Trying to grasp Brad Underwood is not precisely fixing the riddle of the sphinx. A knee-bending acolyte of the “Our Fathers of the Unflinching” Church constructed by Bob Huggins, Underwood is a disciplined, taciturn, hard-nosed coach who lengthy has most popular his gamers who’re molded in his personal likeness.
Or not less than he used to.
In the previous few years, Underwood has come to comprehend that a bunch of barking alphas could not, in truth, be the greatest option to construct a profitable pack. He’s additionally acknowledged that perhaps – simply perhaps – he has to provide a little to get. Perhaps meet his gamers the place they’re. Understand how they must be coached. God forbid, perhaps even really feel a little empathy for them every so often.
“I’m still disciplined, and I demand and expect the same things, but maybe tolerant is the right word?” the Illinois coach tells CNN Sports of his coaching evolution. “Or communicative. Definitely more communicative. I used to tell guys, ‘I need you to pitch the ball ahead because that’s how we do it.’ Now, I actually explain why.”
At 62, it is not a straightforward old lesson for an old canine like Underwood to grasp, but it surely is additionally the solely means he believes he can preserve successfully coaching.
“Acceptance is the best word,” he stated. “Accept the change and then figure it out for yourself.”
If that feels like the first in a 12-step program for basketball rebirth, properly, it kind of is.
This year’s Sweet 16 is a fascinating case research in the present cross- part of school basketball: A regional semifinal that would very simply be bifurcated by age. On the one facet, there are the old canine: St. John’s Rick Pitino, 73; Michigan State’s Tom Izzo and Tennessee’s Rick Barnes, each 71; Houston’s Kelvin Sampson, 70; and Underwood.
On the different, the younger bucks: UConn’s Dan Hurley and Nebraska’s Fred Hoiberg, each 53; Arizona’s Tommy Lloyd and Alabama’s Nate Oats, each 51; Michigan’s Dusty May, 49; Iowa State’s TJ Otzelberger, 48; Iowa’s Ben McCollum, 44 and Duke’s Jon Scheyer, 38.
And then the two tweeners, Texas’ Sean Miller and Purdue’s Matt Painter, 57 and 55, respectively, however head coaches for therefore lengthy that it is advisable to tack on some canine years.
The success of the (ahem) extra mature coaches flies in the face of the narrative following a spate of current retirements. In the final eight years, 4 Hall of Fame coaches (Mike Krzyzewski, Roy Williams, Jim Boeheim and Jay Wright) have walked away and two probably future Hall of Famers (Tony Bennett and, this yr, Greg McDermott) adopted them out the door.
The discombobulation of school athletics contributed to their hasty exits.
“I think I was equipped to do the job here the old way. That’s who I am,” Bennett stated at his 2025 retirement press convention.
Which, in flip, crafted a idea that maybe it was time for a new technology extra keen to delve into NIL and navigate the switch portal to take over.
Instead, right here comes the AARP revolution.
Rather than passing the torch, these older guys are reigniting it. Pitino simply led the Johnnies to their first regional semifinal since 1999 and Izzo is in his third in 4 years. Excluding the Covid-19 shutdown, Sampson has made seven consecutive Sweet 16s (to not point out two Final Fours) whereas Barnes has rolled to 4 second weekends in a row. Underwood has led Illinois up to now twice in the final three years and Calipari is engaged on Arkansas’ second consecutive Sweet 16.
“You know, you get to be 70, you realize it’s a young man’s game,” Sampson stated after Houston disposed of Texas A&M. “But we’re still having fun.”
Ah, enjoyable. Definitely the phrase one conjures when pondering of enjoying for Izzo, Pitino, Barnes, Underwood, Calipari and Sampson.
Fun like traipsing by means of a meadow of razor-tipped daisies.
“Well, the guys that played for me at UMass, they say I got soft,” Calipari stated throughout the first weekend of NCAA Tournament video games. “They look at me and say, ‘You are soft.’”
