Pitino Searching For Answers Everywhere As Gophers Slide In Big Ten
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- It's been the winter of discontent for local sports fans, with the University of Minnesota men's basketball team, the Minnesota Timberwolves and even the Minnesota Wild really struggling through this first month of the year.
The toughest mountain to climb is Richard Pitino's Gophers, who will be fortunate to stay within 20 points at Michigan Wednesday night. They are 0-6 in the Big Ten and Pitino is using a few motivational speakers in an attempt to keep the spirits of his team up.
Richard Pitino is looking everywhere for answers. He ran into former NFL quarterback Rich Gannon and got some advice.
"He made a great point to me and you've all heard it. Sometimes you have to lose before you figure out how to win," Pitino said.
He brought in former Gopher rebounding machine Richard Coffey to talk to the team. Not only is Coffey's son going to play for the Gophers next year, but Richard himself is now a motivational speaker. It's his job to inspire others.
"He made a great line to our team. He said 'You've got to turn to courage when you lose confidence.' And it was a great point," Pitino said.
Pitino also tracked down Gopher volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon and asked how they've turned it around. That team made the national semifinals this past season.
"I brought him over and asked him what was the biggest difference between this year and last year? I said 'I don't know your team, did you have an influx of talent coming in?' He said no, people started to figure it out," Pitino said.
Because this team is stuck in a Big Ten bog and can't get out of it.
The only thing to salvage this season is next season. Do they have enough good young players that in the future they can be good again? And that Williams Arena can again be filled with fans, and can again become a home court advantage in the Big Ten.
This team understands it's not what it should be or could be.
"We had some outstanding crowds over the past three years and it has been a lot of fun and we're going through a tough time right now," senior Joey King said.
As for Pitino, he will stick with the analogies.
"It's like when you're going on a diet and you're trying to figure out how to lose weight and you're doing a million different plans. It's not as complex as we're really making it out to be," Pitino said.
