University of Oklahoma Athletics
OU, Marquette Basketball Staffs Convene in Norman
September 06, 2005 | Men's Basketball
NORMAN, Okla. - Oklahoma's Kelvin Sampson and Marquette's Tom Crean spent three weeks together during the summer of 2004 helping the USA World Championship For Young Men Qualifying Team to a gold medal in Halifax, Nova Scotia. On Tuesday, Sampson and Crean, and their staffs, spent the entire day and early evening in Norman swapping ideas and picking brains in preparation for the upcoming collegiate season.
Crean and his Marquette assistants, including former five-year Sooners assistant coach Jason Rabedeaux, arrived on the OU campus with plenty of ideas to offer. Sampson, OU assistant coaches Bob Hoffman, Ray McCallum, Bennie Seltzer and director of basketball operations Jerry Green were eager to reciprocate.
"We used today as an opportunity to share," said Sampson, who is beginning his 12th year at Oklahoma. "Each coach from both schools was assigned a topic and we discussed a lot of different things from a basketball standpoint. It was a chance to learn from each other. As a coach, you've got to constantly sharpen your blade and this was a chance to help make our teams better."
Both Sampson and Crean spent formative coaching years at Michigan State University. Sampson was a graduate assistant under Jud Heathcote in 1979-80. Crean was a grad assistant in 1989-90 under Heathcote before later serving four years as an assistant and associate head coach in the mid-'90s.
"The great thing for us is that we were able to touch on a lot of subjects in a short period of time," said Crean, who led Marquette to the 2003 Final Four and is entering his seventh year at Marquette. "We were able to get in depth and have quality discussions in a lot of areas."
According to Crean, the morning began with an interchange about offensive schemes that included Oklahoma Christian head coach Dan Hays. The group also discussed zone offense, different defenses and special situations -- such as playing late in the shot clock, coming out of timeouts, out-of-bounds plays and winning a game with 2- and 3-point shots.
Among the day's activities was a 60-minute workout by the 12-man OU squad. A new NCAA rule allows coaches to be on the court with their players for two hours a week this time of year.
"We like to spend an hour a week working out our players individually and use the other hour to do things as a team," said Sampson. "Today we elected to work out as a team so the Marquette staff could watch some of our drills in person."
Said Crean, "I think the most important thing for us, outside of exchanging ideas and getting together with a staff that we have tremendous respect for, is that we got a chance to see what I feel is one of the great standards in all of college basketball. I'm talking about how to play hard, how to play together, how to put the team first and how to have everybody working towards the same thing. The standard has been set by Kelvin. Players will come and go, but the standard and the accountability at Oklahoma will never change.
"It was an environment where everybody felt comfortable with sharing what works. When you get two programs together like this with no secrets, it's a lot of fun."
Joining Crean and Rabedeaux from Marquette were assistant coaches Jean Prioleaux and Dan Panaggio, director of basketball operations Todd Townsend and coordinator of basketball operations Derrek Deprey.
Panaggio served as a graduate assistant on the Oklahoma staff during the 1977-78 season.
Oklahoma, defending Big 12 Conference co-champion, begins the 2005-06 campaign with exhibition games on Nov. 5 and 12. The regular season opener against Samford is scheduled for Nov. 19.
