Winthrop proves its elite status in back-to-back championship appearances

 

Winthrop center Logan Duncomb earned Player of the Year honors as the Eagles won 23 games for the second year in a row. (Photo:  Big South Conference)

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JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. – Winthrop coach Mark Prosser spent Sunday in two places that have become familiar. One is a place he expects to be. The other is one he would rather never visit again.

Prosser’s Eagles entered the season as a largely unknown quantity, having lost a significant portion of their production from the year prior. This lack of knowledge about a lot of the new faces in the Eagle lineup led to a predicted fifth-place finish in the league. Prosser split Coach of the Year plaudits with High Point coach Flynn Clayman and his Eagles won 23 games while reaching the Big South championship game for a rematch with High Point.

Prosser sarcastically commented on the perceived preseason slight – “To finish 13-3 in a league where we were picked fifth – don’t think we forgot that or didn’t know that,” he said Sunday – then opined further on his team and their achievements.

Prosser did so from another familiar – and less desirable – place:  behind the microphone in a press conference while the league champion High Point cut down the nets and got showered with confetti.

“Just knowing what is in the heart of our kids,” Prosser said when explaining the thing that excites him the most about the program’s future. “They’re winners. They were winners before they got here. I think we have a brand of basketball that’s attractive to play in. I think we have a lot to sell in recruiting.”

“We’ve been fortunate to find success. That’s a weird thing to say (while) sitting in this press conference two years in a row and three of the past five, but we know there’s special in this program. There’s special out there for us. Every time you lose one, it just makes you more and more hungry for the next opportunity, and I think that message was passed on to the student-athletes we brought in this year. It will certainly be passed on to the next group of student-athletes we have right now.”

The sadness of the result was obvious – Prosser fought back tears and became audibly choked up at times when answering questions – but the head Eagle shares a distinction with his friend and former boss, Pat Kelsey. Kelsey’s Eagles lost three in a row between 2014-16 before finally breaking through in an epic 2017 tournament victory that spawned a run of three crowns in five seasons.

Prosser has carried Kelsey’s torch after leaving Western Carolina to replace him. His 101 wins in his first five seasons in Rock Hill represent a higher total than Big South legends and league champions Nick McDevitt (Asheville), Cliff Ellis (Coastal Carolina), and – interestingly – Gregg Marshall of his own school. Only Kelsey’s 102 wins eclipse Prosser’s total.

To know the impact Prosser and his staff have had on the program, one simply need ask his stars.

“I love this school so much,” Big South Player of the Year Logan Duncomb said after Sunday’s game. Duncomb had given up on the game before arriving in Rock Hill, and the trip netted him a slew of honors. His coach called his shot before the season, too, saying that Duncomb could be a Player of the Year candidate.

“They’re the school that gave me a chance,” Duncomb continued. “These coaches – they stuck with me and helped me grow a lot as a person and as a player. They filled the team with good players and good guys. It’s just one of the coolest teams I’ve ever been around. Everyone likes each other. Everyone hangs out with each other. Being here at Winthrop has been really special. It’s a different type of basketball that you can’t get anywhere else.”

Guard Kareem Rozier, who transferred from Duquesne before the season, was also vocal about his choice to wear the garnet and gold.

“The first call (when I went in the portal) was here, and I knew right and then that this would be the place I would call home to finish my career in college,” Rozier said. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Rozier then turned his words toward Prosser.

“You mean the world to me,” Rozier said. “You gave me an opportunity. You believed in me throughout this whole season, even when I was down. This is a family. I don’t want to ever take off this jersey. That’s how much it means to me to be a Winthrop Eagle.”

Though Prosser understands that there is an expectation to hang banners in the Winthrop Coliseum, he also has a clear grasp on the type of players that should be part of the program. Whether it’s legendary point guard Keon Johnson – who probably left a dent or two in the maple from crashing to the floor while driving to the basket – Duncomb or Rozier, or any of the other stars to help define the Winthrop way, Prosser is not shy about what composes that standard.

“We have a very unique group of kids that are about what it’s supposed to be about,” Prosser said. “They don’t worry about stuff on the outside that doesn’t matter. They sacrifice a lot for each other. They had opportunities throughout the season to second-guess or not buy in, and they never did that. What they did was unique and special, because a lot of times, that’s not what teams and student-athletes do these days. They just kept fighting and being together.”

“It’s hard to (reflect on the group’s legacy) at the moment. We’ve had a lot of really special kids. We have a staff that’s been together for a really long time. We have similar morals and things that we feel are important. We spend a lot of time in the identification process being meticulous and intentional about who we bring into our program. As people, we hit it out of the park this year. It’s hard with the transfer portal, where (the recruiting process) is like speed dating. You get to know somebody really quickly and see where it can go. They’re special kids, and that says much more about them than it does about us.”

The Eagles now turn their sights toward replacing ten seniors from this roster. We don’t yet know the names that will appear on the back of the jerseys, but we know the standard they will be expected to uphold. That standard is obvious in the words Prosser uses to describe Duncomb, who played in all three games of the conference tournament after a foot injury that required constant icing and a scooter.

“He’s a warrior, and we have a locker room full of them,” Prosser said. “Doing unique things takes special people. His story is an unbelievable one that should be celebrated for many more reasons than that alone. He’s a special human being, and so is (Rozier). So are the other 13 that are in the locker room right now.”

Gardner-Webb has everything come together in opening-round Big South Championships victory

Gardner-Webb celebrates its opening-round victory over USC Upstate Wednesday night. (Photo:  Big South Conference)

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JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. – Three wins. One against a Division I program. The outside noise. Hell, for that matter, the internal noise among the fans.

