Jim Boeheim
Jim Boeheim
James Arthur "Jim" Boeheimis the head coach of the men's basketball team at Syracuse University. Boeheim has guided the Orange to nine Big East regular season championships, five Big East Tournament championships, and 28 NCAA Tournament appearances, including three appearances in the national title game. In those games, the Orange lost to Indiana in 1987, on a last-second jump shot by Keith Smart, and to Kentucky in 1996, before defeating Kansas in 2003 with All-American Carmelo Anthony...
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth17 November 1944
CityLyons, NY
Is he the best player in the league? No, he's not. But he's the most important player on any team in the league. When Allan Ray is hurt, Villanova wins. If one or two guys from Connecticut have bad games, they still win. If Gerry doesn't play for us, we can't be in the game.
I think the thing fans admire and I admire is the way Gerry plays hard all the time. He knows no other speed than full speed. When he makes a mistake, it's an effort-mistake. Most guys make mistakes because they don't give enough effort. That's never been the case with Gerry.
I think they're a very good defensive team. If you watched the game, you know why he wasn't in the game. Gerry could not make plays.
This was a heck of a comeback from that kind of deficit against a team that controls the game. You just can't give anybody that kind of lead and expect to come back, but we just keep plugging away and as long as we get Gerry some looks he's going to make his share.
We made a couple bad mistakes at the end of the game. And fortunately Gerry corrected them.
Without Gerry McNamara, we wouldn't have won 10 games this year.
This team showed more heart and guts than any team I've ever coached. And Gerry had as good a four days as anyone I've ever seen.
When Connecticut caught us, and they caught us a lot, we kept going. Gerry wouldn't let it get away. He was playing on half a leg today. He's got more guts than anybody I've ever coached.
For Josh Wright, who hadn't played, to make all four, and we needed all four, that's a lot of guts. I'm not sure Gerry would have, as tired as he was.
We relied on Hakim (Warrick) and Gerry a little bit too much last year.
When Gerry got the ball coming down, I set something up. I told him (to) drive and give it to one of three guys at the end of regulation. He looked at me and said, 'Can I shoot it?' I said, 'They're not going to let you shoot it. But if they do, shoot it. As soon as he released it, there was never a doubt that ball was nothing but net.
When Gerry gets going like that, it's disheartening. He can pull up and make it from anywhere inside the half court.
I had to laugh when our student newspaper called him overrated. Without Gerry McNamara, we wouldn't have won 10 games this year. The other guys just aren't ready. They needed him. We wouldn't even have a chance to play this game without him.
If Gerry played at Notre Dame he'd probably average 25 a game for four years because that's what he gets when he comes here.