By Pete Sweeney SYRACUSE (Newhouse Sports Media Center) - After about twenty minutes ticked
by in Syracuse Head Coach Scott Shafer’s Texas Bowl press conference last
Friday, a reporter in one of the first few rows finally had the floor.
“Does it feel strange at all, still
talking about—“
And with that, he was cut off.
“This is my guy right here.” Coach
Shafer said. “You’re a Syracuse guy, right?”
The reporter confirmed and Coach
Shafer proudly pumped his fist in the air.
“Go Orange baby!”
It’s been five years since Scott
Shafer arrived on the Syracuse campus. Then, it was 2009 and the challenge he
faced was daunting—a defense that ranked 101 in the nation—one that he was
expected to turn around. But as intimidating a task as that seemed, Shafer
never balked. He rose up to the challenge with positivity, enthusiasm, energy,
and a deep sense of pride.
Today, as Syracuse’s head coach, all of those
same qualities he brought to the table originally have not waned. If anything, they
seem to have only amplified.
As
there are no major league professional teams in the area, members of the
Syracuse community collectively share a strong connection with the university’s
athletic programs, especially basketball and football.
On the basketball end of things,
there’s Jim Boeheim, someone that strong connection has made famous in this
city and across the sports world. For more than 50 years, starting as a player and for the last 37 years as head coach, Boeheim has bled
Syracuse Orange, a quality you can already tell Shafer shares in year one at
the helm.
“[The job has] been everything I expected and everything I signed up for,” Shafer
said at the press conference. “I love
the job. I really do. I can’t believe I have had the opportunity to coach at
Syracuse. Such a great institution.”
Boeheim provides someone for
Coach Shafer to look up to. The basketball legacy of more than 900 wins, four Final
Four appearances, and a national championship paints a clear picture of what
Shafer strives for.
“We’ve got
a great blueprint watching Jim Boeheim build that program,” Shafer said. “I’m
so lucky to have somebody like that to just watch, look, read about, ask
questions about what it’s going to take to try to get our football program to
some sort of level just close to what he’s done. Scratch the surface, I’d be
happy.”
As far as
beginnings go, Shafer started off in a similar fashion to Boeheim. Both men
began as assistants who helped to turn their programs around by the time it
was their turn to be a head coach.
In Boeheim’s first season as head coach,
he took Syracuse to the NCAA tournament and lost to Charlotte in the Sweet
Sixteen.
In
Shafer’s first season, he has done something a lot of fans and media did not think
was possible before the season began—he has reached a bowl game.
On
December 27, Shafer’s team will face off against the Minnesota Golden Gophers
at Reliant Stadium in Houston for the Texas Bowl Championship. Beating
Minnesota would clinch a winning season for the Orange, something Shafer hopes to make a precedent for years to come.
By having a chance to bring a trophy back to Syracuse, Shafer has earned the opportunity to take that first step of many that it will take to reach the
likes of Jim Boeheim.
But if
you’re going to climb the mountain, you’ve got to start somewhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment