Greensboro, North Carolina - hours long struck midnight, and at the same America, the latest Cinderella darlings did not leave the dance. They are, however, left the room for the evening, at least. Slightly more than three hours after the NCAA tournament on its head, Lehigh players and coaches away from the Greensboro Coliseum, in the midst of one of the most beautiful disorder in the tournament history, the relative calm at the Doubletree, where the two men most responsible for the Mountain Hawks' 75-70 shocker at Duke on Friday night were very happy to well-deserved award.
For junior guard CJ McCollum, which meant the last to leave from the first moment of the attributes of Fame - an endless stream of text messages and Twitter mentions that he had to ignore in any case, when his phone is dead - and benefit from soaking in a soaking in an ice bath in his hotel room.
For non-stop head coach Brett Reed - who once worked as an assistant coach and assistant at all times with a maximum load of the course for his doctorate - it meant the opportunity to enjoy the victory, finally getting something to eat, "I tried to eat the pizza they gave us after the game, but I could not taste it, "he said.
All that time ago, the campus of Lehigh in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, was, according to one player, "in rebellion", and yet he says that the best player on the team and its head coach is not focused on just playing the game, the legacy just reached, but game in front, and the moment is not seized.
Responding to a question, if he had spent much time watching the brightest of his sterling 30-point performance that helped defeat the vaunted Duke, McCollum said, No, we have another game to prepare for.
As hard as it may be to believe, even two days later, Lehigh is, in fact, live in a tournament NCAA. On Sunday, the Mountain Hawks will coincide with the number 10 seed Southern Xavier for a place in the Sweet 16 in Atlanta. This is, in many ways, the first game of the remaining life of the program, which previously had been backdated to the sport, but there will always be known, if nothing else, as a team, which has become one of the six number 15 seed ever to win a tournament game in NCAA.
In addition, it is the first game in the national spotlight McCollum, slithery 6-foot-3 guard, whose performance against Blue Devils drew the comparison with March of last year as the darlings of Jimmer Fredette and Stephen Curry. Like those two, McCollum was in hindsight, how high a player shkole.Kontse rapid growth - he entered ninth grade in Canton, Ohio, at 5.2 times, and still only 5.11 at the beginning of his junior year - kept him from radar in most schools, despite an average 25 points per game as a junior and 29 as a senior.
"My dream school was North Carolina," said McCollum on Saturday. "I do not know whether it was [Michael] Jordan factor, but a good blue color, I liked the fan support and they always won."
Not only is the Tar Heels did not pay him any attention, has done more, local authorities, like Ohio, Cincinnati, and even Xavier. McCollum picked Lehigh over other small schools like Bowling Green and St. Bonaventure, but wasted no time making his mark. As a freshman, he was named Patriot League Player of the Year and led his team to the championship of the conference.
After trying a sophomore season in which Lehigh has missed his way back to the Big Dance despite McCollum finished ninth in the country with 21.8 points per game average, McCollum was dissed again. This time, LeBron James Skills Academy on 10 minutes by road from his hometown of Akron, which failed to find a place for him among the list of 30 invitees.
This season, McCollum again ranked among the top scorers in the country, averaging 21.9 points per game and won his second league player, the Patriot title. Nevertheless, it remained unknown, but he plans to change all that. Before going to court to play Duke, McCollum said of the Tar Heels' walk after the victory over Vermont. "Tell your fans to stay", McCollum said. "I'm going to put on a show."
"We were like who is this guy?" said North Carolina Harrison Barnes. "Then he went out and put on a show."
In 39 minutes of fun, McCollum scored 30 points and did nearly all the major pieces in the Lehigh upset Duke, much to the delight of fans who are Carolina, in fact, to stay to watch.
No one is better than sitting Reed, fifth year coach, who, like most of his colleagues, coaching, McCollum did not provide a future star. "I saw the value in a package that is not necessarily as glamorous as you would necessarily expect from college players," Reed said. "I saw the talent. I see and feel the game, basketball IQ, and only the smoothness of it, I really appreciate."
Reed has a pretty decent IQ itself, possessing PhD. from Wayne State in the so-called Educational Technology, which he describes as "the most efficient and effective learning tool."
It would be easy to guess that in basketball terms, that means simply "pass it CJ" but, as he demonstrated against the prince, Dr. Reed has a brain scientist and restrained manner to match, suggesting he should be in a white coat, but not in suit and tie on the sidelines. He and his staff coordinated exclusively on the fight that took the Blue Devils out of the offensive sets before they start "Training is what we can control," Reed said, sitting in an empty locker room, where the night before he wrote the word «Believe» on board before his team took the court. "If we spend the time necessary to have a lot of information that we can take away."
Reed has never been a stranger to training. He played college ball at Eckerd College and had a view of the law school before deciding that he wanted to be a coach, like his father, Lynn, who won a college national championship in college Oakland community. Because he did not have his teaching certificate, he received a master's degree in Wayne State, and when given the opportunity to continue their candidate after winning a fellowship, which covers most of the cost, he agreed.
Reed received his Ph.D. in 2003, when he landed at Lehigh as an assistant after the previous incident on the staffs of the University of North Carolina, Greensboro and High Point. In August 2007, Reed was named head coach. Three years later he was back in the Lehigh Tournament NCAA.
This type of emission over the loss to Kansas. The result on Friday was much more enjoyable for Reed and his team. After the madness finally subsided in the Coliseum, Reed returned to the team hotel a little after 1:00 am, he was scheduled for the beginning of the film study by Xavier at once, but even as a mad scientist to get some rest, so he set the 7th meeting for their employees so they can relax. Instead, he shared with his embrace of the assembled family and friends, including his father - "He was very proud," Reed said - and went to his room with his wife, Kindra.
All he wanted was something there and the opportunity to take a shower, but instead he and Kindra were just saying, a rare moment of reflection for those who, by his own admission, "hard to step back and really appreciate it . "
In the end, though, he could not look at the endless moments of SportsCenter and savor a moment of triumph, he elaborated. And what is the most analytical trainers, this son of a coach, you think? Perhaps the plays, he had to flee, but did not, or how to get his team to repeat that performance on Sunday. No.
"I think," Reed said, "It's really cool."
Sourc: sportsillustrated
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