Dooley Talks About Opportunities

By Joe Corley
ECUPirates.com

Joe Dooley talked a lot about opportunity on Tuesday afternoon as he and his staff met with several members of the media in the Smith-Williams Center to discuss his first four months on the job as the ECU men's basketball coach.

With a roster that currently includes one senior, one junior and nine underclassmen, Dooley knows he and his staff are facing a challenge in his second stint with the Pirates, but they're facing it head-on and with the knowledge that the landscape at ECU has changed significantly since 1999.

"The good news is, we're young; the bad news is, we're young," Dooley said. "When you look at our league, you've got to get old and stay old. You look at some of the better teams like Cincinnati, Houston, Wichita State lost nine players from last year, they had an experienced team. That's where we want to get.

"The good news is our guys are going to get opportunities to play and figure out what they can do. We have to develop those guys. Those sophomores have to get older and stronger. Those freshmen need to figure it out this year. Obviously Isaac Fleming is a senior and Seth LeDay is a junior, so those are our two upperclassmen, and Seth's never played here and hasn't scored a basket here. We need to see what those guys can help us with."

So far, the emphasis off the court has been on recruiting, and on the court a premium has been placed on strength and conditioning. It's something that has been important to Dooley throughout his coaching career, and the difference already is notable.

"We had four guys over 20 percent body fat three months ago, and we've got mostly everyone under 10 now with one exception, and he's only been here a couple of weeks," Dooley said. "Once the guys start seeing their bodies change, they'll buy more into the strength and conditioning program.

"And it's not just getting bigger and stronger, strength and conditioning is also injury prevention. If we can keep guys on the court, or if they're dinged up and we can get them back quicker, those are all important factors."

Of course, strength and condition can take a team only so far, and Dooley knows that. There's plenty of work being done in other areas, too,

"We need to speed things up some, and the biggest things is getting to compete at a high level," he said. "One of the things we've started figuring out how to do is compete at everything. Everything we do is competitive. Our shooting drills are competitive. If we can figure out how to do stretching competitively we will.

"Look at the stats. We struggled to score last year, so we're working a lot on offensive skills. Defensively, our field goal percentage on defense was poor, so we're addressing that. Our assist-to-turnover ratio was poor. We turned the ball over. We need to value each possession. We'll try to simplify those things, then get better at simple things."

Dooley's assistants, most notably Steve Roccaforte and Raphael Chillious, also met with the media. Like LeDay, who transferred in last year and had to sit out, Roccaforte is joining the Pirates from Virginia Tech. He liked the challenge he had in Blacksburg, and he sees similarities with ECU.

"When we went into Virginia Tech, it was probably at its lowest point that it had been, and we went in there, signed some really good players, got 20 wins, 20 wins, 20 wins, three straight postseasons, and were ranked in the top 10," said Roccaforte, who also holds the title of recruiting coordinator. "It was the right time for me (to leave). It's a new challenge.

"I don't know how other people feel about it, but I'm here to work, I'm here to improve, I'm here to help people. That challenge was gone for me. What else can you do as a coach? When you go in and it's as bad it's been and when you leave and it's as good as it's been. So it was time to go, time for a new challenge."

Roccaforte has a strong pedigree, having coached in five NCAA tournaments (two with Virginia Tech, one each with South Florida, Tulane and Memphis). He was the head coach at Lamar for five seasons from 2006-11, and has coached under some pretty big names in the college circles, including John Calipari, Billy Tubbs and Perry Clark.

"I haven't spent a lot of time here yet, but when I came here the first time I was surprised at how big it was," Roccaforte said. "It's bigger than what I thought. I think it's a really good place to live. The facilities are much better than what I anticipated. And I think you're selling Joe, Joe's background, where Joe's been, his success. We came to win."

Chillious was the associate head coach at Connecticut last year after having spent seven of the previous eight at Washington. At Connecticut, he helped assemble a top-25 recruiting class.

"One of the big things is, we do have an experienced staff that has done it at a high level," Dooley said. "They understand, Raphael having been in the (American Athletic Conference) and Roc having been in the ACC, the type of recruiting we need to do and what it takes to be successful at a high level."

ECU has changed considerably since Dooley was let go in 1999 after compiling a 57-52 record in four seasons as head coach of the Pirates. The facilities are night-and-day different, and the competition has taken a huge leap forward with the move to the American. He is using both facts to his advantage on the recruiting trail.

"The league helps a lot. It's not a single-bid league anymore," said Dooley, who in 30 years as either a head coach or an assistant has been a part of only four seasons in which his team finished with a losing record. "We can sell the league. You look at (there were) four guys drafted from our league. You look at we had two four seeds last year in Cincinnati and Wichita State, which means they're top 16 teams in the country. We can sell those things. If we get to the top half of our league, there's postseason tournaments.

"Last year was a really good year for the league, and we had two historically good programs who were down by their standards. We need to sell that. Our practice facility is good. Our weight room is good. Come be part of something we're trying to build."

He's already seeing the work pay off, with several recruits set to make unofficial visits in August and official visits in September. Unlike his last two stops — first as an assistant at Kansas under Bill Self from 2003-13 and then as head coach at Florida Gulf Coast for the last five seasons — he's not inheriting a team with plentiful experience.

Although the American had four players drafted last year, it's not a league in which they come in and stay only a year or two before going pro. The better teams always have experience as strength.

"Now that being said, we have younger guys that are going to have opportunities, and they'll figure out as freshmen and sophomores how good they are and what they need to do to win," Dooley said.

"The facilities here are great, but the big thing is Joe's passion," Chillious said. "When you meet Dave Hart, you meet Lee Workman, they want to be good. And they've tried to provide us with all the resources available to be as good as we can."

Players Mentioned

Isaac Fleming

Seth LeDay

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