• Wed, 02/08 | Men's Basketball at Sacred Heart L, 79-77 (Final) BX | RC
  • Sat, 02/04 | Men's Basketball at St. Francis (NY) L, 80-67 (Final) BX | RC
  • Thu, 02/02 | Men's Basketball at Long Island L, 75-70 (Final) BX | RC
  • Sat, 01/28 | Men's Basketball vs. Monmouth L, 78-68 (Final) BX | RC
  • Thu, 01/26 | Men's Basketball vs. Fairleigh Dickinson L, 66-63 (Final) BX | RC
  • Mon, 01/23 | Men's Basketball vs. Brown L, 67-60 (Final) BX | RC
  • Sat, 01/21 | Men's Basketball vs. Quinnipiac L, 78-71 (Final - OT) PR | BX | RC | LS | V | A | T
  • Thu, 01/19 | Men's Basketball at Central Connecticut L, 69-51 (Final) BX | RC
  • Sat, 01/14 | Men's Basketball at Mount St. Mary's L, 64-60 (Final) BX | RC
  • Thu, 01/12 | Men's Basketball at Wagner L, 78-61 (Final) BX
 

January 9, 2009

Providence Journal: Tim O’Shea is glad to take challenge of coaching Bryant

January 9, 2009

Tim O'Shea is glad to take challenge of coaching Bryant

Providence Journal
by Jim Donaldson

Bryant University has a losing record in this, its first season playing Division I basketball. The Bulldogs will almost certainly have one next year, too. And, probably, the year after that, as well.

But in the long run, it's a win-win situation in which Bryant and its new coach, Tim O'Shea, find themselves.

It's a win for Bryant, because O'Shea is exactly the sort of man you'd want coaching your basketball program. Assuming, that is, that you want a man who's both highly competitive and highly intelligent; who can identify not just talent, but also potential - which, if you're trying to build a program, is much more important; a coach who can X-and-O with the best in the business, both in practices and during games; who is cerebral, articulate, and has a value system that doesn't put winning and being a good player above being a good person and a good student.

And how, one well might wonder, is it a win for O'Shea, who has taken a step down, both professionally and financially, from his previous coaching job at Ohio U. - where he resigned after averaging 20 wins a year over the past four seasons, won the Mid-American Conference championship in 2005, and upset the likes of North Carolina, Maryland and Virginia - to take the job at Bryant, where he'll probably lose 20 games this season?

"You can quantify a pay cut," he said this week. "But I don't know how you can quantify improvement in quality of life. I'm working at a great university, for a great president, with a great bunch of kids, and living in the best place in America.

"I wake up every day looking at Newport Harbor," said O'Shea, who lives in a restored, 18th-century colonial in the Point section and commutes to Smithfield from Aquidneck Island.

"It's exhilarating for me to drive over those bridges twice a day," he said.

For those who find it baffling why a coach would take a pay cut and leave a successful, mid-major program to take over the newest program in Division I, O'Shea has a simple explanation.

"A lot of people," he said, "thought I was crazy."

But the truth is, O'Shea may be the sanest coach in college basketball.

"It comes down to values," he said. "What good is it if you're making a lot of money, but living in a place that doesn't feel like home?

"I've always felt Rhode Island is the greatest place in the country to live - especially Newport. I've never lived anywhere else I've felt this way about."

Read more from Jim Donaldson on Tim O'Shea here: http://www.projo.com/sports/jimdonaldson/sp_bkc_jim_donaldson09_01-09-09_UJCT564_v10.8df50b.html

 

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