World Cup 2018: Rattled Spain finds hope in Michigan's run to '89 hoops title

Mike DeCourcy

World Cup 2018: Rattled Spain finds hope in Michigan's run to '89 hoops title image

All that was missing from Spain’s bonkers announcement that national team coach Julen Lopetegui had been fired on the eve of the World Cup was federation president Luis Rubiales declaring for all to hear, “A Spaniard will coach Spain!”

It would have been awkward, because Lopetegui is a Spaniard.

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Born 51 years ago in Asteasu, a town in the Basque region, Lopetegui spent his entire playing career and all but two years as a coach – those he worked across the border in Portugal – in his home country. But after he accepted the Real Madrid coaching job on Tuesday, he was dismissed and Rubiales announced national team sporting director Fernando Hierro would coach instead.

Think this is unprecedented? In the World Cup, probably so. But there was a similar episode in NCAA basketball three decades ago, when Bill Frieder announced on the eve of the 1989 NCAA Tournament he would be leaving at the end of the season to coach the Arizona State Sun Devils.

UM athletic director Bo Schembechler, the legendary tough guy who coached the Wolverines to 13 Big Ten championships, wasn’t having that.

“A Michigan man will coach Michigan, not an Arizona State man,” Bo proclaimed.

Frieder was out, replaced by Steve Fisher, who went to college at Illinois State.

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Technicality!

Fisher had worked seven years as a Wolverines assistant coach, and that was Michigan enough.

Rubiales was angry the federation had not been notified of the negotiation between Real and Lopetegui, only learning of the arrangement minutes before the new deal was announced.

Spain had been installed as one of the favorites to win the tournament; the change hasn’t impacted the team’s online odds to win. Maybe the books are mindful of what occurred when Fisher took over the Wolverines.

A team that had been inconsistent during the regular season, that finished third in the Big Ten and entered the NCAAs with a 24-7 record and a No. 3 seed, unleashed a superstar scorer in forward Glen Rice and fought through higher-ranked teams North Carolina and Illinois to reach the championship game, then outlasted Seton Hall in overtime.

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Hierro’s coaching career has been limited. He worked as an assistant at Real Madrid, then for one season as head coach at second-division Real Oviedo.

Fisher’s head coaching experience before he took over Michigan was limited to high school hoops. His first six games as a college head coach were the six he won with the Wolverines to claim the NCAA title.

So, yeah, this can work.

You know who knows? Gerard Pique, a World Cup champion with Spain in 2010, who is expected to start in central defense when Spain opens it tournament Friday against Portugal.

On Twitter, in Spanish, he posted: "University of Michigan. Basketball. 1989. NCAA Champion. It wouldn't be the first time it happened. All together, now more than ever."

 

 

Mike DeCourcy

Mike DeCourcy Photo

Mike DeCourcy has been the college basketball columnist at The Sporting News since 1995. Starting with newspapers in Pittsburgh, Memphis and Cincinnati, he has written about the game for 35 years and covered 32 Final Fours. He is a member of the United States Basketball Writers Hall of Fame and is a studio analyst at the Big Ten Network and NCAA Tournament Bracket analyst for Fox Sports. He also writes frequently for TSN about soccer and the NFL. Mike was born in Pittsburgh, raised there during the City of Champions decade and graduated from Point Park University.