Cougar coaches remain busy

I probably won’t talk to the Cougar coaching staff very often over the next few weeks. Right now they’re all back in Detroit, and April is normally devoted to recruiting so they’ll be on the road a lot. BYU’s coaches don’t discuss their recruiting targets or recruiting strategies. In fact, my next communiqu’ will likely come when they have something to announce from those recruiting efforts.
But here are a few more items that came from last week’s sit-down talk with Cougar coach Dave Rose:
On the frustrations felt by many regarding BYU’s NCAA Tournament failures?
“You know from being in this business that everybody wants more. Your players want more. Your coaches and your staff want more. Your fans, they want more. That’s the position I think every program is in,” Rose said.
“Now when you take our staff and the fact that we’re going into our fifth year and we’ve been extremely successful on the conference level, we want to make strides on the national level as well.”
But the coaches are not dwelling on the disappointment of losing in the first round again this season. Instead, they’re working on building a team that is more deep in talent.
“It’s too much. It will just distract you. The focus is on what’s next and what you need to do to get better,” Rose said.
With another scholarship available now that Gavin MacGregor won’t petition the NCAA for another year of eligibility, the Cougars are looking at JC players, high school seniors, transfer players, and even evaluating practice-squad players. Redshirt walk-on Brock Zylstra will also be back from a mission.
If Jonathan Tavernari doesn’t come back for his senior season, that would add one more scholarship and would increase the need for a more immediate impact player. Who knows, there might even be additional roster spots open, as some have speculated on the state of freshman Matt Pinegar, who missed most of the season with a sports hernia.
“There is always an evaluation process from year to year on every player,” Rose said.
For BYU, however, the issue of two-year church missions complicates the scholarship chart and exactly how long a scholarship is actually available.
“We’re involved with a lot of players, but I think the core group of our team is already here or already signed,” Rose said.
Whether Tavernari comes back or not, the Cougars will have starting center Chris Miles for one more year, starting guards Jimmer Fredette and Jackson Emery for two more years, and freshmen Charles Abouo, James Anderson and Noah Hartsock for three consecutive years.
“That is a real plus for us that their situations won’t get interrupted,” Rose said.
Lamont Morgan and Michael Loyd add depth and quickness to the guard line, and incoming freshmen Tyler Haws and Brandon Davies are both skilled enough to challenge for playing time, even spots in the starting lineup.
“This is a new group, and we’ve lost a great leader in Lee Cummard. But there’s opportunity now for other leadership to come to the forefront. My expectation for this group is that they really do come along, but as far as what’s going to happen on the court next year, we’ll find out in the next few months how they’re working and how committed they are. But we’ve got some young talented players coming in who are going to push these guys. And right now I couldn’t be more excited for our program and where we’re going and what’s next. But when you lose a guy that has been as good as Lee has, we’re going to have to see how we’re going to replace him,” Rose said.

Cougars will return to the islands: According to a story on April 2 in the Honolulu Advertiser, BYU and Hawaii will meet on Nov. 20 in Honolulu. Rainbow coach Bob Nash said Hawaii will also play BYU in 2010-11 at the Marriott Center.