Georgia State coach celebrates Father's Day a couple months early
JACKSONVILLE, Fla.
Ron Hunter rolled to the podium after Georgia State's 57-56 win over Baylor on Thursday, beaming not as a coach whose team had just completed one of the most improbable comeback victories imaginable but rather as a dad whose elation over his own son's game-winning 3-pointer quite literally knocked him off his one good foot.
Hunter's son R.J., a junior guard, was virtually invisible for the first 37 minutes of Georgia State's win, making one of his first eight shots. But with the 14th-seeded Panthers trailing 56-44 with 2:53 to play, Hunter began playing like the first-round pick many think he'll soon be, going on a 9-0 run by himself over the next 92 seconds to cut the gap to 56-53 with 1:21 remaining.
A steal by Isaiah Dennis — third-seeded Baylor's 21st and final turnover — set up a free throw to cut the lead to two with 19 seconds left, and after the Bears missed the front end of a 1-and-1 on their next possession, Hunter spotted up from Atlanta with 4 seconds to go, sinking a contested 3 to close out a comeback no one could have seen coming.
The bucket sent the elder Hunter to the floor in a fit of euphoria, the coach tumbling from the stool he's currently confined to after tearing his Achilles' tendon celebrating GSU's Sun Belt championship win Sunday. After the game, a bleary-eyed Hunter wasted no time making it clear how special the moment was for his family.
"It was a great game, but I'm not going to be Coach, I'm going to be Dad right now," Hunter said, as he settled into his chair and put his hand on R.J.'s shoulder. "I'm proud as hell of this guy. This is my son. I'm proud of him, so I wanted to say that."
And for R.J., the Panthers' leading scorer at 19.8 points per game this season, the chance to honor his father — a former Miami (Ohio) guard who lost in the first round of the tournament three times as a player and had yet to win a tournament game as a coach — meant just as much.
"It's unbelievable and a dream come true," R.J. said. "Growing up, your dad's profession is trying to get to the NCAA tournament. We've had so many downfalls, (having) to be in second place, and for us to be here now -- I hugged my sister and said, 'We're going to be in “One Shining Moment,” ’ because we always watched that as a family. That's what you watch when your dad is a coach.
"It's unbelievable, man. It's a little surreal right now. It's a little hard to digest, and God looked out for me today."
On the Baylor side, Bears coach Scott Drew compared the devastating loss to one of the most memorable moments in NCAA tournament history: his brother Bryce's buzzer-beater to give 13-seed Valparaiso (a team coached by their dad, Homer) a first-round win over Ole Miss in 1998.
"I've been a part of one of the best moments in college basketball in the NCAA tournament with my brother hitting that shot, and I think I've been part of one of the worst that I'll remember, R.J. hitting that shot," Drew said.
"The thing I've been disappointed with is all year long we've executed down the stretch. We've been a tough team, and I feel bad the way that the last five minutes went from that standpoint. ... That's not who we are, and yet I know that's what will be dwelled upon and talked about is how we didn't finish the game, and that's on me as a coach."
Down the stretch, Baylor's offense seemed confounded by the Georgia State press, turning the ball over 14 times in the second half, including four times in the final 2:38. The team's previous high for turnovers in a game was 19, but the Bears were generally a careful team, playing nine games all season with 15 or more turnovers.
After the game, Drew implied that his team may not have spent enough time scouting the Georgia State press and that he didn't anticipate it affecting Baylor quite like it did. For Georgia State, of course, that was kind of the goal.
"I had to convince my guys that we could beat them," Hunter said of his preparation for Baylor. "And the only way I could convince them is, I said we had to throw the first punch and the last punch, and the only way to do it was by pressing. I wanted Baylor to know we weren't afraid to play them."
At this point, though, the Panthers are used to feeling overlooked, and now that jilted feeling is one Hunter wants his team to continue to carry with it, for as long as its tournament run lasts.
"I told (the team) at the beginning — and this isn't a knock on the NCAA or any of that — I said, 'Guys, at the end of the day, think about this: They put Baylor up in the Hyatt, they flew in here on a nice charter flight,'" Hunter said. "They put us on a bus and put us in the Holiday Inn. And guess what, we get to stay another day."
Next up for the Panthers will be No. 6 seed Xavier, which beat Ole Miss 76-57 in its second-round game Thursday. It's unknown whether Georgia State will have guard Ryan Harrow back after the senior missed the Sun Belt championship game and the NCAA opener with a hamstring injury, but should he return, his 18.7 points per game certainly won't hurt.
"Especially when we got down, all I wanted to do was to be out there and help my teammates," Harrow said. "But, you know, I kept saying it's not over and if we keep playing until that buzzer sounds and we lose then we gave it a good fight. But if we win, then it's what we've been working towards all year."
Without the former NC State and Kentucky guard Harrow, Georgia State got strong performances from senior guard Ryann Green (11 points, 4-of-9 shooting) and junior forward Markus Crider (10 points, 5-of-11). Meanwhile, Kevin Ware, the former Louisville guard who gruesomely broke his leg during the Cardinals' 2013 championship run, struggled, hitting 2 of 8 shots, but could be seen playing a vocal role on the court during the team's second-half drought.
"Just don't give up — that's what Coach Hunter kept telling us, so that's what I had to put in my head. I saw Ryann crying like a little punk over there, and I really didn't want this to be his last game," Ware said with a sly grin. "We've got some seniors that fought hard all year, and we just wanted to fight and win this game."
The Panthers will need all of those players to be at their best again on Saturday, but should Georgia State get past the Musketeers and advance to the school's first-ever Sweet 16, it'll be another reason to celebrate — but perhaps not quite as hard as they did today — for a father and son that you can't help but want to root for.
"I saw him cannonball off his chair," R.J. Hunter said with a laugh, giving his dad a playful pat on the back. "I told him, they've got to get him a chair with a back or something because that wasn't going to work."
Added Ron Hunter: "There are a lot of coaches that get to get to the Elite 32 or the Final Four, but when you get to do it with your son — when you can watch your son hit a half-court shot — I can't tell you how I feel inside. That's unbelievable. I wish every dad in America could have that opportunity."
You can follow Sam Gardner on Twitter or email him at samgardnerfox@gmail.com.
