Penny Hardaway says other college coaches are jealous of his NBA background
Penny Hardaway is only in his first year of coaching the Memphis Tigers men’s basketball team, but he already feels like he has a target on his back.
Hardaway spoke to the Associated Press on Monday and talked about how his NBA pedigree is making other coaches feel.
“I’m getting used to this as a coach because it’s a little jealousy from a lot of these coaches around the country,” Hardaway said Monday. “I do understand that because we are NBA players trying to come back, and we didn’t have any experience as college coaches. So we didn’t quote, unquote, ‘Pay our dues.’ So the coaches and their so-called boys that are in the media, they’re going to always throw jabs at us.”
The “we” Hardaway is talking about is him and his coaching staff of Mike Miller and Sam Mitchell. Both are former NBA players — Miller had a 17-year NBA career that ended in 2017, and Mitchell played from 1985 to 2002. Mitchell also has NBA head coaching experience, and won the NBA Coach of the Year award with the Toronto Raptors in 2007.
None of that experience includes any time coaching at the collegiate level, and the same is true for Hardaway. When he was hired to replace Tubby Smith in March, he’d been at East High School in Memphis since 2015 in various coaching roles.
Despite the lack of college coaching experience for Hardaway and his staff, things are starting to trend in the right direction for the Tigers. They’re 13-7 overall, with a 5-2 record in the American Athletic Conference. They’ve won three of their last four games, including a 20-point victory over UCF on Sunday, who were the preseason favorite in the AAC.
Hardaway felt so good about that win that he said after the game that he thinks the Tigers can hang with any team in the country. Retired Houston coach Tom Penders didn’t like that quote very much, and tweeted that Hardaway’s reach shouldn’t exceed his grasp:
Woah! Beat Houston before you make such statement. Houston would be a much better measuring stick. What is UCF's #MarchMadness all time record? I love Penny but he just put a target on his own back if Memphis doesn't make the NCAA Tournament. Be happy about a nice home win! https://t.co/jIMrkUCQ9D
— Tom Penders (@TomPenders) January 28, 2019
According to Penders, who hasn’t coached since he retired at the end of the 2010 season, publicly showing confidence in your team means certain embarrassment if they don’t make the NCAA tournament. Hardaway might have a point about that jealousy stuff.
The ankle-biting jealousy Hardaway is feeling from his fellow coaches isn’t likely to go away with more winning. In fact, winning will probably amplify it. But something tells me Hardaway will be just fine with that, especially if it means bringing more success to his alma mater.
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