His patented icy glare pierces downcourt and his booming voice rattles his players from the bench.
All seems commonplace for a Frank Martin-coached team.
Just don’t accuse the first-year Gamecock coach of intimidation — no matter how crinkled his face becomes.
“It has nothing to do with intimidation,” Martin said in an interview with The Daily Reveille Tuesday. “The fans have fun with it, the people outside the program have fun wit h it because they’re not around me or my players.”
Transplanted from the basketball-crazed Big 12 to the football-obsessed Southeastern Conference, Martin has undertaken the challenge of rebuilding South Carolina, an SEC cellar dweller in the last two seasons under previous coach Darrin Horn.
The former high school math teacher crafted household names like Michael Beasley and Jacob Pullen while in Manhattan, Kan., consistently demanding aggressive defenses en route to a 117-54 record through five seasons at Kansas State – complete with four NCAA Tournament appearances.
But rumors swirled that the Miami native would leave the Wildcats in 2012 when the hometown Hurricanes were in search of a new coach.
Instead, Martin shocked the basketball landscape to embrace what he’s undertaken his whole life — a challenge to resurrect South Carolina basketball in a football-crazed region
“I like challenges,” Martin said. “That’s who I am … Since I was a kid back in the early ‘80s, the SEC has had as good of players and as good of coaches as any league in the country.”
Now saddled with the task of rebuilding South Carolina to the form it was when it won back-to-back NIT championships in 2005 and 2006, Martin has brought his intense defensive style to the SEC, catching the attention of the rest of the conference.
LSU coach Johnny Jones, who faced off against Martin in the NCAA Tournament when he coached at North Texas, gushed about Martin’s in-your-face style and had no doubts that the rigid regimen Martin employs would translate well into the SEC.
“I think if you take his system, how he coaches and his mentality and you put it on a team, I don’t care what conference that you’re in,” Jones said. “He’s going to be able to compete and have success.”
Although polar opposites in their demeanors on the bench, both first-year SEC coaches face the same uphill battles as their teams each started 0-2 in conference play riddled with mediocre shooting percentages and turnover issues.
Jones called Martin a great personality with a remarkable sense of humor. However, when game time rolls around, Jones said joking is nowhere to be found.
“He’s a tremendous guy who you really enjoy visiting with,” Jones said. “But when you get between those lines, he’s a very intense person.”
Now both coaches will go against each other, each going for his first conference win, each showcasing a unique, passionate brand of basketball – with his mindset reflected on the floor.
As serene as Jones may seem and as livid as Martin may seem to become, the two have one common goal, according to Martin.
“The beautiful thing of this world is we’re all different and have all different personalities,” Martin said. “As long as our mission is the same, which is to help kids, we can be excited about what we’re doing.”
And as for Martin’s adjustment to football country? The man some call stern but players admire looked no further than his co-workers for affirmation in his jump to the SEC.
“[Football coach] Steve Spurrier could have hand-picked any job in the country and he picked South Carolina,” Martin said. “Same with [former baseball coach and current athletic director] Ray Tanner. If it’s good enough for all those people, it’s good enough for me.”
