Everyone crams into the tiny back room of Manley Field House, to see what Quentin Hillsman has built.

They file into the small, square room with white walls and nothing but a couch and a television. Fifty people line the walls, taking up every seat, and begin to sit on the floor. The newsmen pull out their television cameras – eight of them in all. The photographers take their seats, along with the newspaper reporters in the back. Family, friends and finally the team sit in the middle.

Rushing around, shaking hands, darting in and out of the room is Hillsman, the reason they all came. They want to see the crowning moment of his team’s resurrection: an NCAA Tournament bid, to be broadcast on ESPN in about a half an hour.

Exactly 17 months after the day he was hired as head coach, Hillsman has taken a 9-20 team and turned it into 22-8, on the brink of the NCAA Tournament. After a strenuous first season, Hillsman orchestrated a 13-win turnaround, the second-largest swing in Division I this season.

But he still looks nervous as the big moment approaches.

***

The camera is ready to roll, and Hillsman is in his normal spot, right in front of it. He’ll appear live on Action News 3 in just a few moments, flashing that smile that has appeared on television and in newspapers so often this year.

The clock is ticking until he will know whether or not his team will make the dance, and everyone wants to talk to the man behind it all. And Hillsman engages every one of them.

For Hillsman, task No. 1 was to change the attitude of a perennial loser in the Big East conference. The program had recorded one winning season in the last 17, and had made only one NCAA Tournament in the past 20 years.

Moving past that became a priority for the young head coach. He focused on bringing in players from winning programs. McDonald’s All-American Erica Morrow became a poster child for those priorities, coming from New York City powerhouse Murry Bergtraum, and its nine consecutive NYC titles.

The season got off to a 13-1 start on the shoulders of Hillsman’s recruiting class. But now he had a new challenge: not letting the team’s success go to its head. He started feeding his players adages like, ‘When you think you’re great, you’ve lost already.’

The day after the team earned its first-ever national ranking on Jan. 21, Morrow said Hillsman worked the team twice as hard in practice, just to prove his point.

The attitude took hold, and nowhere was the attitude more apparent than in the team’s Jan. 15 matchup against No. 1 Connecticut, which came to the Carrier Dome undefeated and winning by an average of 42.6 points per game.

His team wasn’t intimidated and jumped out to a 32-23 lead. It lost in the final seconds, falling by only six points.

UConn finished the season 32-1. Syracuse finished 22-8. The culture was changed.

‘We were striving to build a culture of being competitive, and to change the culture,’ Hillsman said. ‘And we did that.’

***

The players take their spots on the couches. Ten minutes until the show starts.

As Hillsman goes to take his seat in the middle of his team, he pauses for a second to ask a question.

‘Anybody have to go to the bathroom?’

The players laugh and shake their heads.

But Hillsman knows his team too well. He looks around until he finds junior guard Chandrea Jones.

‘Shawn…’ Hillsman calls her by her nickname as he gives her a friendly glare.

Jones blushes, jumps out of her seat and heads for the restroom. The room erupts in laughter.

Throughout the whirlwind of the season, the young Syracuse team has grown closer together. Players consistently refer to the family-type atmosphere around the team as it heads to the postseason.

‘Coach is more like a dad,’ senior Fantasia Goodwin said. ‘And I can talk to Coach about anything, and I think if you have a lot of respect for your coach, it plays a huge role on how you play. I feel like genuinely, he cares for us, outside the court and on the court. He’s a great guy.’

Hillsman has worked hard to develop a level of trust among his players, and it didn’t always come easy. Before the season started, he took Goodwin aside and informed her that she would be coming off the bench this season. The news upset her at first – coming off a season as the team’s second leading scorer.

Goodwin grew to accept her role on the team, and eventually, embrace it. That’s why now, she refers to him as a ‘genius.’

‘Even if you don’t always agree with what he says, at the end of the day, it always works out,’ Goodwin said. ‘That’s why everyone thinks he’s a genius. Everything always works out for him.’

***

The selection show is about to start, and the room starts to quiet down.

Before the tense moments begin, Hillsman has one more message for his team.

‘You have exceeded every expectation,’ he says.

It’s a rare thing for a coach to say, but Hillsman reiterated it throughout the year, that his team blew past any expected learning curve on its rise to national prominence.

But after 30 minutes creep by, Syracuse still hasn’t seen its logo on the screen. The players are starting to get jittery, and start to whisper to one another.

Finally, that small Syracuse logo finally appears on the screen, and the room erupts, as players jump off the couch and begin celebrating.

Hillsman tilts his head back, looks toward the ceiling and lifts both arms toward in the air. His team was a seven seed, set to play Hartford in Baton Rouge, La., on Saturday.

It was a moment of relief. But it was fleeting.

‘Hartford’s good,’ Hillsman shouts – practically pleading – over the excitement. ‘They’re good.’

But Hillsman can’t even deny his own excitement and how much adrenaline he has over the completion of his turnaround. His players mingle around, looking almost dazed, as if the weight of their accomplishment hasn’t quite hit them.

As the night winds down and the emotions begin to settle, all eyes are once again on Hillsman. He’s just taken his team to the promised land. But he can’t be satisfied, and he can’t let his players be, either. For him, it’s always about what’s ahead.

‘I think the next step is to make sure that we can maintain this level,’ Hillsman said. ‘And the better we can maintain this level, the better off we’re going to be years down the road.’

kbaustin@syr.edu

Published on March 19, 2008 at 12:00 pm