Darian Devries, Drake Men’s Basketball Coach

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Call 562-314-4603 for details. Drake is going back-to-back years to the NCAA tournament. I was watching their championship game up against Indiana State this past weekend.

And their head coach is Darren DeVries, who's kind enough to join us right now as they get set to see where their name is going to get called and what seed they're going to get coming up on Sunday. Coach, first and foremost, congratulations. Appreciate the time and thanks so much for doing this. Yeah, thanks for having me.

I appreciate it. So how do you kind of put this into words? Back-to-back years going to the NCAA tournament, this group winning another Missouri Valley Conference tournament championship. When you were walking off the court and had a few days to kind of process it, just what comes to mind? I think the best part is we get this whole week to enjoy it. That's the advantage of having your tournament the week before everybody else.

It's got nobody to prepare for. We just get to sit and watch games and be a fan this week as we get closer and closer to selection Sunday. But obviously a great feeling being able to do it again this year with ten new guys on our roster compared to last year where we had guys that had been with us for a long time. So kind of two different, unique teams that were able to accomplish it.

But right now it's sit back and relax. With the guys that did return, you know, you always wonder when you have such a successful season, if you're going to be able to replicate it, maybe with some success, guys get complacent. With the players that did return, why wasn't that the case for your squad? Well, I think we had great leadership with Darnell Brody and then Tucker DeVries. Those two played a lot of minutes, important minutes for us last year. And then we had three or four other guys too that contributed on last year's team. So they had that experience as well coming into the year. And I thought they did a great job of, you know, getting all the new guys kind of up to speed on the way we like to do things.

And as the year went on, you could see them growing more and more together each day. Darn DeVries here with us. His squad going to be playing in the NCAA tournament next week. He's the head coach of Drake back to back Missouri Valley Conference Championships. So now you've had sustained success, right? This is your third time going to be playing in the NCAA tournament as a head coach.

Just how did you guys kind of built this thing? Not only to move it in the right direction, but to sustain that success, just wondering. I think it all starts in your locker room and we have great, great players, great personalities in there.

You know, they all believe in one another and what we're trying to do. I think that's important for any team. It's not just the starters, it's everybody in that locker room that has to be on the same page and connected towards, you know, trying to continue to achieve higher level of success. And they've done a great job of maintaining that the last six years. I could tell that you really enjoy coaching your son Tucker, who's the star of the team. Sometimes I talk to coaches and they're like, that experience coaching my son didn't go as I envisioned it. Other guys absolutely love it.

How has the experience been? I even see the smile on your face. I know it means so much to not only you, but also your family.

Yeah, I absolutely loved it. I know Tucker has as well. It's one of those things when you're in this profession, you miss a lot of things when they're growing up, you know, weekend tournaments and things because you're recruiting or having your own games. But now I get to do something a lot of parents can only dream of doing, and that's getting to interact with your son on a daily basis in college. You know, normally you just get you get a call, maybe a few word answers. But I get I get to sit down and have lunch with him every day.

And, you know, the trips, the travel, the games, you know, what an awesome experience. Now, usually you have good scouting reports, but they did bring it up on the broadcast that you thought Tucker at first was going to be a walk on. And that's who used to tell tell the old staff at Crayton.

So what happened with the scouting report of your own kid back in the day? Yeah, I might I might have mis-evaluated that one. I think I was basing it solely off of his genetics like he had no chance because of me.

So that's that's where the evaluation came from. I was I was blaming it on my own genetics that there's no way he would get to this level. You know, I'm not comparing myself, obviously, to to a basketball player. But my dad, when I first who's who's in the radio business, he said to me, don't get involved in this business.

You don't want to do that. Was there at all any skepticism from you? You know, I know it's probably a coach's dream to be able to coach their son and develop, you know, your own kid. But was there ever any doubt when your son wanted to play a lot of basketball and maybe just trying to humble him a little bit and put some limitations on him?

No, not really. I think it's just something that we our whole family actually just just love, love the sport, love, love to compete. And it's been such a fun process, you know, watch him grow up and now obviously getting to coach him. When did you start to realize, OK, maybe the scouting report wasn't so great.

I have something special here. I think between his sophomore and junior year to let myself off the hook, he did grow four inches after the evaluation. So you got to factor that in. But I think that's when he kind of started to make his jump that I maybe needed to reassess my evaluation skills. Darren DeVries here with us, the head coach of Drake. You know, a lot of people parachute into the sport this time of the year from a far and a broad surface. Everyone's going to talk about you. Everyone's going to talk about your son. What else do you want people to know about this year's version of Drake's basketball team? I think when you watch him just watch how much fun they have and how hard they play. I think that's that says a lot about what we have going as a program and the type of guys that we have and how much they just love competing. And that's what it's supposed to be about. And that's what we try to do is have fun with it every day. And, you know, hopefully success comes with it.

And that certainly helps put more smiles on the faces. Now, how do you kind of react? We always try to wonder where you guys are going to be placed. You guys play in a very good conference.

You just won the conference. I saw Lenardi had you guys as a 10 seed. Do you think that's like about right?

That's about fair? That's what you guys are expecting when Selection Sunday rolls around? Yeah, I think we're right in there in that 10-11 seed somewhere in there.

And, you know, once you get in, it's just it's not really about what seed you are. It's you got to go play well now. And so whenever that pops up on that screen Sunday night, you get to work.

And, you know, hopefully on that Thursday or Friday, we can go put together a good 40 minutes. Now, just wondering how much has previous experience for you actually matter when that ball tips up in the air? They throw that ball up in the air on Thursday and Friday, like through all your stops at Creighton, and then what you've done so far in the NCAA tournament at Drake. How much does that at all help you as a coach as you get set to coach another tourney? I think it helps a lot. I think, A, for our players too, the ones that played in it last year. But as a coach, having been through it as an assistant and a head coach, I think it helps with your mindset of making sure that you don't get too wrapped up into, you know, the moment and forget to play.

And it sounds like that's crazy, but it's easy to do. You know, you got, you know, friends and family and everybody, you know, talking about how great you are and all these things. And then the game comes and it's like, we got to play the way we've played all year if we want to try to advance and to make sure that you got the right mindset coming into that game. And you know this, when you're the underdog, if you have a good start and you're within striking distance or you had the lead at halftime, then all the pressure goes on to the other team and the entire building.

Most of the time, it's, you know, majority of it is a neutral crowd. Then the building starts to go with the underdog. So is there anything without knowing the opponent right now that you're going to play that you could do this week before Selection Sunday happens to kind of make sure that your team's ready to go coming up on Thursday or Friday? Yeah, I don't know if there's a lot we can do in terms of game prep. I think it's more about us just staying sharp, making sure you maintain your edge that you have, that's helped make you successful. But outside of that, it's, you know, there's not a lot.

You're not putting in a whole new offense or defense or anything like that. So it's just staying sharp and try not to get anybody hurt, you know, between now and then too. Last thing I'll ask you, Coach, Darren DeVries from the Drake basketball team.

They're going to be in the NCAA tournament once again next week. You were an assistant for a long time. When you got this job years ago, why did you know or why did you think that this was the right fit for you and your family to be able to now have this run and have the success that we've seen the last few seasons? Yeah, I saw a lot of similarities between Drake and Creighton, a school I was at for almost 20 years and just thought there was a blueprint there that we could try and follow.

And, you know, thankfully, we've had a lot of support here as well that can rally behind it over the course of these last six years, and that's given us a chance to be successful. Well, Coach Darren DeVries, good luck coming up next week. We'll be excited to hear and see when your name's going to get called coming up on Sunday. Thanks so much for doing this. Awesome.

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