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MINNEAPOLIS – Chris Beard might as well be considered the king of smooth running.
It is an approach that the Associated Press coach of the year adopted when he embarked on a major reconstruction of Texas Tech three years ago. During this short period, Beard turned the Red Raiders into a group of the 12 biggest who started their first Final Four a year after losing six of their top eight goalscorers to a team that reached the Elite Eight.
Beard's simplest method is to use a simple approach to maximize opportunities – a kind of resourcefulness that he has used as much in recruiting talent to build his programs as in his ranks as a university coach. .
"A few years ago, I was in the ABA or D-II, and that's the special part about it," Beard said. "I do not take it lightly, I even talked to my team about it … It's about when I was assistant and you came to the Final Four and that you had no room, and that you begged one of your friends who are in Division I crashed on the floor.I have been to a lot of rooms where there is two guys in each bed without the duvets because you have two other people on the floor with the duvets, then a maybe in the bathroom tub with the pillows.
"The problem comes from the morning with the towel because I'm not a big believer – I guess I'll share a bar of soap if you wash it really well, but I do not share a towel with one you know? We used to come to the Final Fours and bring our own towels, a true story. "
The humorous version of Beard, which has fallen over the years during the biggest university basketball weekend, embodies what his coaching confidants describe as a blue-collar guy with a flea on his shoulder. His path took a winding road through the ranks; a journey that began in 1991 and went through colleges, small schools and the now defunct American Basketball Association before arriving in Lubbock, marking the 11th stage of his coaching career after serving as a coach. assistant to the Red Raiders under the orders of Bob Knight and Pat Knight from 2001 to 2011.
The way this fellow coach arrived at the Final Four is very different from that of heavyweights like Tom Izzo, Bruce Pearl and Tony Bennett have reached the same university basketball summit with their respective programs.
Developing his sense of tenacity, ingenuity and mental toughness is the result of the rich experience he's gained at every level imaginable, each stopping to shape Beard for what he's doing. is now, about to play for a national title.
From Fort Scott Community College to the ABA Warriors of South Carolina, through Division III McMurry, Division II Angelo State and his first division I concert in Little Rock, Beard has been a success. He has made Texas Tech a constant contender while reaffirming the program's identity as a defensive pillar.
Many who have followed similar paths have not reached this level. This is unconventional, often categorized as the route of the outsider. This is what perfectly describes all that Beard stands for, and how he found the way to win fast and big.
"It's amazing to see his career, because there is no plan in college coaching to say, hey, if you follow this path, it will lead you to become a Division I head coach," he said. Cinco Boone, coach of the Angelo State,. "He believed in this vision, he knew that he could do it at Texas Tech, he was so close last year, being part of the Elite Eight and being beaten by Villanova, but he knew he could do it, and so here he is again, now in the Final Four, having a chance to win this last game on a Monday night, I just think he's in a place where he can do that now . "
Recruit on a budget
Danny Kaspar knew from the start how Beard's resourcefulness would pay dividends. Kaspar hired Beard, then aged 23, as a "Word Incarnate Assistant" in 1995 (at the time NAIA program), where one of the responsibilities was to collect funds to strengthen the unprecedented recruitment budget.
Beard and Steve Lutz, Purdue's current assistant and Kaspar's volunteer assistant, were charged with selling $ 1,500 worth of ads for the basketball team media guide. Restaurants have quickly become their favorite place to raise the funds needed to fulfill their obligations.
"He was coming back and saying," Coach, this guy says he could give us $ 300 in cash and $ 300 in coupons? ", Recalls Kaspar, a Texas State coach today.
"Well, I cracked for it, because after receiving several, I put the coupons in a blue bank bag in my briefcase." He and Lutz began to come to the office. Lunch time to ask for coupons to go eat I was still joking him.I said, "You've prepared me, dude. I told you that I needed $ 600 and you all told the owners that you could make coupons and all that for me to eat you all the time. "
It was an introduction to the type of grind that Beard was going to taste at his other stops. Recruitment trips taught the coach to make the most of what he had to work with.
Boone was part of many of these trips, having been on Beard's staff at McMurry before following him to Angelo State, where he was eventually named head coach after Beard left for Little Rock. The two men were introduced by a mutual friend in 2009, during a week-long camp organized by Beard, which was to allow many of his fellow coaches to come to work.
The camp eventually became a trip where nearly 15 coaches gathered in Concan, Texas, 80 km west of San Antonio. The "Concan Brothers", which bring together a host of coaches who have risen to the rank of Division I, including Chris Ogden (UT-Arlington) and Joe Golding (Abilene Christian), have been drinking beer and have told From basketball to life through the love Frio River for hours.
Several years after his meeting, Boone was looking for a new job and called Beard (nicknamed the Concan Brothers captain), who had hired him to McMurry. Their first week of work included evaluating 50 recruits from top to bottom. Then it was time to hit the road.
Instead of a pony for a budget motel, they spent several nights lying in Boone's Dodge large-box truck. After finishing dinner at Applebee after visiting a recruit and preparing another one the next morning, Beard gave Boone directions for what the assistant thought was a hotel. It was rather a YMCA in Fort Worth, where their next recruit, Cameron Saville, had to work his morning shift as a rescuer in a few hours.
