UW men’s coach Danny Sprinkle leads his Huskies into the Big Ten tournament this week. (Dean Rutz / The Seattle Times)
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By
Percy Allen
Seattle Times staff reporter
Given a second chance, Danny Sprinkle would do things differently.
Still, the Washington men’s basketball coach defended his decision to walk on the court and complain to an official about a call that led to his ejection in the final seconds of the Huskies’ 85-79 loss at Oregon on Saturday.
Sprinkle had never been tossed from a game during his seven-year-career, but his frustrations reached a tipping point when UW freshman star Hannes Steinbach appeared to draw contact from several defenders in the post before losing the ball with Washington trailing 80-79 and 2.5 seconds remaining.
“I was upset at the play that occurred,” he said. “I thought we should have been shooting some free throws.”
Sprinkle walked to midcourt and vehemently argued with officials who gave him with two quick technical fouls and threw him out of the game.
“I deserve to be ejected,” Sprinkle said. “I did. Randy (Richardson), the referee that ejected me, I actually have great respect for him. He’s a tremendous official and I 100% deserve to be ejected for that. I have no problem with that.”However, the timing of Sprinkle’s outburst and ejection have put him in the crosshairs of disgruntled UW fans.
Sprinkle’s technicals gave Oregon four free throws and Ducks forward Kwame Evans Jr., who drew a foul after the Steinbach turnover, made 5 of 6 foul shots to seal the win.
“If there would have been 4½ or five seconds left, I wouldn’t have got ejected,” Sprinkle said. “Even though it’s a one-point game, if they missed the front end of a one on one, we still have to make a 75-foot shot. By the time you get a rebound, you probably get one dribble, maybe two, and you got to heave up a shot. It’s like the chances weren’t great anyway at that point.
“Now, obviously they’re better than me getting ejected. I probably got to do a better job, but I also got to protect my players, too.”
Particularly, Steinbach, a 6-foot-11 forward, was saddled with three fouls in the first half and finished with 26 points and 13 rebounds — both game highs — for his 20th double-double.
“I’m not going to elaborate too much because I don’t want to get in trouble, but I do not feel like he gets treated like one of the best players in this league,” Sprinkle said, noting Steinbach is 10th in the Big Ten in free throw attempts (150). “I know it. I’ve watched it all year. I watch guys in our league that are considered in the upper echelon of players. I see some of the foul calls they get. He doesn’t get those same foul calls.”
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Still, before Evans’ six foul shots at the end, Washington enjoyed a free throw disparity while connecting on all 16 of its attempts. Oregon was 14 of 20 at the line.
“It’s hard for officials, too,” Sprinkle said. “You never know how they’re going to call stuff at end of games. You just don’t. Sometimes they let you play it through. Sometimes they call it. Now, I know my team, we’d have been called for a foul. We have been all year even on some plays that weren’t fouls. Even the previous game. We had some great wall ups, and we’re still getting called for fouls where my guys are straight up like this. Not bear hugging a guy and hitting him on both elbows.
“That’s what’s frustrating is me trying to figure out how to coach my players when they’re like, ‘Coach, this is how I’m guarding it and I’m getting called for a foul.’ The refs were not the reason we lost that game. They weren’t.”
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Sprinkle blamed a poor start in which Washington trailed 29-8 midway in the first half.
After staging a dramatic comeback and taking a 79-76 lead, the Huskies botched a defensive play that allowed Evans to receive a pass on the perimeter and draw a foul on Quimari Peterson before draining a three-pointer for a four-point play and 80-79 lead with 11.6 seconds left.
“We were supposed to foul before they even got the shot off,” Sprinkle said, noting UW had a foul to give. “They shouldn’t even have been able to make the second pass and they did, and the kid made a hell of a play. But it shouldn’t have even got to that, to that point.”
Seconds later, Steinbach lost the ball in a crowd and Sprinkle had seen enough.
When asked if he would do things differently given a chance, he said: “Yeah. It’s a better chance of making a 70-foot shot than it is and me getting ejected. But not much more.”
On Monday, the Huskies flew to Chicago for their first appearance in the Big Ten tournament.
No. 12 seed Washington (15-16) face No. 13 seed USC (18-13) at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday in the second round.
Note
For the fourth and final time this season, Steinbach snagged the Big Ten Freshman of the Week award. In a pair of games last week, he averaged 26.0 points and 18.5 rebounds while shooting 78.3 percent from the floor.Percy Allen: pallen@seattletimes.com. Percy Allen is a sports reporter for The Seattle Times, where he writes about the University of Washington Huskies men’s and women’s basketball teams and the Seattle Storm.
