Cal State Northridge coach Bobby Braswell is no stranger to Kansas basketball or the Kansas basketball system.
Braswell coached Adonis Jordan the first prep player to commit to Roy Williams after Williams became KU’s coach in 1988 in high school, then coached under Williams disciple Jerry Green for four years at the University of Oregon.
So don’t be surprised if the Big Sky champion Matadors resemble the Jayhawks in their NCAA Tournament opener on Friday in Dayton, Ohio.
“We run that system,” Braswell said Sunday night after he learned CSN, seeded 13th in the Midwest, would face the fourth-seeded Jayhawks in the tournament’s opening round. “We don’t know everything about it, and I’m sure coach Williams doesn’t know everything about ours. We do variations on it. But, yes, it does having worked with coach Green.
“How similar are we? I really haven’t had too much opportunity to see them play, but I’ve watched them on television. They run the secondary break; we run the secondary break. We mix up defenses the same way. We try to get up the floor and score as quickly as possible. We’re two teams that like to push the ball up and run. I think fans that come out will see two teams running a lot of the same things.”
Just don’t expect Northridge (22-9), which will join the Big West Conference next season, to be intimidated by its first-ever trip to the NCAAs. Braswell guarded against that by scheduling a tough nonconference schedule that included UCLA, UNLV and USC.
The Matadors beat UCLA at Pauley Pavilion, no less by four, lost to UNLV by one and lost to USC by nine.
“I’d be worried about it if we hadn’t played the kind of preseason that we played,” Braswell said. “But we’ve got a team with seven seniors on it. Last year, we were fortunate to go into Oregon and beat them at Oregon. We went to Fresno. We played in front of 10,000-plus when most of these guys were juniors. This year, we beat UCLA at Pauley Pavilion. We beat Kent there. We’ve always tried to play a competitive preseason schedule if and when it happened that we made it into the NCAA Tournament.
“I know the NCAA is different than the preseason, but our guys thought all along they could go into Pauley Pavilion and win. They’ve shown a lot of character throughout the year. We were predicted to win the conference championship, regular season and postseason. There’s a lot of pressure that goes along with that, and they’ve shown a lot of character.”
Braswell is in his fifth season at his alma mater.
Though he knew the Matadors winners of nine of their last 10 and 11 of 12 were guaranteed a berth to the NCAAs by virtue of dominating the Big Sky tournament, he wasn’t sure where the Matadors would be seeded.
“We knew we were in, but it was nice watching (the selection show) all the way through and seeing your name come across the screen,” said Braswell, who watched the pairings show on campus with his team and a handful of close friends.
“Our conference typically has received a 14 or 15 seed for the majority of the time, so for us to get a 13 seed is really good for us. And it’s kind of exciting to get to play against Kansas and their storied basketball tradition.”
Braswell had a hand in some of that tradition.
Back in 1988, Williams was wooing Jordan, then a senior at Los Angeles Cleveland High. Though the specter of an NCAA probation loomed over the Jayhawks, Jordan committed to KU and Williams with Braswell’s blessing.
“It ultimately was Adonis’ decision,” Braswell said. “I remember Kansas was going on probation, but coach Williams did a great job coming into his home and convincing Adonis and his mother that Kansas would survive that and that Adonis would get a chance to compete for the national championship. The thing that encouraged us the most was his honesty, his approach to things, how he did things. He made a statement that I still remember. He said he’d commit to Adonis for life if Adonis made a commitment to him. That was important to me.
“Adonis was like a son to me, and I was an important male figure in Adonis’ life. He asked me, and I said I felt comfortable with him going to Kansas.”
Curiously, Jordan called Braswell on Saturday night to congratulate his old coach on making the NCAAs. Jordan, who is playing basketball in Germany, works out over the summer in the Matadors’ gym and scrimmages with CSN point guard Markus Carr, the Matadors’ all-time assists leader.
“It is kind of strange that we just talked last night,” Braswell said. “We had no idea this would be the matchup. We talked about old ties and he asked about Markus. It was just a pleasant surprise that he called.”
