With his assistant coaches sitting at his left and right, Richard Pitino leans back in a black leather chair and takes a sip of Gatorade. With video rolling from the Gophers' first October scrimmage, the basketball coach pulls open a manila folder to dive into his notes.
Immediately, he sees something disturbing on the screen. He calls it "horrific" transition defense, when 6-foot-10 center Gaston Diedhiou falls down but still outruns everyone up the court to receive a pass for an uncontested dunk.
Diedhiou can run, but he's no Usain Bolt.
"What was that?" Pitino says.
It's then the Gophers coach realizes he has no idea where his children went.
"My kids aren't making noise," Pitino says, standing to address the silence that haunts any parent of antsy children.
Richard Pitino husband, father and coach
Ava and Jack were tossing around an exercise ball and climbing fitness equipment just moments ago outside of the door. Now?
Pitino pokes his head outside of the strategy room below Williams Arena.
"I don't know what's going on out there," he says, eventually deciding, "Jill must have them locked in a closet somewhere."
Here's Richard Pitino _ a 34-year-old father of three children 5 and under, husband to Jill and the youngest coach in a major college basketball conference, learning to balance the biggest things in his life.
The most public piece of his juggling act is a team he feels is his most talented yet but one that desperately needs to prove itself after an abysmal 8-23 season.
And the proving begins with this young father/husband/coach himself. To many, he's a fledgling coach hired at Minnesota three years ago because of a Hall of Fame last name.
"It's the reality of where I am," he said. "But I believe in what I'm doing, and that's never really changed."
The most difficult moments for Pitino last season were during his team's 14-game losing streak. He wasn't just anxious about going home to hear Ava, now 5, ask about the games. He sometimes skipped the postgame greeting with an ornery Williams Arena crowd after the "Rouser," and he was even skittish about walking into Starbucks.
Starting Friday, Pitino gets a chance to make going for coffee much easier, for with the opener against Louisiana-Lafayette comes optimism with a new-look team.
"We thought we were really going to reset in Year 3, and we did," Pitino said. "It was challenging, but everybody understood we were starting over. I've always said I thought Year 4 was the year we would turn the corner. I feel like we can really compete now."
