Kelli Anderson's 3-pointer piece in SI

Do we have an analysis of similar articles so we can have a comparison of what types of coaches are interviewed for this type of story? Without that, we have no way of knowing ... well, whatever the point trying to be made is.

 

Barry Hinson was one hell of a quote when he was at Missouri State. That's all I got.

 

Boals is a very active Twitterer, and was a solid college player at Ohio. He's a pretty popular assistant, well-known in those circles. Man, I still can't believe Pitt lost on Archie Miller.

 

Just a guess here, but I'd bet Sean Miller, Thad Matta, Bill Self and Bo Ryan had other things to worry about when she was writing this story.

 

There's nothing wrong with talking to, and quoting, assistant coaches. They know the game and the players, too. And they might not be as guarded or as likely to spew cliches as head coaches. In fact, I think Phil Taylor said that that was one of the pieces of advice he got from Jack McCallum when he (Taylor) took over the NBA beat for SI.

 

I don't think that's it. You have to actually seek out assistants to talk to them this time of year. Head coaches are delivered on a silver platter for the media at tournament time.

I know that national beat people often develop relationships with assistants, but it's usually in order to transact down-low information exchanges on openings and so forth (See: Andy Katz). Not saying that's what happened here, but I've definitely seen cases where writers will get an assistant's name into print as repayment of an IOU for some info. Happens on the Rivals network a lot and its ilk, for example, with recruiting info. You can usually tell the best sources because those are the names being pumped as hot head coaching prospects.

Funny that someone said assistant's are less likely to spew cliches and coach speak. In football, I found that to not be the case, largely because the assistants are almost always under a speak-no-evil dictate from the head coach who holds their paycheck in his hands.

 

She might have interviewed 15 coaches, and those guys gave her the best quotes/information.

Miller was a strong 3-point shooter at NC State. Hinson is a former head coach at Missouri State. Boals and Gard are respected assistant coaches. Also might be that those coaches are some of her best contacts. Timing also could have been an issue for some of the higher-profile coaches for a story on 3-pointer shooting.

Personally, I didn't have a problem with the sourcing.

 

Something David Halberstam once said:

 

Just so long as you write your advance and your gamer, there's no space for anything else.

That's sort of an inside joke, but I'm sure others can relate...