Southern Illinois head basketball coach Barry Hinson woke up with just one regret the morning after his explosive postgame press conference that rivaled the likes of Herman Edwards, Jim Mora and Allen Iverson.
Among mentions of snipers, mama’s boys and his wife, Hinson singled out just one of his players by name — sophomore guard Marcus Fillyaw. Fillyaw failed to score a point in 14 minutes during the Salukis’ 73-65 to Murray State, tallying just one assist and two rebounds. Despite these struggles, Hinson said that calling out the guard personally was out of line.
“I regret one thing — calling out Marcus’ name,” Hinson told ESPN’s Jeff Goodman. “That wasn’t fair to him individually, and I’m upset about that. But I’m not upset about anything else I said.
“I’m not going to fake who I am. I’m an emotional guy and I love my players, but I was frustrated with their overall lack of effort. I felt bad about mentioning one of my player’s names. That was a mistake.”
SIU athletic director Mario Moccia told Goodman that he does not doubt Hinson’s coaching ability or character, but he shared his coach’s sentiments on singling out student-athletes.
“Barry cares about his players,” Moccia said. “I know this is not the season he wanted to have after 10 games (2-8). The losses have mounted and he’s frustrated. I just wish he didn’t call out the players specifically and would have used more generalities.
“I know he’s a good man. But he can have these Yosemite Sam bombastic outbursts.”
Moccia also was not concerned about a since-deleted tweet sent by center Davante Drinkard that referred to Hinson as “the little man.” Drinkard struggled from the floor in the contest, managing just two points on 1-of-6 shooting.
“He’s just frustrated like Barry,” Moccia said. “I can’t imagine there will be hard feelings.”
Check out some highlights from Hinson’s rant in the video below.
