COLLEGE BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT : Big East : Seton Hall and Coach Now on Their Way

Rubbing the reddish beard that provides the first clue that he is a little different than most of his colleagues, P.J. Carlesimo demurred Friday when it was suggested that he is the toast of the town, if not of all college basketball.

“People are making a lot out of this,” the Seton Hall coach said, “but I just think people like our kids and the way they play. They play hard and they’re the underdog, and people like to jump on that.”

Carlesimo and the surprising Pirates certainly qualify as underdogs.

Until about two weeks ago, when Seton Hall upset Pittsburgh for the second time in 10 days to ensure its first 20-win season in 32 years, Carlesimo’s job was said to be in jeopardy.

While he had rebuilt a program that was the dregs of the Big East Conference, Carlesimo was not offered a contract extension or renewal last summer, though his contract would run out at the end of this season.

This, despite an improvement in the Pirates’ record in each of his first five seasons on the campus at South Orange, N.J. From 6-23 in his first season, the Pirates improved to 15-14 last season and advanced to the NIT for the first time in 10 years and only the third time in 30.

That wasn’t all.

Just last month, the Seton Hall student senate asked for Carlesimo’s dismissal. In an editorial, the student newspaper, the Setonian, also asked for his ouster. And, finally, a campus referendum resulted in a 508-172 vote to have him fired.

The Pirates, whose best conference record before this season was last year’s 4-12, had started the season well, winning 11 of 14 games and reaching the final game of the Big Apple NIT. But once they got into the Big East portion of their schedule, they seemed headed on a downward spiral once again.

A victory over lightly regarded Connecticut was followed by losses to Syracuse, Boston College and St. John’s. A win over lightly regarded Providence was followed by losses to Villanova, Syracuse and St. John’s.

That was then.

Now, look at what’s happening this week:

--Wednesday, Carlesimo signed a new five-year contract.

--Thursday, Carlesimo was named Big East coach of the year.

--Friday,at Madison Square Garden, the Pirates upset Georgetown, 61-58, in the Big East tournament quarterfinals, marking their deepest advance in the 9-year-old event.

--Today, they’ll make their first network television appearance, meeting 13th-ranked Syracuse in a semifinal game that will be televised by CBS.

--And Sunday, it is virtually certain, Seton Hall will be among the schools named to fill out the draw for the 64-team NCAA tournament. An NCAA tournament berth would be its first.

The Pirates were 8-8 in Big East regular-season play, are 21-11 overall and have won 8 of their last 10.

Even before the upset of Georgetown, in which the Pirates lost all of an 11-point halftime lead before regaining their composure in the face of the Hoyas’ relentless, suffocating pressure, Carlesimo thought his team was a virtual lock for an NCAA bid. “But it’s always nice to make the selection committee’s decisions a little easier,” he said.

Carlesimo takes nothing for granted, and who can blame him?

In 1982, he moved from Wagner College in Staten Island, N.Y., and inherited a program that probably would have had a hard time competing in any conference, much less the powerful Big East.

Seton Hall basketball was so small-time that Carlesimo in those days had no full-time secretary, no staff of full-time assistants and had to share the gym with the women’s team and the Seton Hall Prep high school team. For weight training, he drove his players to a gym off campus.

“We were a little slow as an institution to recognize the things we needed to do to win in this conference,” Carlesimo said.

Still, he jumped at the chance.

“I knew it was going to take some time,” he said, “but the best thing about the Seton Hall coaching position is that it’s in the Big East Conference. Also, the most difficult thing is that it’s in the Big East Conference.

“But as far as I’m concerned, the nine best jobs in the country are in this conference. The other eight (schools) weren’t calling me, so to me this was a great opportunity.”

Slowly, Carlesimo rebuilt.

He scored a coup when he landed forward Mark Bryant, a 6-foot 9-inch high school all-star from South Orange who lived so close, Carlesimo said, “he could see the campus from his home.”

Last season, the Pirates started 11-0, but then came the Big East, where they lost eight games by four points or less.

Still, they took a step forward when they reached the NIT with their first winning season since 1980.

Seton Hall administrators, though, apparently didn’t see it that way. By not offering him a new contract last summer, they sent Carlesimo a not-too-subtle message: Reach the NCAA tournament or find work elsewhere.

“I always felt pretty strongly about the job he’d done,” Athletic Director Larry Keating said, “but when it gets down to the last year of a contract, you’ve got to produce or there are going to be questions.”

In other words, Keating said, “What it came down to was, we were looking to see what he did this year.”

Carlesimo claims not to have been bothered by the cloud that hung over him this season.

“Out of my hands,” he said. “There was nothing I could do.”

Unlike others in his profession, Carlesimo is not consumed by his work. He would rather seek out a recommended Italian restaurant, it has been said, than spend his time pouring over videotapes or scouting reports.

And his popularity among his peers is such that, after losing to the Pirates Friday, Georgetown’s John Thompson told reporters: “I feel good for P.J. I think this game will help Seton Hall a lot.”

It was generally believed that, considering Carlesimo’s relaxed, engaging personality, not to mention his coaching ability, if Seton Hall didn’t want him, somebody else would.

That, of course, is no longer an issue, and for that, Carlesimo gives credit to his players.

“The reason this has been a good week for me personally,” he said, “is because our kids are playing well. I’ve said that before, and people think I’m being smart, but we’ve got the same (coaches) doing the same things.

“Our kids are just playing better, so it makes us look smarter and we get a lot of the credit.”

Bryant, especially, has blossomed this season. In his last five games, he has averaged 27.8 points and 13.2 rebounds. Against Georgetown, he had 16 points, including a pair of free throws with 10 seconds left, and 10 rebounds.

Guard John Morton scored 20 points, including a free throw with 38 seconds left that put Seton Hall ahead for good, 59-58.

Leland (Pookey) Wigington, a 5-4 reserve point guard who played a key role in the second half in neutralizing Georgetown’s pressure with his ballhandling, said the players had been aware of Carlesimo’s situation but didn’t allow it to affect them.

“We said, ‘Let’s establish something for ourselves because we’re going to be here no matter what,’ ” he said. “We just came here to play.”

That they have done.

And well.

“We’re not the best team in the country,” Carlesimo said, “but we can play with anybody.”

What about Syracuse, which has beaten the Pirates twice this season?

Said Carlesimo, grinning: “We’d lost twice to Georgetown, too.”