point loss to Iona in the final game of the calendar year led to a weekend’s worth of boot camp practices and resulted in the Dutchmen winning their first four games in January and seven of their first eight overall as they put themselves in position to earn a CAA Tournament bye. The Dutchmen lost by 26 in the BracketBuster at Wright State but mounted another four-game winning streak that ended with the loss to Old Dominion.

“I think Mo did a great job of going through situations like that and getting everybody refocused and re-energized and working on the task at hand to put those things behind us, learn from them and move on,” Hayes said. “We came back from those stretches and we were very successful.”

Cassara, who coached at six different colleges or high schools in the 13 years before he arrived at Hofstra, said he knew Long Island was the place for him after seeing the reaction to the Dutchmen’s home win over George Mason Jan. 5—a victory highlighted by Cassara racing over to Brad Kelleher and high-fiving him after Kelleher’s buzzer-beating 3-pointer at the end of the first half—and the anticipation prior to the sold-out season finale against Delaware Feb. 26.

“There was a period of time early in the year I was like ‘Oh my God, are we going to win a game? How are we going to do this?’” Cassara said. “And I knew how good George Mason was, they really had been the class of the league and when we beat them at our place and really played well that second half, I could see the momentum start to turn and the fans start to get excited.

“And then I think that kind of just steamrolled into more and more positive things. Walking out on that court that last day down to the student section and being so excited—not about just playing the game, but more excited about the turnout and the fan support in the community—I walked out that day and I said to myself ‘This is not just a job.’

“Those are the two times that I can think of that I said ‘Wow, this isn’t just a job. This is home to me.’”

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.