Corpus Christi Caller Times Caller.com - Islanders' coach Arrow seems at home with the media, but team still a mystery

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Thursday, October 28, 1999

Islanders' coach Arrow seems at home with the media, but team still a mystery
A&M-CC men's basketball squad concentrating on defensive commitment
By Bart Wright
Caller-Times Sports Editor

Two weeks before the start of the Grand Experiment at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, men's basketball coach Ronnie Arrow's quotes are already in midseason form.
   If only he could say the same for his team.
   At a media day gathering on campus Wednesday, Arrow heard athletics director Dan Viola talk about all the work he's consumed with in starting two basketball programs while other programs wind down and more are on the way. Viola implied that Arrow, with only a basketball team to coach, might have the best job on campus.
   "It's good to hear Dan reaffirm that I have the easiest job around here," Arrow said, the corners of his mouth cracking into a smile. "Dan informed me the other day that he's with me all the way - win or tie."
   And off we go into major college basketball, where games never end in a tie.
   There are only winners and losers, which can make it seem daunting for A&M-Corpus Christi, a school without a tradition, with no returning players, no seniors, no redshirt freshmen who have had a year to acclimate themselves, no video tape from last year's games to work on.
   What they have is a blank canvas.
   Daunting?
   "To me, that's the exciting part," said assistant coach Steve Green. "You're definitely going to get the credit for anything you do right, and we have to do better than last year, right?"
   Good point.
   Something has to be better than nothing.
   The potential here was enough to draw Green from San Diego State where former Michigan coach Steve Fisher took over last spring. Green stayed in San Diego for a few months, considered the options, and, after interviewing with Arrow, went with the palm trees and Texas surfers.
   "He grilled me on my offensive philosophy, we talked for a long time," Green said of his interviews with Arrow. "He wants me to run his stuff, obviously, but he made it clear he wanted me to have a heavy hand in what we were doing offensively."
   In that context, Green and Arrow come out of similar coaching molds, founded in the up-tempo offenses wing of the philosophy department in the Basketball Coaches' School.
   They are both to basketball what passing offenses are to football. Football coaches know kids love to pass and catch, and an offense that emphasizes that gains the advantage of having players practice in their spare time just for fun.
   It's the same thing with the offense Arrow and Green are implementing - run it and shoot it. Mix in a little offensive context and you have players practicing all the time.
   Defense is different.
   "We work every day on the defense," said Damian Kirkaldy, a 6-foot-9 Panamanian junior transfer. "But it's harder than it looks on TV. I've watched a lot of college games with the defenses all over the floor like we're trying to do - it isn't an easy thing."
   That's where Johnny Brown comes in.
   Brown is the first assistant Arrow hired. Took him away from Jerry Tarkanian at Fresno State.
   Long before he worked for Tarkanian, Brown played Tarkanian defense in high school in Southern California.
   "My high school coach, I think went to every clinic Tarkanian was ever at," Brown said. "We did that all through high school, then when I moved to Vegas (as a player for a World Basketball League team there), I started going to (UNLV) practices, got to know him a little."
   That led to four years of teaching the Tarkanian defensive principles, which are essentially linked to the matchup zone approach.
   Tarkanian called it The Amoeba defense.
   The one Brown is working on with the Islanders doesn't have a catchy name, but you can think of it as Amoeba Lite, which is to say they won't be doing all the elaborate switching and constant changing you notice in Tarkanian's defenses.
   But it's still a lot of work.
   "There is more man-to-man principle stuff here," Brown said. "We're defending the ball, denying the wings, a lot of pressure up the middle, that kind of thing. A lot of the principles are the same as Jerry's defenses, but we're doing it Ronnie style."
   And for as much as Arrow is known for his fast-paced offenses, he's aware of what separates winners and losers.
   "It's the same with football or baseball or anything," Arrow said, "you have to be able to play defense and that's something we're having a little problem with right now."
   There's still time.
   But the clock is ticking.



Sports Editor Bart Wright can be reached at 886-3745 or by e-mail at wrightb@caller.com

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