High expectations can kill a team before a season starts. With the 2013-2014 college basketball season approaching, the Elon University men’s basketball team has dealt with its fair share of them.
As the reigning Southern Conference North Division champions, the Phoenix returns their top six players from the 2012-2013 squad that fell in the semifinals of the SoCon Tournament in March to the College of Charleston Cougars.
Three of the team’s four marquee seniors — guard Jack Isenbarger and forwards Lucas Troutman and Ryley Beaumont — were selected to this year’s Preseason All-SoCon team. As a result, the Phoenix was selected as the conference favorite in both the Media and Coaches’ preseason polls.
Elon has never won a Southern Conference championship, but those daunting expectations hang heavy on the program with the Phoenix just days away from kicking off what many think could finish as the best season in program history.
But how do head coach Matt Matheny and the team deal with the expectations? They don’t listen. At all.
“We really don’t talk about that stuff that much,” Matheny said. “It’s exciting in some ways because it adds buzz, which I think the campus has and the community has. But it doesn’t have any value once we start playing. We’ve been on both ends of the preseason prognostications so it’s better to be on the positive end and it’s a sign of growth in our program, but we don’t talk about it.”
As for players, Isenbarger didn’t even know of some of the USA Today preseason tournament selections. He said it’s not about where media picks them, but what they actually do on the court, and the best way to succeed on the court is to not think about preseason recognitions.
“Because we have veteran guys who have played in this conference and know what it takes to win, we don’t get caught up in all the hype and we stay level-headed and humble,” Isenbarger said. “We have to stay hungry because we know we haven’t earned anything yet.”
Walking off the court after falling to the Cougars in the semifinals of the SoCon Tournament, Matheny said he and the team remember the feeling and the taste vividly.
“We have a pretty vivid memory of the feeling walking off the court at the conference tournament last year,” Matheny said. “As exciting as last year was, we have a little bit of a sour taste in our mouth with the way it ended in the conference tournament.”
While Elon fell short of the NCAA Tournament, the Phoenix earned a bid to the CollegeInsider.com Tournament. In the first round, Elon met Canisius College and fell 69-53.
Losing back-to-back games to finish the season left the Phoenix hungry for more in 2013-2014, which Matheny said has helped the Phoenix shake off the preseason accolades.
“We didn’t play well in the CIT, but I think the sour taste has driven us to have a good spring, summer and fall,” Matheny said. “Our players understand where we’ve been and our seniors have been through a lot. They remember when we didn’t win as many games and how difficult it’s gotten to get where we are.”
As Matheny enters his fifth season at the helm of the Phoenix, he’s led the team from the bottom of the SoCon ranks to the top in four years. After Matheny’s first year in 2009-2010, Elon had a record of 9-23, 5-13 in conference play. At the end of last season, Elon had a 21-12 mark, going 13-5 in conference. Based on the expectations, 2013-2014 could be the year Matheny’s Phoenix gets over the hump.
On the schedule this season are matchups with Colorado University, Georgetown University and Duke University. Elon will also participate in the Preseason NIT Tournament in a pod with Rutgers University, Drexel University and Canisius. Elon and Canisius are on opposite sides of the bracket, but if the teams rematch, the winner moves on to Madison Square Garden in New York City the following week.
“It’s our philosophy in our program to be able to play the schedule we’ve put together. The reason we do that is to be ready for Southern Conference play,” Matheny said. “We like to play against the best programs in the country. We’ve got several of them on our schedule. We also like to play in arenas that host or have hosted first-, second- and third-round games in the NCAA Tournament. Our dream is to make the NCAA Tournament. So when we make it, when we walk through that door, we want to walk in that door having been in that door before, having experienced it the best we can.”
As for the preseason expectations, they could be a silent killer for the Phoenix. But Isenbarger knows there’s work to be done to bring the expectations to life before the Phoenix can call the season a success.
“Nobody owes us anything,” he said. “We’ve got work to do.”