Men’s Basketball: Anthony Grant Era Begins With ‘Thrill of Victory’

By: Steve Miller – Sports Editor

It didn’t quite hit when the Flyers took the floor in their exhibition against Ohio Dominican. It didn’t even hit when the pre-game introductions lacked the likes of Scoochie Smith and Archie Miller. It took until the postgame press conference when coach Anthony Grant sat behind the mic and delivered a postgame analysis, clear and convincing but without the unquenchable energy that permeated from Miller’s presence, that I understood it was a new era of Dayton Flyers basketball.

“It’s a lot to kind of take in at once, but you know it’s basketball. In the end it still basketball,” said junior forward Xeyrius Williams of the new year.

Many Flyer fans were anxious for the start of the season, both excited to get a look at the team’s new faces and apprehensive that those same newcomers would be unable to lift the Flyers to the consistent level of winning they had attained in recent seasons.

“I worry about them being turnover prone with the inexperience at the guard position and the physicality of the team outside of Cunningham,” said senior exercise physiology major Andrew Kramer, who has enjoyed the team’s prosperity during his time as a UD student. “The team will miss Archie’s intensity, his passion.”

Miller led UD to 139 wins over his six seasons in charge, including five NCAA Tournament game wins and Atlantic 10 regular season championships in each of his last two seasons.

Grant though, who transformed VCU into a perennial mid-major power and won a national championship as an assistant at Florida, is exactly the kind of long-term leader this program needs to take the next step in the NCAA. His hire makes as much sense for the Flyers as it does for Grant himself, who played on this court four four seasons from 1984-89.

“It’s awesome to be back in the arena. Thirty years ago as a player to see it come full circle and to have a chance to walk out of the tunnel as a head coach,” Grant said. “I want to thank our administration: Neil Sullivan, Dr. Spina, for the opportunity.”

Still, change takes some getting used to.

“It was weird. We had our pregame talk and it was weird seeing,” Williams said. “You [think you’ll see Archie] come out and you see coach Grant and it’s like ‘Wow it’s real’.”

President Eric Spina reassured Flyer Nation seven months ago, just before he introduced Grant, that the sun was still shining. Since that day, much has changed: the players, the coaching staff, UD arena itself. Yet the sun is indeed still shining on Dayton’s men’s basketball program, albeit a far different one than left the court of Bankers Life Fieldhouse in March.

Five new faces are taking the court this year in a Flyer uniform for the first time. Three of them check in at above 6 foot 7, and added to juniors Josh Cunningham and Williams, who are 6 foot 7 and 6 foot 8 respectively, compose the bulk of a Dayton team much taller and longer than Miller’s teams.

“There’s other big guys now,” Cunningham said. “So we get help down there, we’ll get more offensive rebounds, defensive rebounds, more blocks and everything. We’re very long so I feel like that’s an advantage we have on another teams.”

On the flipside, Dayton’s major loss is their guard play. The likes of Jalen Crutcher and John Crosby will not soon replace the dynamic play of Scoochie Smith and Kyle Davis.

But as it seems, offense will play second fiddle anyway in the handbook of Anthony Grant.
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“Coach preaches defense. That’s his philosophy: defense,” said sophomore guard Trey Landers. “Just focusing on ourselves and doing what we do. Not trying to get out of whack with everything. Not trying to be something that we’re not.”

The first meaningful minutes of the new season showcased a sterling example of Grant’s vision.

Ball State failed to score a point in the first 6:14 of action at UD Arena in both teams’ season opener. Instead, the Flyers grabbed eight defensive rebounds, a block and a steal on their way to 14 straight points in that span to christen the year.

“We played hard, “ Grant said of his defense out of the gate. “Guys made the extra effort and played really hard, came up with some big defensive plays on blocked shots when we had breakdowns defensively. I think the effort was really good to start the game.”

Anyone who watched the season opener knows that UD’s stingy defense did not last much longer than those opening minutes. But despite the ugliness of the second half, the enduring headline of Grant’s Dayton debut will be a game-winning shot at the buzzer.

“We were fortunate to win. A lot had to go our way,” Grant said after the victory. “We were very very happy that we were able to win the game, and in the process continue to learn and grow as a team and get better.”

That’s about it. There’s winning and there’s getting better. What more can a coach ask from his team? If the Flyers can figure out how to continue to do both simultaneously, the glory days of the Anthony Grant era might come sooner than we anticipated.

That might be challenging for the fans to believe, but for the players, the transition period is already well behind them.

“We’ve been with the coaching staff now for a few months and it feels like forever,” said Cunningham, who was the hero at the buzzer in the season opener. “I mean, they’re amazing people and amazing coaches. They just teach us up, we learn from them every day. [We] just continue to grow as a team.”

While it likely won’t characterize the season as a whole, the thrill of victory is an enjoyable bonding experience, and one the team will gladly use to learn.

“That’s the beauty of sports,” Grant said at a press conference Monday. “If go to a theater, you can probably figure out the ending of a play or the ending of a movie. In sports, there’s the drama, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. We’re thankful that we got a chance to experience the thrill of victory.”

Photos courtesy of Joe Miller, Griffin Quinn, and taken from Dayton Daily News Archive