Manhattan’s first chapter in new regime a teaching moment for a bright future

John Gallagher and Manhattan only won seven games this year, but Jasper future now has clarity after a year of uncertainty. (Photo by Bob Dea/Daly Dose Of Hoops)

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — John Gallagher came to Manhattan College last March with battle scars that had not yet healed, but a vision of how to dress the reconstructed tissue.

Gallagher arrived in Riverdale amid consternation from the fan and alumni bases after one of its own, RaShawn Stores, was unfairly snubbed. The road ahead did not get any easier for the coach, as he soon became saddled with the responsibility of not only healing his own wounds from the bitter ending beyond his control at Hartford, but also the breach between supporters who were placed at a crossroads by a program and administration that chose to willingly disconnect itself from them.

The big picture was always clear from the start for Gallagher. How it was drawn, however, was far different than the finished product of a 7-23 season marked by injuries, adversity, but most of all, evolution both on and off the floor.

“When you take a job over, you have to build the blocks,” Gallagher reiterated. “The last thing you see is the winning. I can’t tell you how proud I am of where we came from after losing Brett Rumpel and obviously the array of other injuries we had, and the fight and toughness that we played with. We were getting drilled in January. We didn’t do a great job and we didn’t have answers to make adjustments. We kept growing, we kept working.”

With wins in three of their first four games, the Jaspers demonstrated an ability to perhaps outplay their low expectations. That changed on November 24, when point guard Brett Rumpel tore his ACL in the second half against UConn, forcing Gallagher to adjust on the fly with a young roster struggling to find its way. The emergence of freshmen Seydou Traore and Jaden Winston as not only reliable hands in their first years at the collegiate level, but also future program cornerstones along with sophomore forward Daniel Rouzan, suggests that the hardest part of the build may now be in the rearview mirror.

“I said to my staff six weeks ago, about 150 teams will mail it in the last week of February and March,” Gallagher revealed. “I said, ‘we’re not going to do that, I don’t care what happens.’ We had to will this team to the finish line.”

Manhattan reached its destination, partially fractured, but also in some ways whole. Gallagher recognized the need to recruit shooters to place around the troika of Winston, Traore and Rouzan, but also addressed a desire to double down on the blue-collar fabric for which his Hartford teams came to be known.

“In college basketball as a head coach, what we did at Hartford and what I’m trying to do here is, you lease it or you own it,” Gallagher explained. “You just saw two guys (Winston and Traore) that own it. What does that mean? They’re changing the oil in the program, they’re changing the tires, they’re making sure that the car is running. We’re moving forward because they own the program. Jaden and Seydou can be the face of our program the next three years.”

“Everyone’s going away from the old-school values. We’re going back to the neighborhood values. I was shying away from doing the whole neighborhood thing because I did it at Hartford, but what’s a more neighborhood school in the world than Manhattan College? We’re transforming the program. It takes so much work, but they’re owners. So if they go to another program and they take the check, what happens is they’re leasing that experience.”

Gallagher, a perpetual optimist by nature, is content with assuming the costs associated with reconstructing the Manhattan program as its new homeowner, so to speak. Where he draws more satisfaction, however, is in the renovations that lie ahead. And if that means writing off this now-concluded first year to further the long-term blueprint, so be it.

“As we move forward here, I’m really excited for the future of our program,” he proclaimed. “We lost, but we’re building. We’re growing, we’re representing what the program is coming to be. I owe it to them to work for the next three months every day to get players in here to try to be a championship program.”