Hope on the Hilltop

The more talented the artist, the less likely he is to be impressed by his own work.

Ask first-year Georgetown coach John Thompson III about the revival taking place on the Hilltop, and he’ll tell you it’s only January.

Tell him the Hoyas (13-5, 5-2 Big East) are off to their best conference start since Allen Iverson was breaking ankles in Landover (1995-96), and he’ll remind you there are nine Big East games remaining.

Explain that the Hoyas are in the top 40 of the RPI (36) for the first time in nearly a decade, and he’ll change the subject to Boston College’s flex offense.

Implore him to unlock the secrets of the Princeton offense, and he’ll respond with a straight face that his practices are devoted to dribbling, passing, shooting and defense.

Push him on his sideline mojo, the late-game magic that has propelled his Hoyas to a 4-1 record in games decided by five points or less or in overtime, and he’ll tell you today’s genius is tomorrow’s moron.

Mention the buzz that started inside the Beltway and finally has reached Bristol, Conn., and the 38-year-old coach will shrug his shoulders.

“I hate to say the buzz is irrelevant, but this is about us,” said Thompson, whose surging Hoyas face No.8 Boston College (17-0, 6-0) tomorrow night in Chestnut Hill. “I don’t think it’s good to look at the big picture. As we win games, sure, the perception of us changes. Winning is a good thing. But buzz or no buzz, we have to be better this week than we were last week. And it’s still far too early to start assessing this season.”

Not if you ask the collective basketball community. ESPN’s Dick Vitale calls Thompson the midseason favorite for national coach of the year honors. Notre Dame senior guard Chris Thomas calls the Hoyas’ turnaround “stunning,” the same word Connecticut’s Jim Calhoun has chosen on several occasions.

“What John is doing there is just stunning,” Calhoun said earlier this week. “He’s taken roughly the same personnel that won four games in this league last year and turned them into a factor basically overnight. He’s reprogrammed all those kids, taught them a new system, taught them how to win in less than half a season. That’s just extraordinary.”

To quantify extraordinary you have to understand just how low the Hoyas were last season during a stretch swoon that included nine straight losses (including one to a pickup squad from St. John’s), a program-worst 4-12 Big East finish and the school’s first sub-.500 regular season (15-16) since 1973.

“It was so bad it’s hard to put into words,” said junior forward Brandon Bowman, the Hoyas’ leading scorer this season (15.2 points). “Teams looked at us like we were a joke. We walked around campus with our heads down. The whole year was humiliating.”

Such was the shattered roster-wide psychology Thompson inherited after the ouster of former coach Craig Esherick. And if Thompson wasn’t certain as to the depths of the emotional scar tissue carried by his squad, the Hoyas’ season-opening loss to Temple (75-57) left little doubt.

“Coaching that game was different,” said Thompson, who was startled by the resignation etched on the collective face of his team when it trailed the Owls by 13 points at halftime. “There were some things that had to be addressed there. I’ve never had a team that came into the huddle and the look on everyone’s face at halftime and the beginning of the second half was, ‘It’s over.’ I said, ‘Hold on, fellas. There’s a lot of ball left to play here.’ That’s something we’ve talked about a lot. And we’ve changed. We’ve grown. I think our group now understands that we can get down and fight back.”

In fact, resilience has become the hallmark of this season’s Hoyas, who have come from behind in each of their five conference victories, as well as outplaying Connecticut and Syracuse after intermission in their only Big East losses. Therein lies Thompson’s greatest contribution to his young team and perhaps his strongest attribute as a coach.

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