The RoundHouse | 3/21/2019 6:49:00 AM
By
Paul Suellentrop
GREENVILLE, S.C.
A package with a VHS video-tape arrived in the Winthrop University basketball office in Rock Hill, S.C., mailed from New Zealand with the blind hope that someone will watch and fall in love with a basketball recruit.
This love story seemed destined to stall before coaches had a chance to watch one shot, hit rewind, and watch again.
"That video-tape, at the time, was in a New Zealand format that you couldn't play in America," said Damon Stephenson, a former Winthrop assistant. "I'm telling you right now, I would have thrown it out."
Stephenson, on his way to another job that summer of 2002, gave the tape to his replacement. They both knew their boss, coach
Gregg Marshall, expected someone to watch the tape. Marshall's voice in their heads asked "Did you get it done" and the circle on his ever-present written check list demanded resolution.
"Those things don't fall through the cracks with him, and it's because he'll hold you accountable," Stephenson said. "You'll see an envelope, and I don't know if he still does it or not, that will have a list of things and there will be a circle. And the circle will either be filled in or not. And if it's not filled in, he's coming back to you."
The assistant coach filled in that circle by finding someone in nearby Charlotte, N.C. who could convert the VHS format to one they could play in an American VCR. On that tape, Marshall found center Craig Bradshaw, who earned All-Big South honors and scored 24 points in an NCAA Tournament win over Notre Dame as a senior in 2007.
Those are the memories that ran through Stephenson's mind this week in Greenville, S.C. as he joined Marshall for Wednesday's 76-70 NIT win over Furman. Those are the details that produced Wednesday's victory No. 500 for Marshall, 306 in 12 seasons at Wichita State and 194 in nine seasons at Winthrop (1998-2007).
The setting made sense for Marshall, in front of his mother and father and friends and family, close to his deep South Carolina roots at Winthrop and the College of Charleston. He won many of those Winthrop games in small gyms against low-profile opponents after a bus trip. The arenas are bigger and his team mostly travels on chartered jets now. Wednesday's win offered a comforting throwback feel, coming against a school he remembered watching in the Southern Conference Tournament as a youngster and against a young coach trying to build a program much like he did at Winthrop.
In 2011, he won career game No. 300 at Davidson in North Carolina, so he appreciated the geography of returning again to this part of the country for a milestone game.
"This is a special win because of those circumstances and because we beat a really good team," Marshall said. "You'd rather beat a good team, and especially on the road."
Stephenson saw victory No. 1 as an assistant on Marshall's first staff at Winthrop and No. 500 as a fan, his son wearing a No. 14 Graham Hatch jersey. The Stephenson family met the Shockers at the hotel on Tuesday, part of the collection of friends all coaches accumulate during their careers, people willing to travel, encourage, console and celebrate during the wins and losses. Rich Jablonski, who met Marshall when he was an assistant coach at the College of Charleston, also met the Marshalls and the Shockers with hugs and smiles at the hotel.
"It's a tight little group," Stephenson said. "The Marshalls are loving people. It's born out of years of loyalty. He was there when we got married. He was there when we had Isaak. We've been really close to them and it's much more about how they feel about our family than any of the basketball stuff."
The basketball stuff provides a great reason to get together. Stephenson, who lives in Florida and works as a basketball scout, and Jablonski, still in Charleston, pop up on Shocker road trips, often during the NCAA Tournament. Stephenson organized Wichita State's exhibition tour of Canada in 2016 and made the 2013 Final Four and last season's American Athletic Conference Tournament in Orlando.
His visits to Wichita happened most often early in Marshall's tenure and he said he remains close with former Shocker Matt Braeuer, now an assistant coach at North Texas. Marshall needed his friends that first season when the Shockers went 11-20 in 2007-08.
"We had to love on Gregg quite a bit," Stephenson said.
Jablonski traveled to San Diego for last season's NCAA Tournament and the conference tournament in Orlando. He came to Koch Arena in 2009 to see the Shockers beat Creighton to snap a six-game losing streak and change course for the rest of Marshall's tenure.
"There was no small amount of tension before that game," Jablonski said, thinking back to practices before that game. "A lot of people felt it. That was a very, very good win. And I think a lot of people got a sense of what could be."
Their discussion of Marshall's success starts with smarts, on and off the court, and hard work and always returns to attention to detail and a demand that others follow that lead. Jablonski, who did play by play on the radio for College of Charleston games, saw Marshall use those habits, just as Charleston head coach John Kresse did.
"He expected that of himself and when he was with Coach Kresse, I saw it expected of Gregg – Coach Kresse was a very hard driver," Jablonski said.
Stephenson, who also worked with Marshall as a graduate assistant at College of Charleston, spent four seasons at Winthrop, all ending in the NCAA Tournament.
"I've never been held to a higher level of accountability than I was when I worked with him," Stephenson said. "Everything else I've done since pales in comparison, because I always had that standard of performance that was demanded of me. It's not customary. I now see why we won. People don't do that. He does it quite naturally, quite organically."
Paul Suellentrop covers Wichita State athletics and the American Athletic Conference for university Strategic Communications. Contact him at paul.suellentrop@wichita.edu.