Soft Calipari earned himself a double technical for jawing with Florida coach Todd Golden earlier this month. Maybe not fairly the identical as being charged by an irate John Chaney threatening to kill him, however not precisely gentle, both.
The harmful false impression right here is to presume these coaches have launched into wholesale makeovers to succeed in modern-day basketball. They haven’t. With about 5 minutes left in a Big East Tournament closing romp towards Connecticut, Pitino’s sharp, New York-hewn accent lower by means of the Madison Square Garden din. “Zuby, get over here,” he stated, beckoning his Big East Player of the Year, Zuby Ejiofor, to him – he may need added a few different unprintable phrases. He rattled off some sternly delivered message that left Ejiofor elevating his eyebrows as if to say, “Dude, scoreboard.”
Izzo this yr instructed guard Kur Teng that he couldn’t defend his 99-year-old mom, and most everybody in Spartan inexperienced agreed it was the nicest factor Izzo had stated to Teng in ages.
Sampson’s Houston still performs like schoolyard bullies, there to pores and skin your knees and steal your lunch cash, and Barnes – who insists, if he have been a soccer coach, he’d run the Wing T – is still completely tremendous if Tennessee shoots fewer threes and runs its offense off exhausting screens.
There is, in truth, a stunning grace that comes together with doing one thing lengthy sufficient – and properly sufficient – to comprehend that you simply don’t need to cater to each new pattern to outlive. It additionally helps to have some gravitas. Four nationwide championships and 25 Final Fours permit the older coaches to thumb their noses at conference.
But this period calls for some bending. This is greater than the one-and-done period, which Calipari mastered; or the introduction of the 3-point line, which Pitino owned earlier than everybody else. NIL fee and the portal are wholesale adjustments in the right way to assemble a roster.
“In what ways are you adaptable, and in what ways are you uncompromising?” Barnes instructed CNN Sports. “That’s the secret.”
It’s most likely greatest to think about the six coaches on a spectrum – from most keen to vary (Pitino/Calipari) to most inflexible (Izzo and Sampson).
Tyson hen founder John Tyson actually staked his declare to Arkansas with a uniform patch. Pitino employed a TV crew to carve some house and garner some consideration in the very crowded New York sports activities menu. Underwood turned to a behavioral evaluation firm, Profile, that not solely does persona testing however implements AI in order that coaches may help refine what it is they’re in search of.
“It’s been refreshing for me,” Underwood stated. “It’s like reading a new book. The further you get into it, the more you get hooked.”
Meanwhile, Barnes could not love the three, however he is aware of he wants it. Hence why freshman Nate Ament and switch portal star Ja’Kobi Gillespie (Maryland) earned hefty NIL packages.
Michigan State’s beginning 5 is the just one in the total Sweet 16 to have began at the college they’re still attending. (By comparability, not a single Pitino participant is a native Johnny). But Izzo additionally brings two transfers off the bench (and would have added a third if Divine Ugochukwu didn’t get damage).
Sampson boasts that he’s solely had 4 transfers in 11 years.
“We just always grow our own food,” Sampson stated. “We don’t go to the grocery store and shop on aisle eight or aisle 10 or aisle 12. We just go in the backyard and pick our beans or get our corn.”
But he’s additionally buying extra at Whole Foods than Piggly Wiggly. His 2025 recruiting class, ranked third in the nation, included two potential NBA lottery picks in Kingston Flemings and Chris Cenac Jr., who additionally occur to steer the crew in scoring and rebounding, respectively.
The caveat to the old-man revolution is that the final plus-60 coach to win a nationwide champion was then 66-year-old Roy Williams in 2017. More, the coaches of the final three title-winning groups (Florida’s Todd Golden and Hurley) all come from the present crop of whippersnappers, as do the leaders of every 1-seed in this tourney.
But hey, 64-year-old Curt Cignetti received one for the gimpers in January.
Maybe, the tide is turning. Or extra precisely, receding, like a hairline.
