A coach has so many people to thank for bringing him a national championship. Seasiders begin to think
of life without seniorsBy Jerry Campany
jcampany@starbulletin.comIt starts with the players, runs through the athletic department and on down to the team that handed him his only loss and prevented him from being perfect.
Without that loss the Brigham Young-Hawaii men's team may not have won the national championship.
The Seasiders won the national title with a 29-1 record -- to match the women, who won the national championship with a 29-0 mark -- and may not have been able to do it without a little bit of a wake up call from island rival Hawaii Pacific.
The Sea Warriors beat the Seasiders 5-4 for the Pacific West title before both teams tore through their regionals and went on to play one of the best matches in the NCAA tournament. BYUH coach Dave Porter believes that his team may not have been able to do it without that loss to the talented Sea Warriors.
"I think it (the loss) really helped us," Porter said. "It told us that we are not invulnerable, that we've really got to fight hard all the way through."
The Seasiders went into that match without No. 2 Peter Madarassy, who missed a stretch of the season with personal problems, so they could have been expected to lose to the team Porter had called "The second-best team in the nation."
They beat the Sea Warriors earlier without Madarassy, and didn't see any reason why that should change. But it did, and gave them a disappointment to draw on on their way to their first national championship.
"Without those battles with HPU, I'm not sure if we could come back in the final," Porter said. "It really helped us learn how to win when we are behind."
Porter has already closed the book on his near-perfect season, trying to find ways to keep Hawaii Pacific -- and 15 other teams -- from taking the school's title.
It still will not be easy, as the Sea Warriors will return their top four players while the champions could lose up to four. Hung Soon Park, the No. 3 who went 4-0 through the national tournament, plans to transfer to a school that offers a major in sports psychology.
Andrew Makarevich is a true senior who will leave as a champion and both Eddie Merc and Daouda Ndiaye, who clinched the championship, have a year of eligibility left but are on course to graduate in the fall.
So Porter does not get to sit back and enjoy the fact that he is only the second coach in history to win dual national titles in the same year, he has to get back to work with assistant coach Wei Yu Su.
He may lean on Su more than ever now, because Porter has to rebuild a national championship women's team that will return only two players.
The good news is, those two players are Adrienn Hegedus -- who was snubbed for national Freshman of the Year honors despite not losing a collegiate match and beating the recipient -- and Amy Sun.
The bad news is that he has to replace a senior class that has lost only one match in their entire careers, going 132-1.
Porter believes he can still compete for both titles next year, but knows that a season as perfect as the past one is not likely.
"The reality is that we're going to have to start over," Porter said. "But I will always have this year to remember how easy it can be."
BYUH Athletics