St. Benedict’s Prep coach Dan Hurley is not happy with how point guard Eugene Harvey is being treated at Seton Hall.
A senior from Brooklyn, Harvey lost his starting job three games ago and was singled out on a Big East conference call by head coach Bobby Gonzalez for his penchant for turnovers.
“It shows a lack of loyalty to make comments like that about a particular player,” said Hurley, who played at Seton Hall. “In intercollegiate athletics, when your team’s losing, you should hold all players accountable. This is not the NBA. If you’re going to choose just one player, I think it’s wrong to single a player out in the media.”
Hurley said he made multiple calls to Gonzalez to discuss the matter but the calls were not returned.
“Bobby Gonzalez and the team are focused on preparing for Louisville Thursday,” Seton Hall spokesman Matt Sweeney said.
Harvey did not start for the third straight game Thursday night in Washington, D.C., when Georgetown beat Seton Hall, 85-73, to fall to 10-6 overall, 1-4 in the Big East. He came off the bench to notch 7 points, 0 rebounds and 0 assists in 16 minutes.
“I was gonna settle on Eugene [starting] tonight but he actually said to me that he felt more comfortable coming off the bench after the Cincinnati game so I put Keon [Lawrence] back in there [as the starter],” Gonzalez told reporters after the game. “And then Keon struggled at first, Eugene went in and turned the ball over. Jordan [Theodore] turned the ball over.
“But I went with Jordan in the first half. One thing about Jordan, when we were down a certain amount of points, one thing about Jordan is you know you’re going to go down swinging. He’s gonna fight. He’s gonna go down kamikaze, just running around, playing hard and that’ what I thought we needed at the time. In the second half I went back to Eugene because I think he realized he hadn’t played well and he came and gave us a lift. But I think at times Keon is going to go to the two a little bit and it’s going to be Eugene as the starter and Jordan kind of more of the way it was.”
Hurley played behind Bryan Caver during his time at Seton Hall and said it was difficult for Caver when he was subbed out after a mistake.
“I saw Bryan Caver, who had NBA ability, struggle mentally because he wasn’t allowed to play through mistakes. He was pulled in and out of games. Point guards need to play through some mistakes,” Hurley said.
Harvey is averaging 8.6 points, a team-best 4.9 assists per game (fifth in the Big East) and an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.0. Theodore is averaging 7.9 points, 3.0 assists and has an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.4. Lawrence averages 4.4 points, 2.3 assists and has the team’s best assist-to-turnover ratio (4.5).
“Eugene is shooting over 50 percent from the field. He makes free throws and has a 2-to 1 assist-to-turnover ratio. I’m not sure what else he’s supposed to do,” Hurley said.
Hurley insisted that he’s not trying to tell Gonzalez how to coach, simply that he’s “disappointed” in the comments he made about Harvey.
In an effort to jumpstart the offense, Gonzalez started Lawrence in the team’s Jan. 6 loss at UConn and then again in the Jan. 9 victory over Cincinnati. Harvey had started 12 of the previous 13 games.
“He has to take care of the basketball,” Gonzalez said of Harvey on last week’s Big East conference call. “I feel like he’s turning the ball over at the most inopportune times in games and it’s really costing us. Obviously, he’s a senior and I’ve stuck by him and I’ve been loyal and I’ve been behind him.
“I’m not going to give up on him. I think he’s still got a lot of ability and he’s still the same kid who scored 1,000 points, 500 assists, a lot of great things for us. But at the same time, in the Virginia Tech game, he helped bring us back with 17 points in the second half but turned the ball over three straight times at the beginning of overtime.”
For his part, Harvey said he’s OK with Gonzalez’s decision.
“At the end of the day, it’s coach’s decision,” Harvey said after the Cincinnati game. “I’m a positive guy. I’m not selfish. It’s bigger than me. I stay positive. I cheer my team on. The guys that was in, I was cheering for them. I was rooting for them. The only thing I want to do is win.”
Seton Hall has three players who can play the point in Harvey, Lawrence and Theodore, and Harvey admitted that it can be “tough” rotating minutes.
“Sometimes it’s tough because all three of us want to play. We all want to be out there when the game is on the line. But unfortunately, maybe one of us or two of us can be out there. It gets tough at times…but I just put my faith in coach because at the end of the day he’s going to make the best decision for the team and he’s going to put who’s playing best at that time on the floor.”
Theodore also said he’s OK with the team utilizing three point guards.
“It’s great, three point guards,” Theodore said. “It’s kind of fun because if guys know their role, then it makes everything better. I know my role coming off the bench. I’m supposed to bring the energy, play defense, score when I have to, lead the team. And I believe that I’ve been doing that, so if I’m doing that every game and everybody else is doing their role, then we have no problems.”
Hurley said Harvey deserved credit for his play in the games the team lost.
“In the Temple game Eugene played very well and they lost,” Hurley said. “If he didn’t play such a great second half against Virginia Tech, they would never have even made it to overtime.”
Harvey was benched for part of the first game against Georgetown before coming back during the second half, when the team made a run.
