East Tennessee State coach Steve Forbes knows all about Florida. Forbes was an assistant coach at Tennessee from 2006-2011, where he faced the Gators multiple times during the peak of the Billy Donovan era.
ETSU coach’s pregame speech: Past Florida greats ‘ain’t coming out of that tunnel’
The Buccaneers coach has seen “great” Florida teams, and he made sure his players knew that this wasn’t one of them.
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One of the Florida teams Forbes saw up close and person was the 2006-07 team, which won the national championship thanks to the tremendous play of stars Joakim Noah, Al Horford and Corey Brewer.
With his 13th-seeded Buccaneers getting ready to take the court against fourth-seeded Florida on Thursday, Forbes took the time to let his players know that the Gators team they were about to face was not the same as the Gators team he had faced a decade earlier.
In addition to the overwhelming “these guys ain’t sh-t” tone of his speech, you also have to admire Forbes for putting a new spin on an old classic.
When Rick Pitino had his famous “Walking Through That Door” press conference, it was a self-deprecating deal. Forbes is using the same narrative technique that Pitino did, but this time he’s flipped it and is using it to both insult his opponents and inspire his own team. We’ll see how well it pays off.
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