On The Record

Howie Dickenmann, the Central Connecticut State men's basketball coach, was walking out of the interview room after his team had lost to Princeton 59-57 back on Nov. 11, 2007. Sydney Johnson, who had just coached his first game as the Tiger head man, was about to walk into the room, and the two coaches passed each other in the hallway.

"First of many coach," Dickenmann said.

TigerBlog has always thought of that as a pretty classy gesture on Dickenmann's part. Dickenmann, who played at CCSU and graduated five years before Johnson was born, was welcoming the young coach to the fraternity and wishing him only the best.

Of course, in coaching, there is rarely "only the best." It's a harsh world, coaching, where so many factors - many beyond a coach's control - influence whether or not teams win games. And, in that profession, you can so easily be measured solely by wins and losses, which is always not the fairest way to determine who the best coaches are.

Often, it is the situation that the coach's program is in - or isn't in - that determines how successful a coach can be.

Still, coaches enter this world willingly, and as such, they know that they're going to be judged by their records.

So let's look at two coaches and their records, which in this case reflect something rather remarkable.

Johnson and Princeton women's coach Courtney Banghart started at Princeton at the same time, before the 2007-08 season. Neither had ever been a head coach before. Both were great players in the Ivy League. One (Banghart) wasn't quite 30; the other (Johnson) was barely in his 30s.

The women's team was 13-15 the year before Banghart arrived. The men's team was 11-17, a record that included a 2-12 Ivy finish.

Johnson opened his career with the CCSU win and followed it with a win over Iona and then 12 straight losses.

Banghart lost her first four games and at one point that year stood at 3-12.

By the time the 2007-08 season ended, the two were a combined 13-46, each having lost 23 games.

Banghart's career record actually fell 19 games under .500 after a loss to Lafayette on Jan. 2, 2009. That's actually less than two full years ago.

As for Johnson, his record ended up 23 games under .500, at 8-31, after his own one-point loss at Lafayette, three days before Banghart's game. At that point, Princeton's two young coaches were a combined 19-63, a figure 44 games under .500.

Seems like a long time ago, doesn't it?

Since those two Lafayette losses, Banghart is on a 44-11 run, while Johnson is 41-18. Together, they are 85-29, a figure 56 games over .500.

Banghart reached the .500 mark for the first time in her career last Feb. 12 at Columbia with a 77-55 win. As for Johnson, he was 2-2 to start his career, and he got back to .500 for the first time since in Princeton's last game, a win at Wagner.

It's an extraordinary achievement, especially for two such young coaches who came into such rebuilding situations, to get to .500 so quickly. There are coaches who fall that far behind and never catch up.

Of course, Johnson could go right back below .500 today, when the Tigers play at Towson.

Something tells TigerBlog, though, that Banghart and Johnson are well on their way to being in the black for good. Or is that in the red? TigerBlog has never been sure about that, so whichever one is the good one.

Oh, and there's a certain Princeton coach who went 1-9 in his first year who could very well follow in the path of the two basketball coaches, or at the very least take some comfort from what they've done.

From 44 games under .500 to where Banghart and Johnson are now?

It's quite an accomplishment.