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SPRINGFIELD — Missouri State Bears head coach Paul Lusk sat down with Chad Plein recently to discuss critics of his program, the future of the roster, and scheduling.
CHAD: “Is there anything you’d like to say to fans or people about moving forward, and how this program is looking?”
LUSK: “I think that number one, certainly we understand and I understand that there’s disappointment. No one is more disappointed than me at times. We felt like this season we were going to have a breakthrough, Chad, we really did. We are 11-4 at one time, 2-0 in league play, and we really I thought were finding ourselves, and from that point on we didn’t, we didn’t go forward like we needed to. And we lost a lot of close games, we did have some good moments, but I think we had a winning season. And I think the wins are going to come. And I understand there’s going to be frustration, all I can do is concentrate on my job, do the best of my ability. I do think we have a good nucleus coming back. There’s no doubt that we need to sign some guys, and we still are recruiting, but I feel good with where we are at. Even at the ended the season, the way we played in St. Louis. To be able to beat Northern Iowa two out of three times and Northern Iowa is a program that has been consistantly one of the better program’s in this league, and to beat them two out of three times that was a big moment for us, and I think we played very competitively against Wichita State. But we have to make improvements, I have to improve, our team has to improve, but I look forward to doing that.”
CHAD: “You have three seniors who’ve graduated, Ronnie Rousseau had to leave the team, and everyone understands that, everybody has his support, is his scholarship still available? How many scholarships do you have available? What are your wants and needs?
LUSK: “His scholarship is available. Obviously, he was to be our point guard and even into this upcoming season. We didn’t expect any of that to happen and I will say this, it greatly effected our team. I don’t know if we ever were the same team. But, none-the-less, you still have to produce. So yeah we’re we’re currently looking and then I haven’t had my individual meetings with guys yet because of spring break, but I think the national average is one and a half to two players per program that leave. We’ll see what happens, we will be prepared.
CHAD: “Putting myself in your shoes, you have a 12-piece puzzle that you and your coaches are putting together. I know coach (Corey) Gipson, coach (Matt) Sligh, and (Keith Pickens) they’re all out there doing their great jobs. You have that 100% puzzle, and then a piece goes missing like Ronnie last year, which was unfortunate. Other years there’s injuries, happens to everybody. There’s players who have left your program, I’ve looked and a majority of them have gone down a level. All I can think of is the word frustrating. Maybe Springfield, Missouri State, and the Valley hasn’t seen a 100% Paul Lusk staff.”
LUSK: “Well I really do think in year three and we thought that was gonna be a tremendous year for us, and we ended up winning 20-games, but then we lost Marcus Marshall to an injury. And that we had other injuries to deal with, Ron Mvouika would have been our second best player, and he didn’t play, and none-the-less, we still had a solid season. And then to be brutally honest year four was very difficult. Very difficult. And then here five, I thought when (Obediah) Church and (Jarred) Dixon and (Ryan) Kreklow were freshmen, I thought we made strides and we won eight league games and I thought we were gonna take off this past season. I think we were in position at 11-4 and I thought with the way we were playing we could contend. Then it wasn’t from an injury, we’ve had injuries, but a personal issue, and that effected us. We still won 17-games, we wanted to win more. It didn’t happen, but I think we’re close. That’s evident of the close losses we had. We had seven games that came down to one possession. And you say, ‘you still have to win those games,’ we were capable of winning but didn’t. And that’s an area we can grow in. Sometimes winning is the last thing that happens. You talked about my staff, they’ve done a terrific job. We have put together back-to-back classes with (Church’s) freshman class and Jordan Martin was a part of that class, and then this current class we just brought in last year, they were outstanding for us. Greg Williams was another great signing for us, he was unable to play for us, but those two classes were outstanding and I feel like the class we just signed will help us. We have 60% of our scoring back, 70% of our rebounding back, that’s the most we’ve had. I think they’re be greater carry over. We still have pieces we need to add. I think Alize Johnson; I’ve gotten calls from NBA teams and they’ll be in early and often, that’s when they’re most interested. He has a bright future. And Jarred Dixon is a kid that made the all bench team, played great, he’s just a sophomore. Ryan Kreklow is a guy we need to continue to develope. Church was on the all defensive team, he is a guy who lead the league in blocks, he’s continuing to develope. I think Jarrid Rhodes is a guy who can make great strides. So we feel good about the pieces we do have, guys do need to continue to improve, we have to improve as a staff, everyone across the board has to improve. Because, we want to win a championship and go to an NCAA tournament. I thought this past season, the way it was going and we were progressing, we had a chance, it didn’t happen. But we’ll continue to work.”
CHAD: “And, I know you only care about Missouri State. But when you see what happened to Illinois State, and they’re RPI and record, and being shutout of the Big Dance. When you look inward, is scheduling something you want to stress? How does that all work?
LUSK: We all have different resources from a scheduling standpoint. We know the BCS schools will do what they want. I think it’s an absolute shame Illinois State did not get in. They have a good schedule. A year ago at this time, there was only one mid major who got an at large bid, and that was Wichita State. Wichita State is dominant; proven by their scoring margin. We have a good league. Everyone works continuously to schedule. The average person has no idea how hard it is to schedule. And that is ongoing. I think bringing the Mountain West Challenge back has helped. We have a very good Colorado State team coming in next year. But we have work to do with the schedule. For a league like the Valley, everyone thinks people will just come here, all the BCS schools aren’t coming here and it becomes very difficult to get games – to start quality home-and-home games – whether its dates… and it’s just a big piece of the puzzle, but a very important piece of the puzzle.”
CHAD: “Anything else you’d like to say?”
LUSK: “I’m excited. You mentioned some of the frustration, I understand that. We averaged 73-points per game this year, we were one of the best three-point shooting teams in school history. We let our guys play, especially when we had all of our guys, we were a free flowing team. Due to that freedom, we turned the ball over too much. But I think we have an opportunity to be a very good team next year. We need to make strides. Year four was very tough, year five we made improvement and I think we made improvements this year, not to where it needs to be, but we’re moving in the right direction. I’m thankful I’m here, because I want to get this done, it’s my responsibility. And I understand everything falls on the head coach, good or bad, that’s part of this profession. But I’m committed to getting this done. I think we’ve got good pieces to do that. I think the players are committed to that, we need to have a productive offseason and I feel like our guys will do that.”
