IOWA CITY - A new era of Iowa men's basketball dawns this winter, and Hawkeyes fans all across the country are hoping the Fran McCaffery era is different from the Todd Lickliter era, most of the Steve Alford era, and any other era not named after Lute Olson or Tom Davis. McCaffery takes over the reins at Iowa after a 10-22 2009-10 season that cost Todd Lickliter his job. He comes with a reputation for turning programs around after a 112-51 run over five seasons at Siena. McCaffery took over a Siena program that went 6-24 in 2004-05, building it into a 15-win team in '05-06. That was just the start: the Saints won 20 games in McCaffery's second year, followed by three consecutive NCAA tournament appearances.
"The thing about that (2005-06) team that I will always remember is that from the beginning they accepted their roles and bought into everything that I asked them to do," McCaffery said at Iowa's media day last week. "And then when the game started, they competed like no other team I ever had. And I think that's got to be what the goal is here." Siena was the third mid-major program McCaffery took to the Big Dance, following trips with Lehigh and North Carolina-Greensboro. He became the third coach to take three different teams to the NCAA tournament, and the first to do it three times in conferences that get just one automatic bid. Under McCaffery, Siena was the only program in the nation to win three consecutive regular season and conference tournament titles. His Saints averaged 24 wins per year in his five years and he was named the National Association of Basketball Coaches District I Coach of the Year last season. Now he's the 22nd coach in the history of the Iowa men's basketball program. So what's different? For starters, the Big Ten Conference is a major step up from the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference. And the Hawkeyes are far from being one of the top teams in the conference, like Siena has been in the MAAC the past several years. "A lot of the same things (at Siena) would correlate to what we walked into (at Iowa)," McCaffery said. "I think I have to be realistic; it's one thing to do that in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, another thing to do it in the Big Ten with the quality of teams and the fact that they're clearly established on a national level. "It'll be a lot more difficult, I think, but not so much to get them to accept their roles and to compete harder than everybody night in and night out." College basketball fans may remember McCaffery and Siena from past NCAA tournaments. The Saints are the team that chewed up brackets with a 74-72 double overtime first-round upset of Ohio State in the 2009 tournament. They also pushed the tournament's top overall seed, Louisville, to the brink before eventually falling. In the first round last season they trailed fourth-seeded Purdue by 15 with 5 minutes left, but rallied to within three points with a minute to go before falling. Now McCaffery brings a 'Let's be mad again' theme to Carver-Hawkeye Arena, and the players are already buying in, preparing to build a solid tournament resume. It won't be easy. "We absolutely feel that challenge (to get Iowa back to the postseason)," said Dubuque native Eric May, who was named to the Big Ten all-freshmen team last year. "For every player on this team, that's why you come to play college basketball: to have success and get to that tournament. That's the goal on everybody's mind." McCaffery has already changed a lot in his short time in Iowa City, including the strength and conditioning program. "With Coach Lickliter it was more about benching as much as you could or squatting as much as you could," junior forward Andrew Brommer said. "Now it's more plyometric, a lot of reps and just more high intensity lifting." Conditioning has changed as well, as players get ready for McCaffery's new up-tempo offense. Players such as May, Jarryd Cole and Matt Gatens lost weight in the offseason, and Gatens moved from his small forward position to a more natural spot as the team's shooting guard. "It's been a lot different. The (conditioning) sessions this year have been a lot longer, and we are definitely getting something out of it each and every time," May said. "It's important to get that when you are looking at the system changes. We want to be able to play all 40 minutes of that system."
