A very different version of the Primer was about to post Tuesday afternoon, drawing parallels between last season’s 91-71 loss at St. John’s on March 1 and Saturday’s loss at Xavier. The team CU was chasing a year ago also lost, leaving the door open a crack, and they won the final two games of the season to claim a piece of the title. Of course, that exact same thing happened this year — Villanova was upset by Butler, leaving the door open a crack — and with wins in their final two games of the season CU can make history repeat itself.
But that version of the Primer was scuttled when the bombshell news broke of Greg McDermott’s inexcusable use of the term “plantation” in his postgame locker room speech following the loss to Xavier.
His exact quote is head-scratchingly tone deaf at best, cringeworthy racism at worst. Where you fall on that spectrum may vary, but the same question remains: Why?
“Guys, we got to stick together. We need both feet in. I need everybody to stay on the plantation. I can’t have anybody leave the plantation.”
From our interactions with him over his years on the Hilltop, that’s not who he is. I’m confident in saying this was a slip of the tongue. Frustrated after a loss where his team played poorly, he meant to say something else. But a term hurtful to the players in his locker room came out instead. That can’t happen from someone in his leadership position and it’s completely inexcusable. Whatever the fallout is, whatever the consequences of it are, McDermott will have to accept his fate. He said those words. He’s apologized, but he can’t take it back. And whatever I or anyone on the outside thinks of that apology is just noise and fuel for the public relations inferno; National media is already lining up with their hot takes, as you’d expect.
It’s the players in the locker room — the ones the message was delivered to — who have to decide whether that apology has merit.
For the record, I don’t think it’s a fireable offense. His body of work should give him the benefit of the doubt that his apology is sincere, that he means it when he says that he understands how hurtful it was, and that he intends to follow through on doing everything he can to mend fences.
But if the young men in the locker room and their families who interact with McDermott every day disagree and decide this means they can’t trust or play for him anymore, that this is the end of the line for McDermott on the Hilltop, then it is. It’s an impossible spot for the athletic department; no matter what decision they make they’re in the line of fire, but continuing to employ a coach who his players won’t play for — and who recruits may very well refuse to sign with — is untenable.
It’s a shocking revelation about a coach who’s encouraged frank discussions about race with his players, arranged for video messages from his players talking about racial issues to be played on the video board inside the arena before games, and whose team wears the word “Equality” on the backs of their jerseys. It doesn’t make sense.
Creighton President Daniel Hendrickson and Athletic Director Bruce Rasmussen traveled to Cincinnati, where the team was staying and practicing in between games on this road trip, to meet with the players face-to-face. Rob Dauster and Jeff Goodman reported that as part of those meetings, McDermott broke down in tears as he apologized to his players and offered to resign. The team took a vote and decided they wanted him to remain as head coach, believing the apology was sincere and not just simply the kind of lip service leaders often offer when they apologize for a transgression.
That doesn’t seem to be unanimous, if you’re reading between the lines. Goodman also said he’s hearing he’s lost the trust of “a few players” in the locker room. ESPN’s Jay Williams says his sources tell him several players want to boycott tonight’s game, but aren’t sure how best to do it.
https://youtu.be/PR-armLWX60
McDermott gave his first public interview on the subject to 1620AM The Zone’s John Bishop for tonight’s pregame show, and they aired it this afternoon on Unsportsmanlike Conduct. Here’s the full interview:
“I hurt some people that are really, really close to me and that I care about deeply,” McDermott said in that interview. “And so while there’s people on the outside that I’m sure are disappointed as well, I need to take care of home first. That’s those guys in the locker room. They mean the world to me.”
He noted that he believes everyone will play tonight, and that everyone has practiced the last two days with that intention. McDermott said players who have been in the program longer, and known him longer, have reacted differently than players who haven’t had that experience.
“The first thing I wanted to make sure is whether the guys wanted me to coach them,” he added. “This is their team. They’ve had a special year, they’ve sacrificed a lot this year, they’ve invested a lot into it. And if they would have chosen to have me walk away, I would have walked away. But that is not what they wanted. They wanted to get back to the practice floor as quickly as possible. So that’s what we did.”
On the point of the timeline for releasing the news coming so far after it happened, McDermott said he initially wanted to go public with his apology right away. “The players did not want me to do that at that time,” he said. “They wanted to try to handle it internally. As time went on and I saw the distraction that it was causing our guys and our staff, I didn’t feel like that was a good option anymore. So after practice yesterday I revisited it with the guys and got their blessing on moving forward with (a public apology).”
