By Paul Gotham
ROCHESTER, NY — Two decades in one job has a way of creating complacency. Just don’t expect that out of Monroe Community College’s Jerry Burns. The head men’s basketball coach is in 22nd season, yet his approach to the game is as fresh as his first year at the helm.
“I always worry about the next opponent,” Burns said recently. “It’s one game grind it out at a time.”
Monroe has been grinding its way to the national tournament under Burns. Six times the Tribunes have advanced to the national tournament, reaching the finals in 2006-07. With a 13-1 record, this year’s Tribs rank second in the Division II national poll and look poised to make another late-season.
If this year’s MCC team is to reach that national tournament, they will do it with a slightly different style of play.
“What we’re trying to do is a total change from what we’ve ever done,” Burns said recently. “It’s also a total change from where we were in the beginning of the year.”
It started when the Tribunes lost a pair of post players early in the pre-season. Burns and his staff took a look at their lineup and realized that a back-to-the-basket approach in the post wasn’t going to work.
They made adjustments.
“When we started in September, we had a whole different offense. All of sudden we went really small,” Burns explained. “Now, what we do is just spread people out and try to backdoor you, dribble penetrate and kick and always make the extra pass. We’ll catch the ball on the left wing; we’ll dribble penetrate in the middle. We’ll kick to the corner, and on the kick to the corner, we’re looking for the guy on the top of the key for the extra pass and the shot.”
The result has not only stretched opposing defenses, but spread the scoring across the Monroe lineup. The Tribunes average more than 82 points per contest. Ta-Quan Zimmerman (Waterbury, CT / Holy Cross) leads three in double figures, but the sophomore guard averages just 11.6 per game. Jahvari Josiah (Brooklyn, NY / Beach Channel) and Dallas Gary (Buffalo, NY / East) chip in with 10.8 and 10.7 respectively.
Six different Tribunes have taken turns tallying game-high points. Two others have shared the honor. Along with Gary, Josiah and Zimmerman, Reuben Berry (Bronx, NY / Danbury), Arnold Fripp, Jr. (Brooklyn, NY / Brooklyn Collegiate) and Greg Williams (Cincinnati, OH / Princeton) have led the Tribs on different nights. Kenny Johnson (Philadelphia, PA / Abington Friends) and Malcom McNair (Jacksonville, FL / Samuel L. Wolfson) have shared the honors.
“We talk about it in practice all the time, it’s offensive pressure,” Burns added. “Everybody talks about defensive pressure. But on offense, we want to put on offensive pressure. The worst thing you can do is catch the ball on one pass and jack up a jump shot. We do a lot more ball screening. Especially if we can find a weak link, we ball screened them every single time.”
Another Trib, Tashawn Desir (Brooklyn, NY / Nia Prep) averages 9.4 points with 3.1 assists.
The Tribs hit 45.7 percent of their shots from the floor. Despite abandoning traditional post play, MCC still scores plenty in the paint. More than 14 offensive rebounds per game allow the Black and Gold to score around the rim on second-chance opportunities.
Opposing teams find MCC difficult to keep off the glass. The Tribs force defenders to come out on the perimeter. Once there, the athletic guards use it to their advantage and get to the glass.
“We’ll get hurt by a good big kid, but where we’re getting hurt we’ll gain more on the offensive end. Our goal is to spread people out, especially if they have bigs.”
Zimmerman leads the Tribs with 5.4 rebounds per game. Fripp, Jr., Gary and Josiah have all taken turns leading the team with boards on a given night.
“It may be total coaching philosophy change for me. I really like it. We need to recruit guys who can shoot and handle it.”
After the usual long layoff between semesters, the Tribs will tip it off Thursday night against Jamestown Community College. Game time is scheduled for 8 p.m. on George Monagan Court.
As for the national tournament and the subsequent ranking?
“We’ll worry about that in April,” Burns concluded. “It’s always about the next opponent.”
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