The argument against Ben Howland and why UCLA should dismiss him

The wounds are still fresh. The blood drawn from Sports Illustrated’s damning piece on UCLA basketball has yet to dry. And the stove is still hot as Hell.

Because Sports Illustrated’s scathing article depicting Ben Howland as egotistical, UCLA players as apathetic and Reeves Nelson as a maniac is something we — the universe that bleeds True Blue and Gold — all saw coming but tried, hard as we could, to ignore. Many of you wanted desperately to believe Howland could right this ship by next season. Many thought that, because Howland did it not once, not twice, but three times brought national prestige to Westwood, that he couls do it again if given the chance. No one — Howland supporters or otherwise — didn’t want to see Howland for what the SI article painted him to be: an egotistical control freak.

We knew about the general things — that Howland was, in fact, overly controlling and dictatorial; that Reeves Nelson thoroughly damaged any chemistry our squad had; that some players were more about partying and gettig laid than they were about basketball. This stuff was obvious.

And, taken at face value, those problems weren’t harmful to Ben Howland’s reputation.

It was the specifics that have essentially sealed the fate of Howland as a bad coach.

Letting Reeves Nelson injure his teammates? Allowing players to get smashed and show up the next day? Playing favorites with his line ups and findinf excuses to take players out of games? I can’t let thay fly, dear reader.

I’m not going to get on my high horse and lecture you about how your support for Howland is “unacceptable.” You have your reasons to believe Howland will win games, and i respect that. My job, though, is to steer you into a certain direction. My direction. What I believe to be the correct direction.

Perhaps Howland’s acts weren’t disgraceful. But if they are not disgraceful, then they should be deemed as the wrong way to do things. They should be indicative of how not to run a basketball program.

And you may believe he will change. That, too, I will respect, dear reader. But I will dispute that claim.

Because this isn’t a “few isolated incidents” as Dan Guerrero would like you to believe. This is a personality issue. Howland’s personality is, to put it diplomatically, abrasive. He’s cold, distant and calculated. He’s vindictive. He lacks self-awareness.

These things — personality traits in feneral, really, are pervasive. They don’t go away very easily and within a span of a few months.

Howland’s personality is not meant for coaching 18- to 22-year old players. Perhaps grown men that get paid millions to ball, but not kids who play because they love the game of basketball.

Howland has never made conscious efforts to reach out to his young players. So long as they were “producing” and not pissing him off, he didn’t care. If that meant letting teammates getting under one another’s skin, so be it.

And that isn’t the kind of mentality that wins games. John Wooden did more than win NCAA tittle after NCAA title. He mentored his players, connected with them on a level that many coaches would never connect with their players the way he did. The ability to relate to your squad is integral not just in college hoops, but in team sports in general. It’s why Phil Jackson competes with Wooden as one of the geeatest coaches in sports history. His philosophy on life was something he readily shared with his players, almost in the mold that Wooden had done decades before him.

Howland doesn’t do that. His disciplinarian approach isn’t the problwm. It is his inability to go up to one of his players after letting him have an earful and telling him that he needed some tough love, and that he merely wanted the best out of him.

It’s doubtful that Howland even wanted to tell his players that. His success was self-serving in that it made him, not the UCLA basketball program, look better.

And attitudes like that do not change for quite a long time. Expecting that would be reaching, and thus, expecting another Final Four berth out of him is also reaching.

Take note, Bruins. Howland has won before, but winning normally brings back players, much like it did with those Florida teams that ended our seasons. Instead, many jumped ship as soon as the opportunity was best. Abrasive personalities like Howland will do that.

So next time we discuss Howland, keep these in mind. Because much like the box score doesn’t tell the whole story, the win-loss column doesn’t either.

GO BRUINS!!!!