PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Occasionally you’ll see on social media or hear bar conversations about who the toughest coach is in a certain sport. Who could take who? Potentially there could be a new favorite or at least someone you wouldn’t want to mess with on the sidelines.
Former Big East Rookie of the Year DeJuan Blair is coaching the Zoo Crew team in The Basketball Tournament. TBT is mostly alums from various Division 1 and other college basketball programs getting back together and competing in an NCAA Tournament-style bracket. It has Blair thinking about a future in coaching.
“It’s tough, at the same time I’m having so much fun with it,” Blair said of being a head coach. “I’m enjoying it a lot. I think it is a start.”
It’s obviously not a full-time opportunity, but he’s taking it seriously. To see him at practice with a star with his arms crossed yelling ‘rebound’. You know if needed he could get out there and demonstrate. He might still be playing if not for no longer having knee ligaments.
He laughed when asked if he would patrol the sidelines like his college coach Jamie Dixon. The former Pitt head coach is still notorious for constantly moving on the sidelines, never at rest, always using not only his voice, but body language to get his point across. So would he be like Dixon?
“Jamie gets excited and he’s running around spitting on everybody,” Blair said with a big smile. “I’m just going to let them play. I feel like we are doing everything we need to do take it on the court. If I see some mistakes, I will try to correct them. We have the General (Levance Fields) out there and Sam (Young), I think we will be good.”
He took another first step into coaching by doing some recruiting. He said he had to pull a few favors to get Fields and Young to play. Young has been retired for a couple of years, but still shows a lot of high-quality game including the still deadly ball-fakes. Fields also has game and commands the floor.
Blair said his plan is for players to get Young the ball. He said he will use the foundation all on the team learned at some point playing at Pitt to make the offense work. It’s a team with players who played their whole careers with the Panthers (Young, Fields, Talib Zanna, Gary McGhee, Gilbert Brown-who is also the team general manager) and those who played part (Josh Newkirk, Nelly Cummings, Greg Elliott, Ryan Luther-although he will miss the first game).
“He’s been bringing the same intensity he brought when he played,” Elliott said of Blair. “You can definitely see it, especially if we have a draught and we are not rebounding. That’s when you see his intensity really come out.”
He’s leaned on current Pitt head coach Jeff Capel for assistance and called him a great help. Capel has had Blair speak to his teams about Pitt tradition, now Blair said it’s cool to just be able to talk with him about coaching. As for his advice?
“Have them be poised and don’t think a lot,” Blair said. “Don’t think about the million dollars, just have fun and try not to get hurt.”
Blair won this tournament with a few of his old Schenley High School teammates a couple of years ago. He knows what it takes, but hasn’t done it as a coach.
“It’s fun,” Blair said. “You are spreading your knowledge, you are trying to put them in the best position to win. Hopefully we can pull it out. We are going one game at a time.”
He then ended with something that sounded very DeJuan Blair.
“We don’t plan on losing.”