March is a month defined by its trademark madness, but it can also be a time to bury the metaphorical hatchet.
After spending much of the past week critiquing Miami (Ohio) men’s basketball and dumping cold water on its NCAA tournament aspirations, former Auburn coach Bruce Pearl made nice with RedHawks head coach Travis Steele as Steele made an appearance on TNT on Saturday, March 7, one day after Miami capped off an undefeated regular season.
Pearl, ever the charmer, broke the ice by telling Steele he felt like the fourth-year RedHawks coach was Cinderella and he was “the ugly stepmother,” drawing a laugh from Steele.
“I’ve also said teams are going to win their way in or they’re going to lose their way out, and you guys have won your way in,” Pearl said. “All you’ve got to do is go, ‘Hey, BP, scoreboard.’ You know I’ve been rooting for you. I’m proud of you.”
With a 110-108 overtime victory on Friday at Ohio, Miami improved to 31-0 and became just the sixth team since the NCAA tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985 to finish the regular season unbeaten.
While the RedHawks would earn an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament by winning the Mid-American Conference tournament, their potential candidacy for an at-large berth has been a subject of intense debate, particularly from Pearl, who’s in his first season as an analyst for TNT.
On Feb. 28, Pearl said Miami would have to win its conference tournament to make the cut for March Madness, noting that “as an at-large, they are not one of the best teams in the country.” Pearl’s comments drew extra attention and criticism because his son’s Auburn team is among the squads on the tournament bubble, with a 16-14 record heading into its regular-season finale against Alabama. Steven Pearl is in his first season as the Tigers’ coach after taking over for his father following his abrupt retirement last September.
Among those who fired back at Pearl was Miami athletic director David Sayler, who lambasted Pearl on social media on March 2.
“U are flat out wrong about @MiamiOH_BBall when u say we would finish last in the Big East,” Sayler wrote on Twitter. “The disrespect is awful and u should not be near a TV studio covering this sport when u show your true colors! Even slipped in a ‘we’ when talking about Auburn, nice work!”
Though Miami made serious efforts to schedule “buy games” against teams from college basketball’s five power conferences, only to be turned down, the RedHawks have played no games this season against teams in Quad One of the NCAA’s NET rankings and their non-conference strength is schedule is rated as the fifth-easiest in Division I, according to KenPom. Their non-conference schedule included three games against non-Division I opponents.
Still, Miami is No. 21 of 365 Division I teams in strength of record and they’ve managed to go undefeated against Quad Two opponents, something that even top-10 teams like Michigan and Florida can’t say.
“We’re getting everybody’s best shot,” Steele said to Pearl. “It’s a Super Bowl everywhere we’re going. For our guys to be able to kind of withstand that, it just shows you the resiliency and the grit our team has. It’s really impressive.”
Pearl made sure to leave things on a positive note at the end of their two-minute conversation.
“Travis, you and me, it’s just business,” he said. “This is the business we’ve chosen. It’s not personal. I’m happy for you.”