Georgetown is Back

When I was growing up in the DC area, Georgetown basketball was still king with John Thompson as their coach and 3 legit stars coming from the program in Mutombo, Mourning, and Ewing. I didn't witness anything great from Maryland until Joe Smith came along a few years later, so the Hoyas were one of the first teams I followed as a child. The Terps became the best team in this area, and have been media and fan favorites for most of Gary Williams' tenure. This meant a lot of attention that Georgetown had been receiving was now going elsewhere.

The team was still good under John Thompson, but they weren't memorable like his earlier teams. The Hoyas completely became non-factors under Craig Esherick, and barely any attention was paid to the program for about 5 years.

The hiring of John Thompson III brought some press back to Georgetown, but mostly because it was the legendary coach's son coming in to coach where his daddy was successful. It turns out that JT3 really is a great coach, and he deserves the job not just because of his name. I really respect John Thompson III, and part of it is that he didn't take the easy way to get where he is at Georgetown. Of course he has a built in advantage being named John Thompson, but he went his own way instead of having his father pull him along. He played away from his father's influence at Princeton, and learned how to coach under Bill Carmody and Pete Carril. He was successful at Princeton before landing at Georgetown, and I respect that a whole lot more than guys like Sean Sutton and Keno Davis being handed the job after their father steps down at Oklahoma State and Drake.

Not only is there a Thompson who knows how to win at Georgetown again, but the players on this team are fun to watch too. They have some great talent on the team, and its nice to see JT3 bringing in local kids to get the job done. Jeff Green, Roy Hibbert, and DaJuan Summers are all Maryland kids who fans could follow in high school and through college. Each one is a future NBA player and seems to represent themselves well on the court. The future also looks good for JT3 recruiting locally. He already has 4 committs over the next 2 recruiting classes from the DC area. Chris Wright and Austin Freeman are huge prospects for St. John's and Dematha who will be on the team next season. Chris Braswell from Dematha and Jason Clark from O'Connell are also verbally committed for the class of 2008, with Henry Sims and Sean Mosley from the Baltimore area on the radar screen as well. Interesting to note that Sims and Mosley are also being recruited hard by Maryland, so it will be interesting to see where the local kids want to go play. Is JT3 back to steal the thunder from Gary and the Terps, or can the DC-Baltimore area keep enough talent to support 2 big time college programs. I'm hoping for 2 great teams in the area, and hopefully an annual out of conference game between the two of them.