INDIANAPOLIS \u2013 Jim Crutchfield notoriously doesn\u2019t watch much basketball outside of his own Nova Southeastern teams, but one has to imagine that the legendary coach cracked a smile as Easton Bazzoli led Gannon to the program\u2019s first ever national championship.<\/p>\n
While Bazzoli never worked for Crutchfield, he picked up Crutchfield\u2019s famed \u201cSystem,\u201d and continued it on as head coach after former NSU assistant Jordan Fee left Gannon. On Sunday, Bazzoli became the second \u201cSystem\u201d-running head coach \u2013 first not named Crutchfield \u2013 to win the national championship.<\/p>\n
The Golden Knights ran through the Division II NCAA Tournament, winning all but one game by double digits, including an 84-61 thrashing of Lander in Indianapolis to take home the crown. Sophomore guard Pace Prosser dominated with 28 points and 11 rebounds and six assists.<\/p>\n
Defined by others for its full-court press and other quantifiable elements, the players who play it characterize it differently.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a really fun way to play basketball,\u201d Prosser said. \u201cIf you\u2019re getting recruited by one of these places, especially Gannon, I would definitely look into it. This style is part of the reason I came to Gannon. The speed of the game and the freedom, you\u2019re able to make decisions both offensively and defensively, just being free.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bazzoli, just 30 years old, is one of, if not the youngest coach to ever win a NCAA Men\u2019s Basketball National Championship. He showed humility in his press conference, but with the entire Gannon team standing on the side, Prosser wouldn\u2019t pass up the opportunity in front of the nation to hype up his coach.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can say it coach, you\u2019re the best coach in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n
In order to play The System, which Crutchfield won the national championship with in both 2023 and 2025, it takes tremendous effort and understanding from your players.<\/p>\n
Guys are constantly tired, rotating in and out of the game, and need to get rid of some of their previously held basketball habits, per former West Liberty players in Basket Under Review. But the results validate themselves, and it, along with many other reasons, is why Bazzoli is able to get the buy-in that he needs to win at a championship level.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhatever our philosophy or style, we\u2019re all fighting for buy-in,\u201d Bazzoli said. \u201cI think that it\u2019s because these guys believe in it. If we\u2019ve done anything well as a staff, it\u2019s in the recruiting process. We\u2019re being very clear about what you\u2019re signing up to do.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just don\u2019t want guys coming here that one, aren\u2019t excited about it, and two, just you see it all over the country, they look at everything but does this actually fit me and do I see myself excelling in it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"INDIANAPOLIS \u2013 Jim Crutchfield notoriously doesn\u2019t watch much basketball outside of his own Nova Southeastern teams, but one…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":701498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3723],"tags":[7,217,231,772,1400,1544],"class_list":{"0":"post-701497","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-college-basketball","10":"tag-ncaa","11":"tag-ncaa-basketball","12":"tag-ncaa-tournament","13":"tag-ncaab"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116358418481281304","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=701497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/701498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=701497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=701497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=701497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}