Phil Martelli sheepishly tries to give back Big 5 coach of the year trophy
When it was time for him to accept the trophy for Big 5 Coach of the Year on Monday night, St. Joseph’s coach Phil Martelli couldn’t resist poking fun at himself.
The coach whom Martelli had beaten out to win the award went on to win the national title a couple weeks after voters had turned in their ballots.
“Seriously, there’s not one person in here that would say ‘Big 5 Coach of the Year? It must be Phil Martelli! It’s not Jay Wright!'” Martelli told guests at the Big 5 awards banquet.
“Jay, this is yours. I’m going to borrow it for an hour and if I can get into your gated community in Newtown Square, I’ll drop it off.”
As recently as three weeks ago, Martelli was not a ridiculous choice. After all, St. Joseph’s won 28 games, captured the Atlantic 10 tournament title and led No. 1 seed Oregon deep into the second half before falling in the second round of the NCAA tournament.
Of course, everything changed when Villanova validated its Big East title with the type of NCAA tournament success that had proven elusive in recent years. The Wildcats broke through to the second weekend for the first time since 2009, defeated surging Miami and No. 1 overall seed Kansas to reach the Final Four and then throttled Oklahoma and edged North Carolina to capture the school’s first national title in 31 years.
At the end of his speech, Martelli smacked a sticky note onto the trophy with the words “Jay Wright” written on it. The award may inevitably find its way into the St. Joseph’s trophy case, but if Martelli has his way, you can bet the sticky note is staying on it.
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
