Calipari looking to practice free throws “at least once a week”

MEMPHIS, TN — Now that the smoke has cleared and the dust has settled on the men’s college basketball season, Memphis Tigers head coach John Calipari – he of a brand new contract extension – agreed to an exclusive interview with SSNN. And he has vowed that next year he will do something about his team’s struggles at the free throw line.

“Of course, free throws are something we’re going to be working on,” he said. “In fact, we may go ahead and have our players actually practice shooting free throws specifically; maybe as often as once a week. It’ll be difficult, but it’s something we’ll just have to fit into our schedule.”

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Calipari and his team know they blew a chance to win the NCAA Championship. All the Tigers had to do was make two or three more free throws in the final two minutes, and they would have been cutting down the nets and celebrating at mid-court in San Antonio. Instead, the team could do nothing but watch as the Kansas Jayhawks made a spirited comeback and won the game in overtime.

Calipari and the rest of the Tigers blew off numerous suggestions that their poor free throw shooting would come back to haunt them at some point in the NCAA Tournament. “We’ll hit them when it matters,” they said throughout the season. “Free throws don’t win and lose games.”

To a certain extent, that’s true – free throws don’t singlehandedly win or lose games. There are many factors in winning and losing in the game of basketball, and free throws are just one of them.

But they are an important part, which is something Calipari says he now realizes. The coach admitted that the team only practiced shooting free throws twice all season, but promised that things will be very different next season.

“Look, it didn’t work out in the title game. We didn’t hit our free throws, and that contributed to our demise. We’ll simply remedy that by putting up a dozen or so shots at the end of one practice each week. Problem solved.”