Throw it out the window. All of it.

In a season where highlights have been a challenge, Gardner-Webb saw everything come together. It wasn’t perfect – it never is. Whether there is another day to celebrate in the Mountain Empire for Gardner-Webb is to be determined, but the ninth-seeded Runnin’ Bulldogs knocked off eighth-seeded USC Upstate, 65-64, Wednesday night in the Big South tournament opener.

Excitement. Justification. Redemption. Catharsis. It was all that and more.

“It’s been a rewarding year. It’s been a frustrating year,” Gardner-Webb coach Jeremy Luther said after the game. “So many people – all the reporters and people around campus and around town, they all want to tiptoe up to me and ask, ‘How are you doing, Coach?’ Why are you doing that?”

“I’ve had a great – probably one of the most rewarding coaching years in my 28 years, because we’ve got a great group of kids, and they show up every single day, despite the record. They fight. They practice. There’s no reason to practice as hard as they’re practicing every day when you have the record we have.”

To have a season as Gardner-Webb has had is hardly unprecedented in this league. Asheville went 4=27 in Mike Morrell’s first season at the helm for the Bulldogs. Morrell is now the longest-tenured coach in the league, with a league title and a Coach of the Year award to show for it. Luther wants no part of anyone feeling sorry for him or his program.

“I’m not trying to sugarcoat anything, (but) the mark of a team is how they progress through the year,” Luther said. “When you start off 0-8 in the league and get beat the way we did in some of those games, then come back and play all these teams – Presbyterian beat us (by) 37 at home. We lost there by six. Asheville beat us by 19. We lost to them by four.”

“This team got better. I always said this team was going to be better. I really don’t care about the record. If I can keep this group together and all these freshmen become sophomores, the sophomores become juniors, and we can add a couple of people – we only lose two kids – I’ve been told we’re going to be able to go out there and get some kids like we used to get, we’ve got a chance.”

One of those freshmen to whom Luther refers provided a glimpse Wednesday of just what kind of chance the Runnin’ Bulldogs may have. Jamias Ferere, a 6-foot-6 freshman from the backyard of conference champion High Point, scored 21 and grabbed 12 boards. Ferere also sank the two winning free throws that helped Gardner-Webb advance.

“He came to me during (Upstate’s late) timeout and said, ‘Coach, give me the ball.’ He said that twice,” Luther said. Ferere expanded on his coach’s words.

“I wasn’t nervous at all. I told him to give me the ball,” Ferere said. “I’m not sure if I got it (by) accident or not. It came to me and I did what I said I could do. That’s what I pride myself on – doing what I say I can do. Getting to the line, it wasn’t anything to me. I just had to shoot them and knock them down.”

Ferere has a tie to Gardner-Webb’s prolific past. Ferere played at Putnam Science Academy in Connecticut, which has yielded Runnin’ Bulldog stars of the past like Jose Perez, Kareem Reid, and Jaheam Cornwall. Luther’s connections to the school have paid clear dividends, with the latest being Ferere.

“(Playing for Putnam) put me around other Division I players – guys more athletic than me, stronger than me, bigger than me,” Ferere said. “I played in many games with this type of atmosphere. You’ve got no choice but to survive.”

Ferere shows flashes of Perez as a shooter, as a driver, and as a believer in himself. Ferere offered a postscript following the press conference Wednesday evening.

“I was left off the All-Freshman Team, and I don’t want to make this sound selfish, but I don’t think there are five freshmen better than me in this conference,” Ferere said. “I’ve got a lot of respect for this conference. I’m from High Point. I grew up in it. I do not think there are five freshmen better than me. I think anything you look at will tell you that, as well as the eye test.”

Ferere apologized for his comments, but the point was made.

Gardner-Webb now moves on to face that team from Ferere’s hometown Friday at noon. Luther acknowledges the job Co-Head Coach of the Year Flynn Clayman has done and the differences between the two but refuses to shy away from the challenge.

“Flynn’s done a really good job,” Luther said. “I think it’s widely known that they’ve invested a ton into that program, and it’s gotten them to 25-4 or whatever they are, but that doesn’t take away from what Flynn’s done. I’m going to say this – I’m confident in my guys. (High Point) has played a lot of teams close.”

“I will say this about my guys – they’re going to go out there and fight extremely hard. We’re not going to back down. We’re going to make it a game. I feel like we’ve got a pretty good game plan. I’ll guarantee you this – if we score more than one point than they do, we win. We’re going to go out on Friday and give it everything we’ve got. I know everybody’s going to root against us – so be it. That’s fine.”

Whatever story Friday afternoon writes for this Gardner-Webb team, it will be a postscript to a story that reads like a line from a Jimmy Buffett song.

“Some of it’s magic. Some of it’s tragic.”

Luther and his players know how they will tell the story, though.

“You look at the season and you look at the record and you think, ‘Ah, man.’ I think it matured us,” Ferere said. “I think we kind of had to go through it for a moment like this. When you talk about a tense moment, we’ve had a few games where it was like this before. I’m a freshman, (guard Jacob Hudson) is a sophomore. Those moments built us for today.”

“I had, what, 21 (points) and 12 (rebounds)? That didn’t happen today. It was just a lot of stuff that we had to get through to get to a moment like this. I mean, we’ve still got a lot left to do, but I think if you look at it with the cup half-full instead of half-empty, the losses that we had, the tribulations we went through, they made us ready for this moment.”

Thanks to Wednesday, Gardner-Webb will get one more moment.