Rick Snider: Larranaga, George Mason aim to prolong dream

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - George Mason men’s basketball coach Jim Larranaga’s offseason was so busy his birthday cake became an afternoon snack eight days later.

Michael Jordan invited Larranaga to coach at his lucrative summer camp in Las Vegas where rich men pay $17,500 for a week of hoops. A boxer sent ringside seats. The Virginia governor invited the team for dinner at the Richmond mansion. There were the ESPYs and speaking engagements as far as Seattle.

And the madness begins again on Friday as ESPNU broadcasts from the Fairfax campus as part of its Midnight Madness coverage. The network’s other two stops? North Carolina and Indiana. It’s just the start of a season with three nationally-televised contests and the most games on TV in school history as Mason readies for its Nov. 11 opener at Cleveland State.

Everybody wants a piece of last year’s Final Four sleeper. Everybody wants to know if the Patriots are a one-year wonder or good enough to return to the NCAA Tournament.

“There’s a lot of interest in our program and people want to see what can George Mason do the year after the Final Four,” Larranaga said.

A new electronic message board on Braddock Road alerts passersby of the once overlooked Patriot Center. It’s just one of the new perks of becoming a national sensation.

Make that international sensation. Two World Cup soccer teams called themselves the George Mason of the tournament. So did one of the owners of a horse in the Preakness Stakes. Every underdog now believes it can win thanks to Mason’s national semifinal run before losing to eventual champion Florida.

Three of the stars of last year’s unexpected run are gone, though. Jai Lewis is playing in Israel while Lamar Butler is in the Czech Republic. Tony Skinner played briefly in France before returning for the NBA’s developmental league.

Two starters return and two players injured last season come back along with some promising transfers and recruits. They’ll face rising expectations of a team that went from barely making the tournament — which was a victory unto itself — to becoming the frontrunner in the Colonial Athletic Association (with seven teams rated in the top 100).

Larranaga has already told his new roster not to feel pressured by replicating last year’s magic. They are what they are, whatever that brings.

“You don’t live in the past or the future,” he said. “You live in the present.”

The present includes a frontloaded early schedule with five games in November and a trip to Duke for the first time since 1983.

“We’re going to find out if we can compete at the national level,” he said. “Even if we were to lose those games it will probably prepare us very well.”

Larranaga’s gut feeling on this season’s team?

“Considering we haven’t even started practice yet, that’s a hard question to answer,” he said. “We won’t really know how good this team will be until some time in January.”

That’s as close as it comes to jarring loose any projections from the coach who will soon be inducted into the New England Hall of Fame.

“If we ran our program based on other people’s expectations we never could have made the run to the Final Four,” he said, “because all the experts said we couldn’t do it.”

Maybe the experts will now say Mason can’t do it again. For now, Larranaga continues living the dream last season created.

“I think I say that every day,” he said.

Rick Snider has covered local sports for 28 years. Contact him at rsnider@dcexaminer.com.

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