Northwestern University Athletics
Staying the Course
2/13/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
By Skip Myslenski
NUsports.com Special Contributor
The season opened with Duke, coming off a national championship game loss to Arkansas, ranked No. 8 and expected to carry on its tradition of success. But very soon dark-and-ominous clouds loomed over that storied program. On the first day of practice, during a layup drill, its junior guard Chris Collins broke his foot and then, mere weeks later, its coach Mike Krzyzewski underwent a back operation.
It would, despite those blows, survive well enough through its non-conference schedule, finishing that skein a respectable 9-2. But then, in its ACC opener, it fell to Clemson at home for the first time in 11 years, and two days later it was staggered again. Here Krzyzewski, whose rehab had gone poorly, was sent to the hospital by his doctor, and soon enough it was decided that he would not coach another game that season.
Into his place stepped Pete Gaudet, a restricted-earnings coach making approximately $300-a-week, and now it all simply unraveled for the Blue Devils. They lost their next eight conference games, and ended their year at 13-18, and finished last in the ACC with a record of 2-14. "For awhile a lot of us were feeling the weight of the program on our shoulders," the junior guard Collins would say back then in February of 1995. "Are we letting down the tradition? Are we going to be the downfall of everything that Duke has built?"
"That's what's different," Collins will say Thursday afternoon when reminded of that quote. "We're building a program. We're starting fresh and we're in year two. So I don't think our guys feel that. I just think competitively ... you look out here, the guys work hard. They put a lot into this. They watch film. They work. When you don't get to reap the rewards of that joyous locker room and feel the successes of what your work's putting out, it wears you down. That's kind of where we're at."
Did he feel worn down those 20 years ago?
"It's human nature," he says quickly. "You're going to be down because you're competitive. You lose 10 games in a row (as his `Cats have done), I don't care who you are. That's going to effect you. It effects me. No one likes going through a stretch like that. What you have to do, though, is you have two choices. You can lay down and wallow around and pity (yourself), or you can choose to get up and just start throwing punches and fight your way out of it.
"What we want to do is be that second group, that group that picks themselves up and says, `You know what? We're going to keep fighting `til the finish.' If we do that, hopefully we can finish this thing out strong and set the stage for what we want to do in the future."
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Last Tuesday, at home against Michigan State, the `Cats were not strong. Their losing streak had been built on a series of gut-wrenching and heart-rending defeats, defeats settled in the game's final minute, and by a pair of four-minutes lapses against Purdue and Nebraska. But here, against the Spartans, they appeared dispirited, and later Collins would say, "For the first time tonight, I felt like I saw some guys with their heads down a little bit, that looked a little defeated. When you go through a stretch and you're not rewarded, it's human nature to get a little beat down."
"Yeah, a little bit," guard Tre Demps will say when asked if he feels that way. "It's frustrating sometimes when you know very easily you could be five-and-six and we're not. We're one-and-10 (in conference play). That kind of cloud comes over you a little bit (and) it's going to remain until you win. But you've got to ignore it, ignore the rain, and just keep pushing forward and treating every day as a new opportunity and fresh start."
So now, as they prepare for Iowa's Sunday visit to Welsh-Ryan, it is not a matter of Xs and Os for the `Cats. It is instead a matter of the mind. "We," explains Collins, "have to reinvent ourselves this last month of the season. We've got to have fresh minds, we've got to have good enthusiasm. We had a stretch, where we played really well and got no results for it. That's what really hurt this team.
"Would we be talking differently right now if we had a win over Ohio State, Michigan State, we win at Maryland? Then we have four wins instead of one. It's the same team. We just didn't pull those games out. So you look at the record and you say, `Man, what the heck's going on?' But we've played some good basketball. We did not play good basketball on Tuesday. It was our worst game. We're disappointed about it, and we've got to get back on Sunday to playing like we played in games against good teams and we played them to the last possession."
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It blew double-digit leads against Virginia and North Carolina and lost to both in overtime. It lost four straight at home for the first time in school history. It lost to Wake Forest by one, to Maryland (twice) by two, to Florida State by three. "There's things when I was a player back then that I wish I would have done differently. I wish I would have been a better leader," Chris Collins says Thursday, thinking back to that winter 20 years ago.
"I was a junior on that team. We didn't have Coach K. We didn't have our leader. I was a veteran on that team and I wasn't happy about the way I acted. I could have been better with keeping our spirits up. I use that. I told the guys, `I was on a team that went two-and-14 in the ACC and finished last a year after it played in the national championship.' So I've been through a bad year. I've been through tough times. I've been through losses, and you try to use those experiences to keep these guys fresh and upbeat."
So, back then, did he experience the same feelings now endured by his team?
"For sure. Everyone was crushed," Chris Collins finally says. "What's funny is, it was very similar to this team. We were like in every game. We lost a lot of games in the last two minutes. We had a chance to win some games and just didn't do it. It was tough. It's not fun. It's not fun. No one wants to lose. But hopefully it makes you stronger, and hopefully it will make the end result that much better.
"We've just got to stay the course. For us, we have to stay the course of what we're doing. We're going to continue to work. We're going to continue to fight. And we're going to continue to develop. I haven't wavered on that."
POSTSCRIPT: In that '94-'95 season Collins, coming off his injury, averaged just 3.9 ppg while shooting 29.8 percent overall and 23.3 percent on his threes. A season later the Blue Devils finished 18-13 overall and 8-8 in the ACC and Collins averaged 16.3 ppg while shooting 46.7 percent overall and 44.1 percent on his threes.
He, then, knows all about staying the course.
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