“It’s a credit to Eugene that in the second half he responded the way he responded after being benched again in the first half,” Hurley said. “In the second half when you’re down 20, you bring him back in the game. He plays his butt off and you cut it to 7 or 8, that showed the character of him. A lot of players would’ve just gone out there and gone through the motions so I’m proud of the way he handled himself.”
(Mike Vorkunov contributed reporting; Photo courtesy Seton Hall Athletics)
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Pirate4Ever / January 15, 2010
Adam, who annointed Dan Hurley as the Pope of high school basketball and of basketball in general. Seton Hall has been held captive by him and his father after Jr. didn’t like the way he was treated by Pirates fans all those years ago. It is time for the Hurley clan to forgive what happened in the past and move on. Bobby Gonzalez (for better or worse) is the coach of this team. He can substitute his players and bench his players as he wants. See Adam, this is the problem with the game and players today. If you don’t coddle and kiss the players or their high school coaches butts, they bad mouth you and keep other players from going to a particular school. This is a prob;em Gonzalez is having now. He is afraid to discipline his “star” players because he doesn’t want them to leave or bad mouth him. Seton Hall needs a coach who is secure in his own plan, doesn’t care what the Hurley’s or Boyle’s or any of these other high school primadonna’s who hold a basketball program hostage. Dan Hurley GROW UP, MOVE ON and either support your Alma Mater or leave it alone.
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shu92 / January 15, 2010
You have a former coach defending his player after being singled out by his coach in the media. the coach can play whoever he wants to play and it does not seem like the point of his comments. bobby did not go after hazell for his awful shooting % and defense in losses to temple, va tech, wvu, syracuse, uconn or popes terrible ft shooting vs. w virginia. real coaches do not throw their players under the bus. they accept responsibility for their performance. i believe hurley steered harvey our way in the first place.
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shu92 / January 15, 2010
when you recruit a player from a hs program you are accountable for developing that kid. harvey has regressed as a player. saw him outplay ty lawson at the primetime shootout his sr year in hs.
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SPK145 / January 15, 2010
Zag,
When are you going to write the shortest story you’ve written: Who Hasn’t Gonzo Pissed Off?
Seton Hall Basketball: The Time Was Now
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piratesfan / January 16, 2010
First of all, I generally admire and respect Bob Hurley Sr. and Dan Hurley. They are at the top of their game. They know all aspects of the game. They are highly knowledgeable X’s & O’s men. If I had a son with basketball skills, I’d send them to one of the Hurleys, and I’d tell him that he’d better do everything exactly as he’s told.
Why? Because the Hurleys specialize in straightening the mindset and work ethic of student-athletes.
In fact, I have always hoped that Dan Hurley would one day become the SHU head basketball coach. The last time an assistant coaching job opened up at SHU, my number one, two and three choice was Hurley. He’s an alumnus, he has the aforemetioned high basketball IQ and he can probably be a great recruiter. In other words, he would be an assistant who could easily become your head coach.
However, this situation with the Hurleys and SHU long ago became a ridiculous situation. A lot of fiction is written.
I agree that PJ badly mishandled Hurley and Caver. Caver was 6-4 or 6-5 and had tremendous skills and athletic abilities. I thought that Caver was a lock for the NBA. Anybody who saw Caver play has to agree. (Who can forget Caver’s end-to-end buzzer beating drive to clinch a home victory against a stacked Georgetown team?)
PJ pulled very good players too quickly. PJ was also a big-time yeller. I think this affected certain players.
So if Dan Hurley wants to maintain a life-long grudge because of what happened on the court, that’s his prerogative.
But please cease and desist with the fiction that fans hated him and that he never wanted anything to do with SHU after he graduated.
Hurley played in 121 games for SHU. He’s scored 1,070 points. He dished 437 assists. He amassed 171 steals. During his five years at SHU, the Pirates made the NCAA Tournament three times. Hurley was also a member of the 1993 Big East Tournament championship team.
By any measure, Hurley had a very successful college career… a career to be proud of.
But Hurley has helped to create a fiction about SHU.
Let’s not forget that Hurley wanted to join Tommy Amaker’s staff at SHU. (That was after working as an assistant at Rutgers.) Hurley thought he had the job. He was looking at apartments in South Orange. Then that a-hole Amaker made the stupid decision to not hire Hurley. Why? I have no idea.
And the notion that SHU fans did not support Hurley and taunted him with comparisons to his brother is pure fiction. It’s just not true. It’s false.
First, fans of the opposition constantly taunted him and other players. Second, if there were SHU fans who booed Hurley, it was a tiny minority of less than one percent. Figure that if 15,000 people are packing an arena, and 25 loud jerks are getting on your case, why are you fixating on the jerks rather than the thousands of Pirate diehards who are cheering and rooting you on to victory?
I wish that somehow a way could be found for Dan Hurley and SHU to reconcile. Somebody has to make the first move.
Perhaps the next time an assistant coaching job is available, SHU can make Hurley an offer he can’t refuse. I believe Hurley turned down the Pitt job because it would take him away from his family. That would not be an issue at SHU.
Anyway, whatever happens, let’s at least not re-write history.
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