Following a 12-15 record last season and a sixth-place
finish in the California Collegiate Athletic Association, the UCSD men’s
basketball team will open its regular season Nov. 17 at Cox Arena against
under new leadership and renewed hopes.
Following former head coach Bill Carr’s departure, the
Tritons found a new head coach during the off-season. Chris Carlson, a San
Diego native who served as UCLA’s director of basketball operations over the
previous four seasons, was announced as the Tritons’ head coach in June and
will lead a team that, apart from the new head coach, will remain remarkably
consistent with 13 returning letter-winners.
Carlson said he wanted the job because he believes in the
Tritons’ ability and is confident that they will be CCAA title contenders.
“I’ve always believed in the promise and the potential of
UCSD, both as an institution and as an athletic department,” he said. “The
chance to be the head basketball coach here is something I’ve always found to
be really enticing.”
Senior guard Clint Allard, who has started all but 10 of the
games he has played throughout his UCSD career, described Carlson as very
personable and has found him to be a good teacher of the game.
“Defense and good shots are still going to win us games, but
I think the confidence both from experience and from coach’s trust in us to
make the right decisions will be the biggest difference from last year,” Allard
said.
Carlson, who was also a staffer under Bruins head coach Ben
Howland at Northern Arizona University and the University of Pittsburgh, agreed
that defense is key in bringing the Tritons back from the depths of a sub-.500
season.
“Our success is going to lie in our ability to stop people,”
he said.
Along with the 13 returning letter-winners, seven of whom
started games last season, the Tritons will also welcome back senior guard
Jason Bull, who did not play for the team during his junior year, and former
CCAA Freshman of the Year guard Andrew Hatch, who redshirted the previous
season due to injury.
While the team had only one senior in each of the past two
seasons, this year’s squad will be led by a quartet of senior players,
including Allard, Bull, forward Brett Stuckey and guard Jon Ward.
Carlson said he feels that the veteran leadership has
already paid dividends.
“Having guys who have played a lot of games with this
program and a lot of games at a high level like Clint Allard, [junior forward]
Henry Patterson and Andrew Hatch, guys like that, it’s really shown up already
in terms of their leadership skills, leadership ability, and leading this
program and leading the rest of the guys in just trying to get a little bit
better every day,” Carlson said.
Carlson’s first game as head coach ended in success this
season during an exhibition upset over Division-I squad UC Riverside. Allard
led the way with 20 points, while Hatch added 14 points in 26 minutes off the
bench, and eight Tritons played at least 10 minutes en route to the 67-61
victory.
The Tritons were able to out-rebound UC Riverside 30-28,
while connecting on 7-of-13 three-point attempts.
While the team was unable to duplicate the victory against
another tough D-I opponent, Drake University, UCSD again mounted a balanced
attack with 11 Triton players scoring, led by Patterson’s 10 points on 2-of-3
field goal shooting and 6-of-8 free-throw shooting.
The Tritons will face their third-straight game against a
D-I opponent when they square off against SDSU, but Carlson said he welcomes
the challenge.
“I think the thing you gain [from playing D-I opponents] is
you certainly go against a higher caliber of program in terms of people’s
perceptions,” he said. “I think what happens is for us in having a chance to
compete against UC Riverside, Drake [University] and [SDSU], is it provides a
real gauge of where we are at.”
This season will conclude with a CCAA Championship
Tournament for the conference’s top eight teams, preceding the NCAA D-II West
Regional and Elite Eight tournaments.
Carlson enters his first year as the Tritons’ head coach
looking for his squad to excite and involve the UCSD campus both with success
on the basketball court and by being active members of the campus community.
“I hope we can provide the campus and the community with a
team they can rally around — a program they can be proud of,” he said.
