12-18-2015, 10:35 PM
Remember the first team that UC played after Mick stepped down almost one year ago today? VCU. The Cats got spanked. Understandable since Mick had told the players not long before the game started that he could no longer coach for the foreseeable future. I'll bet the game on Saturday holds some extra emotion for Mick for how far he has come since this time last year. I'm glad he's back and look forward to a solid game from the team.
Quote:Cincinnati's Cronin happy to be able to coach against VCU this yearMick One Year Later
Posted: Friday, December 18, 2015 3:00 pm
By TIM PEARRELL Richmond Times-Dispatch
A year ago almost to the day, Cincinnati coach Mick Cronin was driving to the arena for a home game against VCU when he received a doctor’s call.
You have an unruptured aneurysm near your brain. You can’t coach. We need to do more tests.
The tests eventually revealed an arterial dissection, an abnormal and usually abrupt tear or damage to the inside wall of an artery. If the tear enlarges, accumulating blood can generate clots or block flow, leading to a stroke.
Cronin was ordered to rest, take medication that promoted healing of the artery, keep his blood pressure down and not coach the rest of the 2014-15 season.
He has no restrictions now. His world is back to what he knows as normal as a coach, and he’ll be on the bench when the No. 23 Bearcats (9-2) play against VCU (5-4) this afternoon at the Siegel Center.
“I’m just happy to be able to coach the game this year,” he said. “God willing, I’ll be there Saturday.”
The Rams made 15 of 31 3-pointers last year and beat Cincinnati 68-47 in the Bearcats’ second-lowest output of the season. Cronin didn’t see any of it. He was at home by then, taking some heavy-duty medication that knocked him out until the next night.
“You can imagine not coaching because you either retire or get fired or choose to do something else, but you never think you’re not going to be able to coach your team because of health reasons,” he said. “It’s still hard to get your head around that it all happened.”
Cronin began experiencing severe, persistent headaches about a week before. He had undergone tests before the VCU game and had spent two hours in and out of an MRI tube late the night before.
He alerted his staff he might not be able to coach and was on his way that morning for the noon game when the call came. Cronin met with his team in the locker room about 90 minutes before the game and informed them that while he wasn’t dying, he had a medical condition that wouldn’t allow him to coach until doctors decided how to treat it.
His players understandably were stunned.
“It was just on our minds that things could be bad,” said junior guard Troy Caupain, who played at Cosby High. “Not saying that was an excuse (in the game); it was more so the in-game adjustments.
“You’re like, man, you’re about to lose your head coach, and you don’t know how long or if he’s going to be OK or if he’s going to ever coach again. ... We were just thinking it could be anything. It was dot, dot, dot after he said that.”
Associate head coach Larry Davis took over coaching practices and games, but Cronin didn’t stay away completely. He went to the office, did some game planning, did some recruiting, did his radio and TV shows.
“At first, you’re worried about your health,” he said. “Once I was pretty confident I was going to be all right and just had to go through the process … The ultimate test as a coach is you tell your players all the time it can’t be about you. It’s got to be about the team. I had to find a way to change roles and still help the team while following my medical advice.”
Cronin may have helped others as well. When he made his condition public, he got letters and emails — “in the teens,” he said — from people experiencing similar symptoms. His story prompted them to see a doctor.
A woman from San Diego told Cronin he was one of her husband’s favorite coaches. She told her husband, “Hey, this guy works hard and he’s a tough guy, and he went and got checked. Quit trying to tough it out and go get checked.”
“The guy went and got checked, and he had two arterial dissections,” Cronin said. “It could have saved his life.
“One woman, a married mother of three or four kids, she went and got checked. She also had two.”
