Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes talks with Jordan Bone (0) and Jordan Bowden (23) in the second half of an NCAA college basketball game against Vanderbilt Tuesday, Jan. 9, 2018, in Nashville, Tenn. Tennessee won 92-84. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)Hooray for Rick Barnes.
Discussing tonight’s road game against Missouri a couple of days ago, the University of Tennessee basketball coach said of Mizzou’s Cuonzo Martin, who coached the Volunteers from the fall of 2011 through the spring of 2014: “I’m not sure how he was embraced. But if he wasn’t fully embraced, people should be ashamed, because I’m going to tell you the guy is a heck of a person and he’s a heck of a basketball coach.”
Finally. Someone with Big Orange ties who is strong enough to speak the truth about the most unloved good coach and great guy the university ever employed. And a Sports Illustrated article concerning Martin that hit the internet Tuesday explains both those observations in superb detail. But more on that in a minute.
To briefly return to the 2013-14 season – which ended with the Vols in an unlikely but hugely impressive Sweet 16 run that might have reached the Elite Eight without an official’s questionable call late in that 73-71 loss to Michigan – whether it was a very vocal minority or an apathetic majority, no one ever got the sense that Martin was warmly embraced by the Big Orange masses.
In fact, if only for that uncomfortable online petition that final winter to “Bring Back Bruce (Pearl)” – the one that supposedly garnered more than 36,000 signatures wanting Pearl to return to Big Orange Country despite his NCAA rules violations – it seemed obvious that too many Volniacs wanted anybody but Martin.