{"id":17954,"date":"2024-03-20T14:55:39","date_gmt":"2024-03-20T21:55:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/?p=17954"},"modified":"2024-03-20T14:55:39","modified_gmt":"2024-03-20T21:55:39","slug":"long-beach-march-madness-fired-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/long-beach-march-madness-fired-coach","title":{"rendered":"An improbable story has put national attention on Long Beach’s return to the NCAA Tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"

National media attention for men\u2019s college basketball reaches a new all-time high every year because the NCAA Tournament is built on great stories on and off the court. One of the best stories for this year\u2019s March Madness is right here in our city.<\/p>\n

Long Beach State made an improbable run to a Big West Conference tournament championship last weekend, and that earned them a chance to dance in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2012. But that\u2019s not the best part. The Beach did all of that with a lame-duck coach.<\/p>\n

Dan Monson is the winningest coach in LBSU men\u2019s basketball history and after 17 years at the helm, the university told him before the conference tournament that they would not be renewing Monson\u2019s contract after the season.<\/p>\n

New athletic director Bobby Smitheran delivered that news to Monson last Monday, just three days before their conference tournament opener in Henderson, Nevada.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a sad moment for everybody,\u201d said LBSU forward Lassina Traore. \u201cWe had to find another gear. Firing him, it\u2019s not his fault, it\u2019s everyone\u2019s fault. We were making mistakes. We were losing games. The leaders of the team had several meetings and talked about it. We cannot take this for granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Lassina Traore high-fives a teammate after the Big West Conference tournament championship. Photo by JJ Fidler.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After a campaign full of ups and downs, LBSU ended the regular season on a 5-game losing streak and then proceeded to beat UC Riverside, top-seeded UC Irvine and UC Davis in the conference tournament to earn its way into the NCAA Tournament.<\/p>\n

The story of a fired coach leading a team to the tournament has drawn national attention from ESPN, CBS and others as one of the big storylines of the tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo matter what we were going to give everything to give coach Monson a championship,\u201d said LBSU guard Aboubacar Traore, who was named MVP after recording the only triple-double in Big West tournament history in the quarterfinals. \u201cAfter 17 years, and they tell you that you can\u2019t be here next year, and you still decide to do your job until the end. That\u2019s what clicked.\u201d<\/p>\n

Monson and both players got emotional at the press conference after winning the Big West title while talking about how the team was more like a family.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel pretty blessed and lucky to ride with these guys,\u201d said Monson. \u201cCertainly we\u2019re proud to represent the university but it came down to this week, we did it for each other. We did it for our families.\u201d<\/p>\n

That selfless approach has always been paramount in the college game where sometimes collective effort can overcome individual talent. The \u201cCinderella story\u201d is a March Madness staple and that\u2019s the vibe that this Beach squad has headed to Salt Lake City, Utah for the West Region of the national bracket. The No. 15 seed Long Beach State takes on No. 2 Arizona Thursday morning. Tipoff is scheduled for 11 a.m.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been to the NCAA Tournament, and my wife said she\u2019s never had drugs in her life but it\u2019s got to be a similar feeling,\u201d said Monson. \u201cIt\u2019s a high that I\u2019m expecting these guys to enjoy and soak in.\u201d<\/p>\n

To pull off another upset the Beach will need to embrace that underdog mentality and respond with a lot of emotion early in the game on Thursday. It just so happens that the emotional leader this season is Long Beach native Jadon Jones.<\/p>\n

Jones went to St. Anthony High School and has been a huge part of LBSU\u2019s success. He has an incredible knack for drilling 3-pointers while under duress and will slap the floor before defending in order to pump his team up.<\/p>\n

\u201cJadon Jones had three points the first (conference tournament) game, but he had 15 points the next game,\u201d said A. Traore. \u201cHe was just focusing on what he does best, which is shoot when you can, but also play defense. We know when Jadon slaps the floor he\u2019s going to get a steal or block. That\u2019s how it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI love this city, everything about it and what it stands for, and it\u2019s an honor and a blessing to bring a championship to this city, but this is way deeper than being a local kid from Long Beach,\u201d said Jones. \u201cThis is about everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A fired coach leading his team to the tournament means one of the best stories for this year\u2019s March Madness is right here in our city.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":17957,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[189],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[2805],"class_list":["post-17954","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-ncaa","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17954"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17954\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17960,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17954\/revisions\/17960"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17954"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=17954"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=17954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}