Sports

Colorado State coach knows his audience at Shootout

Gotta love Larry Eustachy. The premier coach at this year's Shootout -- he was Division I's coach of the year in 2000 while at Iowa State -- the Colorado State coach arrived late to the annual Coaches Luncheon earlier this week, but his act was worth the wait.

The highlight of the luncheon comes at the end, when each of the eight men's coaches get up and talk about their teams. This generally means self-deprecating jokes and good-natured barbs aimed at their opponents. The smart ones know to include a story or one-liner about Alaska.

Washington State coach Ernie Kent, for instance, talked about his long history with Alaska. Over the course of a long career he has recruited and signed three Alaska players -- Jumoke Horton of East and John Levitt of Juneau, who both played at St. Mary's, and Ray Schafer of Wasilla, who played at Oregon.

"In 2000, I brought my dad up for a fishing trip, and in 2001 I brought my son up here," he said. "So root for me, because I've left a lot of money up here and I've made a lot of your players better."

You want to talk about economic impact, though, talk about Eustachy.

Eustachy has a past. Despite crazy success at Iowa State, he was fired after photos surfaced of him drinking with students. He has admitted publicly on more than one occasion that he was a hard drinker back in the day, but in the aftermath of the Iowa State embarrassment he went through rehab. His sobriety comes at a cost to Anchorage saloons, he said.

"The bar tabs are gonna go down, let's put it that way," he said. "I used to contribute to the economy here. But I'm so boring now it's ridiculous."

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It didn't look like Eustachy was going to make it to the luncheon. The other coaches had all taken their turns at the podium but Eustachy appeared to be a no-show -- the luncheon conflicted with a team practice. A Colorado State administrator was filling in for the coach and was about two sentences into his remarks when Eustachy arrived.

"I was talking to Sarah Palin so I'm running a little late," Eustachy said.

From there he riffed on P.J. Carlesimo, John Calipari and Bob Huggins. Eustachy was at the 1998 Shootout with Iowa State when Huggins' Cincinnati team beat Duke -- and hometown hero Trajan Langdon -- with a last-second inbounds play in front of a sold-out Sullivan Arena crowd.

"I happened to sit next to (Huggins) after that game," Eustachy said, "and he drew that friggin' play like 50 times for me, like I really cared."

Eustachy noted that his team was playing later that day in Wednesday's late game, which tipped off at 10 p.m.

"What time do we play today? 2 a.m.? That's usually when our guys are just getting in. It'll be perfect," he said.

But Eustachy's most clever line came when he praised the new Alaska Airlines Center.

"What an arena," he said. "That is a wonderful basketball site. Are you gonna play hockey in it?"

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