So…yeah. That brings us to Wednesday night and what remains a de facto Big East regular season title game. There’s a dozen questions none of us had on our minds 24 hours ago. Will McDermott be on the bench? Will there be visible signs of division among the players? Are they still invested in this season enough to continue fighting for themselves, or was this the last straw in a season already fraught with peril because of COVID? Will they be mentally engaged enough to compete and perhaps win, or will Villanova blow them out? When tough moments arise during the game, will the players listen to McDermott or will they tune him out? What happens when McDermott faces the media following the game, and will his answers extinguish or fan the flames?
Winning at Villanova was always going to be tough. The Wildcats have 25 losses in Big East play since realignment, and they’re 21-4 in the next game. They’re also 39-1 in Big East games played on campus at Finneran Pavilion in that same timeframe.
The Wildcats enter Wednesday’s de facto Big East regular season championship game coming off of a loss, looking to avenge an earlier blowout loss to the Jays, AND it’s Senior Night for Jermaine Samuels, Collin Gillespie and others. However locked in and ready you think Villanova will be for this one, ratchet it up a few notches and that’s how locked in they’ll be. It’s hard to see Creighton, with all that’s transpired since Saturday’s loss to Xavier, being anywhere close to that. This one could get ugly. In fact, if I had to guess, I think it will.
- Tip: 7:30pm
- Venue: Finneran Pavilion, Philadelphia, PA
- TV: FS1
- Announcers: Gus Johnson and Bill Raftery
- In Omaha: Cox channel 78 (SD), 1078 (HD); CenturyLink Prism channel 620 (SD), 1620 (HD)
- Outside Omaha: FS1 Channel Finder
- Satellite: DirecTV channel 219, Dish Network channel 150
- Streaming on FoxSportsGO
- Radio: 1620AM
- Announcers: John Bishop and Brody Deren
- Streaming on 1620TheZone.com and the 1620 The Zone mobile app
- Satellite Radio:
- Creighton broadcast: XM channel 201
- Villanova broadcast: XM channel 84
- The Wildcats were a season-low 2-of-27 from the 3-point arc in Sunday’s loss at Butler (.007). It was the fewest 3-pointers the Wildcats made in a game since they went 1-of-11 (.091) in a 77-57 victory over Penn on Dec. 28, 2015.
- Over the past four seasons, the Wildcats have gone 19-14 in February (.576), including 4-3 in 2020-21. The 14 February losses outnumber the total number of defeats (11) Villanova has endured in the other months combined with the results of March 2021 still in the balance. In the previous three seasons, Villanova is 17-2 (.895) in March.
- Entering the final regular season home game, senior forward Jermaine Samuels Jr. has scored 789 points in 109 career games (7.2 ppg). His 504 rebounds (4.6 rpg) tie him with former teammate Mikal Bridges for 50th all-time at Nova. Since the start of 2018-19, the Wildcats are 31-5 in games where Samuels scores in double figures.
- In 117 games he has played as a Wildcat, Collin Gillespie has been on the winning side 93 times. With 359 career assists he stands 20th on the Wildcats’ all-time list. He has scored 1,259 career points and moved past former teammate Eric Paschall into 48th place all-time at Villanova in Sunday’s game at Butler.
- Creighton is 0-11 all-time when making eight three-pointers or less against Villanova, but 5-3 when making nine or more trifectas. CU has hit 65-of-127 treys (52.2%) in the five wins, but 78-of-250 triples (31.2%) in the 11 losses.
- Mitch Ballock will set a Big East record for conference games played should he take the floor on Wednesday. Currently he’s one of 37 players to appear in 72 Big East contests.
- With just two games left in the regular-season, only Creighton and Villanova can still win the Big East title. The team that doesn’t win it will be the No. 2 seed for the league tournament at Madison Square Garden. Villanova can clinch an outright title with a win on Wednesday, regardless of Saturday’s result at Providence. Meanwhile, with a win on Wednesday, Creighton could claim an outright title either by beating Butler on Saturday in Omaha, or if Villanova were to lose at Providence.
Villanova leads the all-time series with Creighton, 14-5, including an 8-2 record in the Philadelphia area. Creighton swept the regular-season series in 2013-14 with a pair of victories by 20+ points, but the Wildcats won the next eight meetings before CU topped ‘Nova in February of 2018.
Creighton has won the past two meetings (76-61 last year; 86-70 last month) and has never beaten the Wildcats in three straight meetings.
On March 3, 2003, the Jays closed down the Civic Auditorium Era with an 86-60 win over Wichita State. Happier times.
The Bottom Line:
Vegas pegs Villanova as 4.5 point favorites. But given everything else surrounding this game, I find it unlikely that the Jays will be within 10 points of ‘Nova by nights end.
#10 Villanova 82, #14 Creighton 70