By Andrew Parente
When it comes to coaching, Todd Townsend has some of the best credentials anybody can ask for: NCAA Final Four experience, being a former captain and giving back to the community.
Those are just a few things Townsend will bring to the table in his first year as an assistant coach of the men’s basketball team.
Townsend played four years at Marquette before becoming an assistant coach there in 2005, the same year he graduated. In 2003, he also started all 33 games for the Golden Eagles, a year where they went to the Final Four.
Now, Townsend joins head coach Bill Coen and the rest of the basketball staff as he tries to help lead the Huskies to another successful season in the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA).
“Coen was a huge influence in my decision to come here,” Townsend said. “You look at some of the things he has done, not only in recruiting, but in his overall commitment to the program, and that was really the main attraction.”
As Townsend sits in his office, which is still mostly empty except for a desk, a few chairs and a rack of basketballs, Coen resides in his office across the hall. Nevertheless, Coen is excited to have Townsend on board this year and said he believes he will be a key player in the team’s success.
“He is going to be a tremendous coach; he has got great energy and the ability to develop a tremendous relationship with the players,” he said. “Obviously his playing experience speaks for itself as he has played at the highest level and he is going to be a great addition to our program.”
At any level, in any sport, the relationship between coaches and players is sometimes overlooked. However, this is an aspect of sports that is very important to how a team performs on and off the field.
“The player-coach relationship is imperative. As a coach, you always need to be there for your players,” Townsend said. “When something isn’t going right for a player, especially off the court, it is important for a coach to be there in order to understand the player much better and be able to help out in any way that they can.”
There are many differences between a player and a coach, but somebody like Townsend who was still playing a short time ago can be crucial for any team and Northeastern is no different.
“Being a former player, I know what they are thinking especially when a coach starts to get on them,” Townsend said. “To me it’s not the difference between being a player and a coach; it’s the adjustments that I have to make.”
While at Marquette, Townsend spent a lot of time working in the community. He directed basketball camps, team outreach activities and was a Boys and Girls Club volunteer. This is something he hopes to continue in Boston.
“I recently signed up for the Big Brother, [Big] Sister program here, and that is something I really look forward to doing,” Townsend said.
Townsend was on the Marquette team that went all the way through the NCAA tournament and into the Final Four. The ultimate goal of any collegiate basketball player is to be able to get that far and have a chance at a national championship.
“Playing in the Final Four was something that really didn’t hit you at first,” Townsend said. “However, the Final Four really wasn’t our goal, it was our destination. We wanted to keep getting better and better as the season went on and we knew that if we did, that’s where we would end up.”
Playing alongside Townsend that year was current Miami Heat superstar Dwayne Wade.
“Dwayne was no different than anybody else other than he got a lot of press,” Townsend said. “But, he was also the guy that got kicked out of practice if he didn’t bring his best game.”
Looking back on it now, Townsend said he realizes how special it was to be able to play with somebody of Wade’s caliber.
“You really didn’t realize how good of a play Dwayne was until he left,” he said. “I think if he had stayed another year, we would have gotten back to the Final Four and won it.”
Marquette was beaten by Kansas in the national semi-final, but not before they upset Pittsburgh and Kentucky who were the No. 2 and one seeds, respectively. Marquette was number three.
“To play in front of 65,000 people in the New Orleans Superdome was just awesome,” Townsend said. “The cameras start flashing and you ask yourself, are we really here?”
The Final Four is something that was unknown to the CAA until recently when George Mason made an improbable run beating the likes of UConn, in the Big East Conference, and North Carolina, in the Atlantic Coast Conference. This has caused the CAA to gain more respect and become a very challenging conference to play in.
“Knowing that the CAA is one of the top Mid-Major conferences, I know it is going to be a tough road,” Townsend said. “I know that we are more talented than the team last year and I hope that we can continue to get better and better.”