"And then we come [to the YMCA] in the clothes of last night, at 6 o'clock in the morning, "remembers Boone." I will never forget it as long as I live. [Beard] "Hey, Cam, is it possible to get a towel and maybe a bar of soap? We'd really like to take a shower before going to the next place. And we've literally done it. We took a shower at the YMCA, we put the clothes on the last night, then we went back to the parking lot, then we dressed new clothes in the parking lot and we ended up at the next recruit. "It was the first day of being on the road with Chris Beard and I think it's going to be a crazy race."
Beard's talent for finding neglected players and turning them into NBA prospects began well before he reached Texas Tech. In his first full-time assistant role at Abilene Christian in the mid-1990s, Beard discovered Kendrick White during a trip to Houston, a very fast guard nicknamed "Nuke."
"Chris called me and said, coach, I found a child we can have, but we have to take it face to face and as fast as possible because no one else l? He also has an average of almost 30 points per game, "said former Abilene. Christian coach Shanon Hays is remembered.
There was just one problem: White was 5 feet 2 inches.
Beard eventually convinced Hays to sign the leader, who became a key contributor this season. After Beard made the leap into North Texas, Hays was still able to take advantage of his assistant's recruiting efforts.
Beard has compiled a winning record wherever he has been head coach. Applying the same approach as used in the ranks of the juco and the junior college to build his lineup in the flagship program that Texas Tech is becoming, has allowed the Red Raiders to suppress illustrious programs while imposing on within the elite of college basketball.
"That's what you do every year in college, and it was his first job as a head coach," said Ogden of UT-Arlington, Beard coach at Texas Tech. "You form teams in a year and you get the best quality players at the moment, and you do not wait, and there is no future. Is just as well as he lives and that he is like he is as a person.He is so confident, passionate and he is not afraid to believe in victory in a championship He must first believe it, and he will say it the second he enters a campus. "
Reach the last four
Wes Flanigan did not have to spend a lot of time with Chris Beard to learn how much Beard was diligent in keeping his promises.
During the Beard season at Little Rock, the Trojans compiled a 30-5 record and defeated Purdue in the round of 32 in 2016. A bet was made between Beard and his players before the season that if Little Rock went to the tournament from the NCAA, the coach will get tattooed.
Without hesitation, Beard kept his word.
Engraved in black ink on the back, Beard has "4: 1" tattooed above his left shoulder with the names of his three daughters (Avery, Ella and Margo) and the word "loyalty" in the drawing .
Having a place at the forefront to watch one of the best coaches in history, Beard has become a disciple of Bob Knight. The former Texas Tech coach said that "mental toughness is physical like four is one" is more than an inspirational quote on which Beard is hooked.
It's everywhere around Texas Tech's installations, because it's the fundamental principle that embodies the way this team has engraved its Big 12 calendar while dismantling its opponents with its defensive aggression in the tournament to reach the Final Four.
For Flanigan, who is now attending Auburn after succeeding his Little Rock mentor from 2016 to 18, "4: 1" has become a mantra of his life.
"I have experienced a lot of ups and downs in my life and if people knew the meaning of 4: 1, they would never give up, they would never let go, no matter the situation," he said. said Flanigan. "You stay tough, you keep fighting and you live the next day, and for me in my life, I'm suffering from bone cancer, obviously being interrupted at a few college basketball stops, to be back in Auburn my alma mater, be an assistant coach, give back, but also play here for the national championship, that's what 4: 1 is for me. "
Like Auburn, Texas Tech is a national semifinalist for the first time in the history of the program. Many people who know Beard are not surprised to learn that he would reach this point. Doing this with the Red Raiders in a university basketball landscape covered in blue-dominated programs is no small feat.
"Am I surprised that he sent Texas Tech to the Final Four? Yes," said Kaspar. "This is not the kind of work that even great coaches can get.Many coaches consider Texas Tech as follows:" Eh, it's the lowest half of the Big 12's work. " I mean, look at what Chris did with that. "
The fact that Beard has become one of the most prominent coaches in college basketball has helped make Texas Tech a major player in the Big 12.
His path to the Final Four is rooted in striking when the opportunity presents itself, no matter when or where. This led him to accept incredible opportunities as they were presented and to have the courage to face even greater challenges under any circumstances (Beard was at UNLV for 19 days before to accept the technician position in 2016).
Beard's experience is not characterized by longevity within a particular program, like the coach he faces Saturday night (Izzo has been Michigan State's head coach since 1995), but his ability to rebuilding the teams along the way and leaving them better than when he took over was a constant throughout his career.
The dream that he's going to live on Saturday does not only reflect his career as a Division I coach. It's the painstaking process that it took to get here for himself and for all of us other coaches with the same goals.
"I would not trade my coaching career for nothing," said Beard. "Whether it is junior college, ABA or a small college, very lucky to be here and feel that I represent a lot of people on this stage who have coached in schools that are very good coaches who have trained great players and who never have the chance under these lights.I hope the local coaches will find some satisfaction with that. "
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