We used to travel around the city looking for a home court. Sometimes we’d practice wherever we could find a gym. Then Junior High School 143 was built, which is located two blocks from YU. So that was unbelievable, to have a gym two blocks away! So we all showed up the first night of practice excited. We ran onto the court, took a look – and there were no baskets. It was a beautiful gym, but there were no baskets.
So we practiced for two or three months with no baskets. The funny part of the story is for the first half of the year we were the leading foul-shooting team in New York City. When the baskets arrived and we started practicing on baskets, we dropped down to about 15th.
You write in the book that the legendary Red Sarachek, your coach at YU, had a philosophy that enabled a smaller team like YU to beat bigger and tougher opponents. What was that philosophy?
Red’s philosophy was you could neutralize your opponents’ athletic prowess by understanding the game of basketball and exercising the fundamentals, especially the fundamentals of playing without the basketball. You know, five players are on the court, but there’s only one ball, which means 80 percent of the time you don’t have a basketball in your hands. The question is: What do you do during that 80 percent of that time?
The concept is moving without the ball. What you try to do is create situations where you’re forcing your opponent to react to you and get yourself in situations where you’re playing two-on-one basketball.
Today, the game has changed. It’s all about getting the ball and beating your man one-on-one. We’re dinosaurs, we still play the old way. And I maintain that even in the NBA, the teams that know how to move without the ball are much stronger opponents. [Gregg] Popovich’s team last year, San Antonio, almost beat the [Miami] Heat. You’re not going to tell me the Heat didn’t have greater athletic prowess, but the Spurs almost won because they know how to move without the ball.
Looking back on your career, what are you most proud of?
Two things. Wherever the YU basketball team plays, it is well respected. When we go to our opponents’ gyms, they all believe they should win, but they all know and are afraid they could lose. So I think I’m very proud of that.
And I’ve done that without sacrificing or compromising the kids’ studies, religious values, or religious practices. So that’s number one. And number two, I get tremendous pleasure out of watching players succeed and giving them opportunities to have what I call “moments” – dreams, last second shots, victories, great wins.…
I’ll give you one final story: The other night we played at St. Joseph’s College, which is located in Long Island, and the coach came to me and said, “Listen, Johnny, we want to pay tribute to you for your long coaching career and play “Hatikvah” before the start of our game.” That’s at a Catholic school.
So I said, wow, this is something I have been able to do – to earn the respect of my opponents. So if you ask me what my great thrills are, those are the thrills: earning respect, giving kids a chance to compete, giving kids a chance to have “moments,” and being able to demonstrate that you can do that without compromise while representing Yeshiva University as the great institution that it is.
