Thanks to J.P. Clark of the men's staff here at UCF for pointing out this article on Buzz Williams, his Marquette team and their commitment to strength and conditioning. The article comes from the Washington Post and was written by
“We have a football mentality,” said guard Todd Mayo, the younger brother of NBA player O.J. Mayo. “That’s just how we are bred. That’s what Buzz (Williams) teaches; he wants a physical team.”
It is a makeup now rooted in his Marquette basketball players, who Murray State Coach Steve Prohm said look like a parade of linebackers or defensive backs without shoulder pads and helmets. After watching Marquette before a second-round NCAA tournament matchup, Prohm joked to his team that the Golden Eagles look like they all should be in spring practice at Alabama or Louisiana State.
“Those guys, those bodies are awesome,” Prohm said. “They are some physical, physical guys. They look like they should be top-10 draft picks in football.”
After Marquette muscled its way past sixth-seeded Murray State, 62-53, the Golden Eagles sat in a locker room — some wearing ice packs, others wearing knee pads — as if halfway through a two-a-day football session in August training camp. And Todd Smith, the man most responsible for instilling gridiron attributes, stood with arms folded and his back to the wall.
“What is unique about all these guys is that they keep coming back every day for the same torture we put them through,” said Smith, Marquette’s strength and conditioning coach, whose offseason program includes “anything and everything.”
Players pull 250-pound sleds. They climb rope until fingers blister. They slip their fists into boxing gloves and pound a body bag. And they use a real football and play a variety of football-related games, rotating quarterbacks in the two-hand touch matchups to keep things fair.
At first, Smith said, players want to quit. Some throw up. But the team’s weight room is not nicknamed “The Confidence Room” for nothing. Perhaps no Marquette player has made bigger strides in conditioning and confidence than junior point guard Junior Cadougan, who ruptured his Achilles’ tendon as a freshman.
“It is just a crazy, radical situation,” Cadougan said. “It’s torture, but it’s from the heart, it’s love. He is not doing it to torture our bodies, but to prepare us for situations like this” in the NCAA tournament.
A big reason Williams already has had conversations with several NFL teams about Crowder potentially trying out is because of the skills the sculpted 235-pound senior honed in Smith’s offseason program. “He just kills you,” said Crowder, the Big East player of the year.
After players survive the summer program, they prepare for two more phases before traditional basketball practice begins in mid-October. There’s individual work with Williams, and there’s the early October “Boot Camp,” 12 sessions that include various forms of two activities: running fast and running faster.
Players said the offseason work has steeled them mentally and physically for the NCAA tournament. Wilson said he saw Murray State’s big men fatigue in the final minutes of the round-of-32 game.
Following a victory over rugged Florida State on Sunday, Cincinnati’s Yancy Gates called the Seminoles physical, but certainly no more so than some Big East teams, namely Marquette. What the Golden Eagles lack in Florida State-like size, they make up for in strength and power.
“We’re small,” Wilson said. “But we take a lot of pride in being physical and stronger than everybody.”
Read the entire article here: http://wapo.st/GDAtoK
