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‘Beating the shit out of them’ — figuratively Chaney treated the media well, and was always honest with them so you could say that the adoration he’s received in the past two days is kind of a sham, but I don’t think that explains it all. Like him or not, Chaney was brutally honest. Looking at an old column I wrote, I found this quote from the grizzled veteran:
I think that’s why people liked him even when he did wild things like threaten to kill John Calipari or even send in a player for hard fouls (and end up having said “goon” break a St. Joe’s player’s arm). He did things his way (and, well, St. Joe’s does get away with illegal screens). Whoever Temple hires to coach the basketball team next may not make embarassing headlines like Chaney occasionally did — unless it’s ex-Cincy coach Bob Huggins — but he sure won’t be as interesting. And I doubt the new coach’ll do as good of a job getting disadvantaged kids to graduate college. He might even be really boring. And, in a sports world sometimes devoid of honest, hard-working, interesting people, that’s kind of a shame. Palestra hosts a Classic [Daily Pennsylvanian] |
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Back when I was a college sportswriter, I covered Temple several times, interviewed John Chaney on a number of occasions and, being a city native, generally liked the man. Sure, he lost his temper a bit too much, and Temple never made the Final Four — although they would have in ‘93 had Chaney not been hit with that technical foul — but, hey, you can’t have everything.
If one criticizes chaney for never making the final four they are crazy. we in philadelphia take for granted that temple is reasonably good at basketball, but do you understand what an undertaking it was to get to that point. have any of you ever been to temple’s campus. how would you like to recruit with the intentions of contending nationally in any sport at that location? what is more amazing is what the place looked like when chaney started there. they played in a gym that held nobody on a street lined iwth boarded up houses. the man is an all-ime great coach and i am certain he does it for embarassingly less money than lesser coaches make. not only that but he almost sabatoges his teams record before the season starts by scheduling every nationally ranked team he can find for his nonconference schedule. temple should have never gotten good at basketball. they should not have a nationally recognized program but chaney made it happen. he scrapped it together and made something out of nothing. he was truly amazing and that is what we need to realize.
Bob Huggins has a much worse reputation than he deserves. He is a great coach and cheap shots like that are absolutely retarded. Much like chaney, Huggins also tried to take troubled kids off the street and create an opportunity for them. Almost all of Huggins former players consider Huggins to be a second dad to them. Yet, in the eyes of everyone else, he recruits thugs, and they cause problems. I could go on for a long time and point at a lot of stuff but that would take much too long. Whoever wrote this story is ignorant. You through the huggins thing in because that is what you have heard on tv about him. Oh well, Bob Huggins is already a much better coach and at the end of his career, will be a better coach than Chaney hands down. I do respect Chaney and think he has done a good job though.
Temple should consider themselves lucky if they were to get Huggs. He and Chaney are much alike.
People must remember the bad press Huggs got came from Cincinnati……I live here…remember we are the uptight city that likes to make outselves known form things like art trials and jerry springer…Our media people can’t print it if it isnt slimy..Cincys loss of Huggs will be someone’s gain. His guys always loved and respected him and he them .
Bob Huggins made embarassing headlines while coaching Cincinnati. I don’t really see how you can argue with that; it’s kind of a fact.
What’s worse? A DUI or threatening to kill someone or sending in a goon to intentionally hurt someone?
Oh? You say he didn’t send in the goon to intentionally hurt someone……that it is something that is misconstrued by the media and fans? Well…..imagine that.
Same goes for Bob Huggins. He deserved to be fired for the DUI…….and Chaney deserved to be fired for many things along the way also. But I respect both coaches. They both took troubled kids and gave them opportunities. They both took immaturity and laziness and turned it into young men.
I’m not a Bob Huggins lover……..but I do get sick of listening to the cheap shots about the guy. He has more upside than downside. He doesn’t care what the media thinks………he only cares about his players.
One more example: Robert Whaley came to Cincinnati with alot of baggage including a black mark of a former rape accusation. Many schools backed off him but Huggins gave him a chance. He was very lazy when he played at UC for a year. The adminstration decided to give him the boot because he wasn’t keeping up academically, and some were worried about his past tarnishing the program. Huggins didn’t want to boot him but had no choice. So Huggins helped Whaley get into Walsh College. Whaley went on to be player of the year in that division of basketball and a model student. He also went on to the NBA and got drafted. But along the way, Whaley said in an article that while at Walsh College, he talked with Huggins a minimum of once a week. Whaley said that Huggins had the most impact of anyone in his life.
How many head coaches would continue to help a kid even after having to boot them from their program? That is the truth about the man named Bob Huggins. But keep on trashing him. But the truth is………he gives more of a damn about these kids than you or I do and especially the media. And for that, I will applaud him.