Some 30 years ago, Jim Calhoun took over a fledgling Northeastern men’s basketball team. It took him nine seasons to lead NU to the NCAA tournament, the Huskies’ first Big Dance.
After 14 seasons coaching on Huntington Avenue, the Braintree native took charge of the hoop program at the University of Connecticut.
He’s done a fine job.
Calhoun has guided UConn to a pair of National Championships, most recently last season.
Some three years ago, Ron Everhart began coaching a Northeastern team that had fallen from its perch. NU had made the NCAA tourney six out of seven seasons in the mid-1980s. Yet, when Everhart took the job for the 2001-02 season, Northeastern had been dancing just once since the 1986-87 season (a 101-66 drubbing by North Carolina in 1990-91).
He’s done a fine job.
Since taking over the program (which was 27-58 in the previous three years) he’s gone 42-48. The team has improved its record each year, going 19-11 last season. The last two seasons (16-15 and 19-11) were the first back-to-back winning campaigns in 13 years of Northeastern basketball. Attendance is up 82 percent.
Monday in Storrs, Conn., the biggest coach in Northeastern history will face the future of NU hoop history.
Calhoun’s Huskies will win, of course. They are, after all, the defending national champions. These Huskies, the ones on Huntington Avenue, aren’t even the defending conference champions. But they’re getting there, they’ve just gotta make sure to hold on to Everhart.
Give him time to pick up where Calhoun left off.
It’s a growing tendency in Northeastern athletics for the best Husky coaches to be lured away by bigger schools and more-recognized programs.
Former football coach Don Brown shunned NU to work for the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
When Everhart inked a contract extension that would have him coaching at Northeastern through the 2007-08 season, he was also being courted by his alma mater, Virginia Tech. He’s been approached about coaching alongside good friend Bob Huggins at the University of Cincinnati.
Everhart is a passionate coach, not unlike Calhoun. He’s a high-energy leader on a high-energy team. And he’s got a scowl that rivals only my own.
As with Calhoun’s turnaround in the 70s and 80s, retooling the program has to start by retooling the roster. Calhoun’s first big recruit wasn’t Northeastern legend, former Boston Celtic and NBA All-Star Reggie Lewis. No, he built the team to that level with guys like Dave Caligaris, Pete Harris and Perry Moss.
In the same right, Northeastern star point guard Jose Juan Barea isn’t the new Reggie Lewis. But maybe he’s the new Pete Harris. Maybe the new Perry Moss is soon to follow. And, who knows, maybe Northeastern will eventually have another Reggie Lewis in waiting.
It starts, and ends, with Everhart. Without him and the success he continues to garner on Huntington Avenue, those future stars will be lost among the masses to bigger schools and better traditions.
Without Everhart, Husky fans will look sadly at Jim Calhoun and wonder where his suitor is.
We let one big fish off the line. Let’s not do it again.
– Jack Weiland may be reached at [email protected].
