Everything Miami Interim Head Coach Bill Courtney Said in First Press Conference
CORAL GABLES, Fl - 'It's Yours'. That was Jim Larranaga's message to the new interim head coach for the Miami Hurricanes Men's basketball team Bill Courtney.
This won't be Courtney's first rodeo as a head coach but with the struggles that this team has faced with a 4-8 start will be hard to saddle in.
Courtney is positive about what he can do with the team as well as a new message that will get this team back on track.
On the conversation with coach L about his retirement....
It was very emotional. his wife was around when we talked about it, and even when I talk now, I still get emotional about that day, um just because the man is the first person that I said he'd been a mentor for such a long time since he's hated for him to have to step down. He was a friend for 28 years you know that. Then you know after a day or two he realized that you gotta start preparing for the next step and we got a whole slate of ACC games ahead of us, and we got to be ready and prepare to play CC games.
The program is one of the biggest shows I think he had and somehow are taking you know once you get you mentioned you get over like the surprise and every all the emotions like when you start, you know, the job I guess like what are the first things you're like okay, I gotta take care of X Y and Z. you realize you got work to do, right? So you gotta start planning you know, again, we're not gonna make drastic changes on the floor, uh, because again this is my guy. And you know, we're gonna make something, you know, and one of the things I've learned about this business, is when you're sitting in this seat, you have to put you over the personality team. It's funny, I'll joke with a couple of different guys. I talked to him. you know, Coach L is special, uh he's so intelligent and he's one of the best basketball minds I've ever been around. I'm kind of the opposite. I'm very excitable, and very energetic when all over the place., but I gotta be me, right? Um, I put it to someone I coach, was like Yoda the J I master and my like young Luke Skywalker, you want to listen at first. um but again, uh can you realize that you realize what you have to to start you very forward, you realize I have to address the players., you know, they came in, they found out, uh and then we came back at night and practice. um, and they, you know, kids now stripped much quicker than adults, uh, and so they were really bright when we got in last Thursday night.
On possible changes incoming...
Yeah, I don't think that right now there's gonna be any dressing from the lineup change. You know, we don't have many guys we, you know, a couple of guys out with injuries and so you don't have a ton of choices. um, but again, uh you gotta put your own in print one. I'll be stupid to get with with. attention changes we're gonna make. um, but again, you'll notice some things that we buy to do. again, we just you know, we can struggle all a little bit and we're trying to let this roop up and get confident and you already go into the games, give our best effort. And you know, Jim said he mentioned how the new era was part of the reason he stepped down.
On Players Transferring...
Yeah, I think they you know, at this point season is very difficult to transfer and again, I think the first thing that we've tried to do um is make sure everybody's to get. I mean, that's gonna be an important part of anything that can accomplish, uh the togetherness of playing as a team to being the caring for each other, uh, so that's the first step. and uh so yeah, right now.
On passing his recruiting hat...
Yeah, I think you know you always, you know when you get to this year, you have so many different things you have to do, so you have that I think that's important that's one of the things. I learned for is that you have to delegate, you have to be good and trust the guys you work with and, you know, we all have full trust in each other., you know, again, it's different, but, you know, you still got to sell the universe, you still got to be able to do those things. I need to do that when I mean, you I mean, you here you're going to the next couple of months, but after that, you know, who knows what's gonna happen? So, how do you go about kind of managing, and recruiting when things kind of happen there? head the next, right? So you still do the same things you did when you were the associate coach or if you were the head coach, you gotta go business as usual. So, you know, you had a great academic institution in an unbelievable, desirably, great location in the country. A tradition of great basketball that's gonna win. that's gonna bounce back from this time of struggle. And so again, those are things that sell, you know, and I think the guys that we recruit and the guys that uh we are recruited can understand.
On coach Larranaga comments on it being a new era...
Yeah, I think as you, you, listen to some of the things the coach talked about in his retiring press conference, it just a different era, um, is this a different society. I think you're gonna go through some struggles then you bounce back it's funny how people quickly forget, right? So we went to the leading the final four back-to-back use. One of the best programs in the country is hard to argue that anyone had a better record of those uses except UCONN, right? And so it's easy to forget that the year before we were in a terrible place during the COVID year. We had six players playing, we couldn't win a game, we made a little run and the ACC Tournament. But that's how quickly the days can change. Right quickly from that year to the very next year, going to the Eletie 8 and even in the year, we were up under 500 coming out of Orlando, you know, we were on the ropes, we had lost a UCF at home, we lost to, you know, by 20 some points and they got beat by Alabama, but like a Bizillion, right? And our kids rally together, the pool together. So, you know, again, kids are able to bounce back and like we could adults. I mean, this world will do that, again, you have to see success, I mean that's required, so we have to win some games for that to be something that they believe in.
On Boston College and the next few games...
Yeah, I mean, we're just gonna practice like crazy. you know, in our guys or working your tails off. we've all watched all the BC films and kind of implemented the game-playing over the next few days. We'll be ready we'll be ready to play circle. um hopefully we play well, uh but we certainly are ready and play that game and then we stay on the road, with an opportunity against [Georiga] Tech on Saturday, and we'll be ready to play again.
What practice looks like now...
I think they showed up very well. Obviously it is something that no one expected, especially from their perspective, um a lot of these guys came here to play for coach L, uh a legend in basketball. It's a difficult time for those guys, so the way they bounced back has been extremely impressive, they had tremendous energy in practice. They played together, they played very, very hard, I think this could be commended for that. I mean, I shouldn't look at them every day and it's like I'm amazed at what they're doing, and so as a coach and as a coaching staff, that helps us, you know, their energy is been infectious, you know, and hopefully our staff's energy has been infectious. those guys also, but they've done a great job of really locking in.
On any potential drop off and what needs to happen...
What needs to happen, what's kind of real point about says Jim was obviously talked to us quite a bit about defense. the defense has been progressing all and he continues to progress, but again, you know, I think if you know, you have great effort, that's the first one. If you have a great effort, you can make some corrections. and I think the kids have shown they have where effort.
On his coaching experience at Cornell translating to now...
It didn't work and then I think certainly as a coach when you go through your career, you learn to it all the time, you don't know you're doing the wrong thing. I learned what works and what doesn't work for me. I think I'll that will help you a little bit, but I don't even since I came back down here to Miami with, I'll take all those experience will help me. It kind of recuses being coming back and playing or all out Seattle, I don't know about the medical stuff. I hope he's a big part of the season and a be a part, of so.
