100% Cotten: Hungry For More
4/20/2011 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
April 20, 2011
This article was originally published in the April 9 edition of Gold Rush.
by Stan Cotten
In less than 24 hours after getting home Sunday afternoon after working IMG College's coverage of the ACC Tournament in Greensboro, my family and I were working our way through Manhattan's Upper West Side looking for the apartment of a friend that would be our home for a couple of days of R&R. Another friend had put us on to Delroy, a friendly Jamaican who had his own car service, and for just a few dollars more than we would have paid for a cab, Delroy delivered us in style from JFK to New York City and a much-awaited couple of days in "The City."
It had been a long season, and for those of you scoring at home, that counts all the way back to September -- and I was looking forward to focusing on my wife and two teenage daughters and our time together. On getting away.
But I found out pretty quickly that it's really pretty hard to truly "get away." While we were looking for our friend's apartment, we turned a corner and, in a city of who knows how many million now, there stood Len Elmore trying to hail a cab. I had just seen him hours earlier in Greensboro. What are the odds? Not long after, we hopped into a store front, rode up the escalator and were greeted by a display of Duke basketball jerseys and other NCAA Tournament propaganda. Already!
What is this? I'm supposed to be getting away! I actually rolled my eyes and just kept walking. In all honesty, I was a bit jealous. I wish it had been Wake jerseys for millions to see.
And then I realized that I was still hungry for what I had missed. More games to call. But there had been no bowl game, and there was no reason to even watch the NCAA Tournament Selection Show on CBS -- which I hadn't.
As I lay there in that New York apartment that first night, trying to block out the sounds that accompany nighttime in a big city, I'm sure I felt a lot like many of you. Was it a long season? Yes. Was I ready for a little down time? Sure. But I could have survived another football game or two. And I'm sure a handful more to the basketball season would not have killed me.
Yep, I was greedy. And then I began to imagine that if I felt this way, what must it be like for Jim Grobe and Jeff Bzdelik? What multiplier need we apply to come anywhere close to what the men in charge of Wake Forest football and basketball were feeling now that the offseason had arrived?
If we are hungry, they must be ravenous.
Grobe sure sounds that way as he puts the Deacs through their spring practice paces. And Bzdelik seemed that way the last time I saw him, which was Thursday night following the ACC Tournament as we met at IMG College for his last radio show. I had not seen or talked to him since the day before Wake Forest met Boston College in Greensboro. He looked and sounded as focused as I had ever seen him. He did not seem down. He seemed rather...hungry.
And now that the season that was is completely behind us, we have the future before us. And in that there is promise and hope. I'm reminded at Skip Prosser's retort in years past when I would see him between seasons and ask, "Hey, George Edward -- how are you?"
"Couldn't be better, Voice," he might say. "Undefeated."
Indeed.