LAS VEGAS ? Some people are born to be writers, painters or mathematicians. They are the quiet people of this world. But San Diego State men’s basketball head coach Fred Trenkle was brought to Earth to be a basketball coach. You don’t have to look to hard or to long at him to realize it.
It’s as clear as Cindy Crawford’s complexion.
So with 17:09 left in the first half of last night’s debauchery, it wasn’t shocking that Trenkle’s tan jacket came flying off ? less than three minutes into the game ? the SDSU head coach was starting his tirade.
Trenkle hates jackets. He hates ties. He hates anything that can constrict his neverending coaching style.
Trenkle’s a screamer, a yeller. A paranoid schizophrenic worry-wart. He chomps his fingernails to the nub. He rips and tugs at his tie. He yells at the refs. He barks at his team.
Every night, the guy coaches himself to near death. So it isn’t by accident that his frenzied style shows on the floor.
Despite losing by 35 points, Trenkle’s less-talented players out-hustled Tark’s thugs for most of the night. They played with heart, emotion and attitude in the first half of last night’s quarterfinal game of the Western Athletic Conference Tournament. However, there was no way the Aztecs could match up with Fresno State talent-wise.
They were out of gas.
It was a tank that was perilously close to empty after Tuesday’s wild overtime triumph over No. 3 seed Wyoming in the opening round. Against Fresno, SDSU was out of miracles and running on adrenaline. Their starters in the Wyoming game played 40-plus minutes of physical basketball and it more than showed last night? it glistened.
Although they were overmatched from the tip, SDSU still hustled and scraped. They fought for the opening half. They had to.
Trenkle would have settled for nothing less.
It is quite obvious that if you expect to play for a Trenkle-coached team, you have to hustle and use your head.
Case in point: SDSU forward Josko Visjnic (SDSU’s version of Tony Kukoc).
After Visjnic let Fresno’s Tremaine Fowlkes get free for an easy alley-oop slam in the first half, Trenkle motioned for Fred Ross to replace him before Fowlkes even landed on the floor.
One mistake and you’re out. You have to respect that about Trenkle.
The guy cares. From the opening three-point basket by FSU point guard Rafer Alston, you could see how every Fresno point tore at Trenkle’s insides. It seemed as if every Aztecs turnover (26 in all, including 19 FSU steals) seemed to take minutes off his life.
In the end it will look like another mediocre season for SDSU. But it really wasn’t. Trenkle didn’t have the guns this year. Point guard Jason Richey and forward Kevin Betts were his only weapons (Richey on offense and Betts on defense).
However, Trenkle still managed to coach them to the second round of the WAC Tournament.
A terrific accomplishment.
The Aztecs had every bad break in the world this year. Before the season started Trenkle had to endure the news that his son Brady would have to quit basketball after being diagnosed with a rare heart ailment. Then Trenkle saw promising sophomore guard Will Porter quit the team after the first game of the season. Then he also watched sophomore forward Stephen Clark leave school because of grades.
Next year Trenkle will introduce his best recruiting class since he arrived at Montezuma Mesa, a class that features five high-school stars. They will be young and raw, but I’m willing to bet they will be prepared.
Trenkle will demand it.
When the Aztecs finished the game last night, they were playing with two walk-ons, a freshman and a junior-college transfer.
Not exactly the McDonald’s All-America crew that Tark threw at him.
And in the end, the scoreboard will show that SDSU got trounced last night by 35 points.
I’d advise you to not look at it that way.
They didn’t lose because they were out-coached. And they didn’t lose because they were out-hustled.
It just happened to be the end of the road for this crew of Trenkle overachievers.
Sean Colclough is a journalism senior and the sport editor of The Daily Aztec, his e-mail address is colcloug@rohan.sdsu.edu.
