University of Vermont Catamounts Basketball 2003-04 America East Champions 2003-04 News Articles Cats outdid themselves By Patrick Garrity, Free Press Staff The Burlington Free Press March 25, 2004 Minutes before the University of Vermont men's basketball title defense officially commenced with the season-opening prac- tice the morning of Oct. 18, Catamounts coach Tom Brennan spoke of the challenge that lay ahead. "The single hardest thing to do in sports is do it again," Brennan said. "The expectations are astronomical, really, for a team from Vermont. All that being said, I ain't worried about it one little bit." Why worry? So the year would begin with a four-game, 13,000-mile losing streak. So the star guard was bound for a sea- son-long shooting slump. So the two fifth-year senior centers would have one good knee between them. So the leading scorer would break his wrist in the middle of the pennant race. All of it made The Championship Season, Part II, that much more compelling. The great expectations of October gave way to a rollicking winter ride that somehow managed to one-up the 2002-03 sea- son -- only the best season in the history of the program. I'll see your 21 wins and raise you to a record 22. I'll see your conference championship buzzer-beater in Boston and raise you a one-armed, 43-point masterpiece at Patrick Gym. I'll see your sacrificial offering to Arizona in the NCAA debut and raise you a fearless, 40-minute effort against Connecticut in the sequel. The single hardest thing to do in sports isn't to do it again, Coach, it is to do it even better the second time around, and your Cats accomplished the feat. What's more, next year could be better still. A bumpy trip Let's get this out of the way: Yes, UVM received a substantial break in the America East tournament when Boston U and Northeastern went down in a quarterfinal twin-killing. To suggest the Catamounts' road to the NCAAs was plowed and salted, how- ever, ignores the potholes. Starting with Matt Sheftic's torn knee ligament and ending with Taylor Coppenrath's broken wrist bone, the Cats played hurt all season. Alex Jensen, slowed by his own knee injury, was unable to be a consistent perimeter performer. Scotty Jones was crip- pled by chronic arthritis in both knees, leaving the green Martin Klimes as the only healthy center. Then there was Coppenrath. The Northeast Kingdom's most significant contribution since Thaddeus Fairbanks invented the platform scale, Coppenrath was lost for seven games with a cracked scaphoid. His heroic return obscures the fact that the team man- aged to go 5-2 -- including a pair of tourney wins -- without him. "It's really incredible what we've done given what has happened to us along the way," Brennan said. "There's just something about this group. They're not going to be denied." From Barnet, with love Nobody, not even Brennan the ultra-optimist, was thinking about Selection Sunday after Rhode Island belted the Cats by 38 points Dec. 30. "If it was a fight, they would have stopped it," the coach said of a defeat that dropped his team's record to 3-5. The Cats wouldn't lose again for 47 days. A sweep of Northeastern. A win at BU. The annual Nick Billings razz-fest. The ensu- ing school-record, 13-game winning streak was filled with shining moments. Coppenrath sparkled in each. The 6-foot-9 junior produced one of the finest seasons in school history, deservedly earning national acclaim along the way. No less an authority than UConn's Emeka Okafor called him "a big-time player" and that was after the Huskies star helped limit him to 3-for-17 shooting. That rough finale cannot smudge a brilliant winter nor will it sober Coppenrath's prospects for next season. NBA scouts might be as common a sight at Patrick Gym next year as Rally Cat and Mama Gooch. Coppenrath is 79 points shy of Tony Orciari for second place on the program's all-time scoring list and a clear favorite to match Reggie Lewis as the league's only three-time player of the year. Get a good look at No. 22 next winter, Cats fans. The next time you see that number, it will be hanging on a wall. More from more Coppenrath will be hard-pressed to improve on his performance, but you can expect more from his teammates. Exhibit A: T.J. Sorrentine. The junior guard returned to the lineup after missing 2002-03 because of injury, but it was a sea- son-long fight. His jumper was never reliable. His timing was often a half-beat off. He battled though, then carried the team through the conference quarterfinals and semifinals until Coppenrath was ready. The swagger Sorrentine displayed in the NCAA loss to UConn was the Sorrentine of 2002. "He's still not all the way back," Brennan said. "Part of who he is is shooting that dagger, that big shot, and this year, he struggled with that. "But look at the kid. All he's done is win rookie of the year, player of the year and first-team all-conference, and we only expect him to get better. That's a crazy thing." David Hehn and Germain Njila also will return to deliver a final installment of heart, and Jensen's recovery, Klimes' contin- ued growth and Matt Hanson's imminent blossoming can only strengthen the core. Kyle Cieplicki, a season of practice under his belt, and recruits Ryan Schneider and Josh Duell join the mix next year, and the team hopes to add two more big bodies to the Class of 2008. One more time Two 1,400-point scorers. Four starters. Six seniors. The pieces are in place for another run. Where will that run end? Let's see ... the 2005 NCAA tournament first-round sites include Worcester, Mass.; Boise, Idaho; Tuscon, Ariz.; Cleveland; Indianapolis; Nashville, Tenn.; Oklahoma City; and Charlotte, N.C. Sounds greedy, yes, but the Catamounts have rewritten all the rules over the last two winters, and no one understands that better than the Catamounts themselves. "I told the guys, "Get hungry; stay hungry,'" Sorrentine said, minutes after the loss to UConn. "We'll be back." © Copyright 2004 The Burlington Free Press Coppenrath's Day In Sun Isn't Ready To Set Just Yet The Caledonian-Record · Friday March 26, 2004 By Jamie Norton It's been little more than a week since the greatest men's basketball season in the history of the University of Vermont came to an end, and the buzz surrounding the Catamounts' historic season has yet to die down. Anywhere you go in Vermont, you can still hear the idle chatter. "Did you watch the game?" Everybody knows what game you mean. "Oh yeah, we were right there in the first half. That big Okafor kid really shut us down." You walk down the street, pick up the paper, there's at least a little something about it. You turn on the TV, J.J. Cioffi makes a passing remark. Yes, the buzz is still alive and well, and right at the center of that buzz is Taylor Coppenrath. By now, if you didn't get a chance to see him play, you've heard the stories. The kid helped the Cats get to the NCAA tournament for the first time ever last year as they put together their best season in school history. Then, they outdid themselves by compiling an even better record and getting back to the tourney this year. Coppenrath, of course, was their leading man. And as if his legacy were in doubt, the 6-foot-9 junior's 43-point performace in the America East Championship game all but sealed it - it was his first game back after miss- ing seven games with a broken wrist. The simple truth following that contest was that if you didn't know who Coppenrath was before, you knew now. He wasn't just a one-man show, though. His roommate and buddy, guard T.J. Sorrentine, was among a supporting cast that befits that of a Seinfeld marathon. Think the Catamounts could have flown that far the past two years just on Coppenrath's ticket? Guess again. But Taylor is something special. You already know about his fourth-in-the-nation 24.1 points per game this season. You've heard about his 1,600-plus career points at UVM. You probably read somewhere that his 20.1 ppg is second all-time at UVM, and he'll proba- bly pass that next year. There's more to it than that. Coppenrath's gifts go beyond what he does on the court. His contributions tranc- send the baselines and the sidelines and the 3-point line and the free throw line. What he has done both for sports in Vermont and Vermont itself is almost unprecedented - at least in basketball. He has done for hoops in our humble little state what John LeClair did for hockey - he put us back on the map. Coppenrath has quickly become the closest thing to a celebrity to come out of the Green Mountain State since, well - Howard Dean. But Dean probably can't knock down a jumper with the same kind of touch as Taylor. He has become a bona fide sports super- star - at least by the standards of a state that bases its economy on maple syrup and snow tires.