Mark Lazerus: Bryce preaching, practicing patience

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Valparaiso head coach Bryce Drew watches the Crusaders in the second half against Augustana Thursday evening November 3, 2011 at Valparaiso. | Jeffrey D. Nicholls~Sun-Times Media

Updated: December 7, 2011 8:25AM

VALPARAISO — Homer Drew’s feet would be pressed together, his hands clasped, almost as in prayer. He’d bend at the waist, turn his head toward a referee and say something like, “Oh, you’re a better official than that!”

“Always very positive with them,” Bryce Drew said with a chuckle.

Meanwhile, a couple seats away on the Valparaiso bench, Bryce Drew would be slamming his dry-erase board into the hardwood and screaming, “COME ON!” or something a little less passive aggressive and a lot more aggressive aggressive.

It was easy to do that from the middle of the bench. Nobody paid him any attention.

But now things are different.

Now Bryce is the focal point.

“He knows he can’t be yelling that much, because now he’s the center of attention,” junior Kevin Van Wijk said. “But he’ll figure that out quickly.”

From the looks of it, he already has. Valparaiso’s new head coach looked an awful lot like his dad during Thursday’s exhibition victory over Augustana. Sure, there were a few exasperated shouts, a few disgusted pirouettes, a few disbelieving looks shot at referees and assistant coaches alike.

Heck, at the end of the first half, shortly after Will Bogan tumbled into the student section and was whistled for a turnover with two seconds left — “THAT WAS A TRAVEL!” Drew twice shouted at the time — the 37-year-old calmly strolled out to center court to have a quick, pleasant chat with the official who made the call. It ended with a laugh, a pat on the back and a smile.

To call it a “kinder, gentler” Bryce Drew wouldn’t be accurate, because he’s always been an affable, pleasant guy. But part of the evolution from player to assistant coach to head coach involves reining in the passion and intensity that a player has in the heat of the moment and channeling it into a focused energy that’s both motivational and calming to his players.

So far, the new boss is drawing rave reviews.

“He has a lot of passion,” Van Wijk said. “Not that Homer didn’t have it, but Bryce is very enthusiastic. It’s a young coaching staff, too, so it brings a little more energy.”

Indeed, Drew and Luke Gore are in their 30s. The rest of the staff — Jake Diebler, Roger Powell and Will Phipps — are all in their 20s. That’s great on the recruiting trail, and that’s great in practice.

“A young staff like that, they relate to us a little better, they connect with us a little better,” sophomore guard Jay Harris said. “In practice, they’re so excited and they’re running with us. Sometimes we’ve had a few guys go down with injuries and coach Jake can jump right in and work with us and move the ball around without missing a beat. So that helps a lot.”

Despite the youth, experience isn’t a huge concern — Drew spent six years in the NBA, so he knows a little bit about the game, and he spent six years coaching alongside his father, so he knows a little bit about the job. Powell played in a national championship game with Illinois, Gore has been on the staff for 10 seasons now, and Phipps is coming from big-time basketball at Georgia Tech.

As a result, preseason practices have been highly educational — which is imperative for an overhauled roster.

“Bryce is really good at making sure everyone feels a part of the team, and he’s very good at teaching and finding certain tiny little aspects that can help improve players and teams,” junior forward Ryan Broekhoff said. “So far, it’s been great, and all the new guys have really adapted to our style of play.”

The only concern to having such a young staff and such a young head coach — all of whom are still so close to their playing days — is patience. It’s not a virtue of the young. And it’s a virtue that this team will require.

Patience while secondary players try to step up into primary roles after losing three savvy, productive, top-tier players in Brandon Wood, Cory Johnson and Howard Little.

Patience while new faces — Richie Edwards, Bogan, Vashil Fernandez — assimilate into the Valparaiso way of doing things.

Patience while the NCAA Clearinghouse holds up the eligibility of Fernandez and Dino Jakolis, the latter of whom can’t even practice with the team yet.

So far, Drew has preached patience, and is practicing what he preaches. He’s not demanding too much too soon at practice. He’s not berating players during games. He’s calling quick timeouts and using them not to scold, but to teach — to reinforce situational plays and proper decision-making.

Of course, he doesn’t really have a choice. But it’s encouraging that he realizes that in his first year with the big whistle.

“Even if my dad was still coaching, I think with this team, because it’s the first time going through things with a lot of them, you’d see a lot of those quicker timeouts to explain things and get everyone on the same page quicker,” Drew said. “We’ve only been going at it since (Oct. 14). So we’re still figuring out what guys can and can’t do. Are certain guys just having a good couple of days in practice, or is this what we can expect from them all season? That was the thing about last year’s team — you knew what you were going to get from Cory, Brandon, Howard and Mike (Rogers).”

But two years ago, Drew and his dad didn’t. That 2009-10 season started slowly with all the new moving pieces. The Crusaders lost their first exhibition to Indianapolis, triggering alarm bells among fans. They got beat by Ball State and Troy and IPFW and Akron, throttled by Michigan State, Butler and Purdue, started 1-4 in Horizon League play.

It wasn’t until a four-game league win streak in late January that things started to click. From then until that class left at the end of last year, VU was one of the top teams in the league.

It might take that long again. And VU has Arizona and Ohio State and Butler in the first month of the season.

So patience, peace and perspective will be virtues.

And Drew knows that. With his poor, beaten-down dry-erase board now in dry-erase board heaven, he’s now the face of the program — to the players, to his assistants, to the fans and, yes, to the officials.

And so far, he definitely looks the part.

“I’m not going to change myself dramatically,” Drew said. “I just kind of do what comes natural. I’m a very competitive person, but I also try to look at the big picture. I believe in what we’re doing here, and we’re doing it the right way.”