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The Indiana State Sycamores bounced back from the heartbreak of not making the NCAA Tournament in the first round of the NIT Tournament, when they beat SMU to move on.
For the Sycamores, who were the biggest NCAA snub with a NET ranking of 29th, it was a great chance to prove the NCAA Selection Committe wrong. They did not waste that chance, and now move on to play Minnesota.
For Sycamore head coach Josh Schertz, these games are an opportunity to spend more time with a team that is clearly special to him. During Thursday’s edition of The Ride With JMV, Coach Schertz spoke to John about how his team responded to their NCAA snub, and what they mean to him.
“I’ve been coaching a long time. Been coaching 26 years, the head coach 16 years. I’ve never been more proud of a team than I was last night. What we went through on Sunday, the devastation of not getting in, and then being able to kind of piecemeal that back together and get our psyche ready to compete, and then down 15 points in the 2nd half, so easy to pack it in and say ‘it’s been a good run, let’s move forward.’ Their superpower all year has been how much they care. How much they care about each other, how much they care about winning, how much they care about Indiana State, how much they care about the fans. How much they care about all the right things, their performance, and that superpower was in full effect last night.”
There are rumors swirling about Coach Schertz, and whether he might leave the Sycamores at the end of the season for an opportunity at a bigger school. Coach Schertz spoke about how he handles those rumors with his team.
“With the team, I addressed it in front of the entire group…What I told the team was pretty simple: I’m completely invested in what we’re doing, I’m not going to make any decisions on my future until the season is over. I’m not in the emotional state right now to make a decision…I need to take 24 to 36 hours after the season ends to decompress. You can make emotional decisions either way, and you don’t want to make a decision of this magnitude on emotion. You want to be able to clear your head, and do it, and when you’re in season and you’re working with your team, and you have all these things going, I don’t think you can make a clear-headed decision. I said to the team, my wife will be the first to know, you guys will be the second to know when I make a decision. Anything you hear outside about ‘this is done’ or ‘that is done’ is people just speculating as to what they either want or what they’ve hear or whatever the case may be…I don’t want to leave people twisting in the wind. I get it, from everybody’s standpoint, and I appreciate it. Trust me, everybody’s hitting me with different things, but at the end of the day I’m going to sit down and really think about it, and then make whatever decision I think is best for my future and my family.”
Listen to JMV’s full conversation with Josh Schertz down below, and tune into The Ride With JMV weekdays from 3-6pm on 93.5/107.5 The Fan!
