Detroit Basketball: On the Road to Recovery

Did you happen to notice this week's Horizon League Basketball Players of the Week? Detroit's Chase Simon shared the award for men's basketball with Green Bay's Rahmon Fletcher. The women's winner? None other than Detroit's Brigid Mulroy. For Mulroy, it's the 2nd time this season she's been honored.

HELLO!??!!

When was the last time that happened? We're talking about the Detroit Titans!

Let's look back at the three previous seasons. Don't cringe Titans' fans, I'll be brief. During the 2006-07 season, the Detroit men's and women's basketball teams combined to win a total of 16 games. How about 2007-08, you say? 13 total wins. And last season? Well, it was the best of the three seasons, but still just 19 wins. During this three year span, none of the teams have finished better than 8th in the Horizon League. The men's team finished in last place twice... as did the Detroit women.

This season the two squads have already combined for 18 wins. That's one less than all of last season, and they've still got at least 27 games left.

The Detroit men currently boast an overall record of 12-7, and they're 5-3 in the Horizon League. Believe it or not, the 5-3 League record is deceiving... negatively deceiving. The Titans three losses in the League have come by a combined eight points (four at UIC, two vs. Butler in overtime, two at Green Bay). Eight points is four possessions. So, if Detroit had somehow gotten a different/better outcome on four possessions, or played better defense for four more of their opponents' possessions, they'd be the team sitting pretty at 8-0 and all alone atop the Horizon League standings (because one of the victories would have been against the Bulldogs). For the Detroit men, four possessions is the difference between potential votes in the national polls or being listed each Monday in a mock NCAA Tournament bracket. Essentially, a lot more people aside from yours truly would be singing Detroit's praises. I could go on and on, but Adam and I have been pretty consistent in our positive analysis of the Titans. Just watch an episode of Two Sense, and you'll see.

But what about the Detroit women? For those answers I went straight to the source, Detroit's Autumn Rademacher. Below is my conversation with the always entertaining 2nd-year head coach. We discussed just about everything you could imagine. Erasing the memory of the 9-game losing streak, the job coach McCallum has done with the men's program, writing about ugly babies on Facebook... yep, we covered it all. Enjoy!