Yesterday, very late in the afternoon, I get an email from Arkansas State Athletics providing a Zoom link to a 5:30 press conference featuring Bryan Hodgson. This was unusual for two reasons: 1) Coach Hodgson hadn’t held a Zoom presser all season, and 2) who holds a presser at 5:30?

Is a player leaving the team? Did Hodgson accept a new gig? Did he read my last post and decided he wanted to personally tear me a new one? As it turned out, he kind of just wanted to rap about Arkansas State basketball.

“I don’t want to be the kind of coach who only talks to the press when things are going well,” said Coach Hodgson, which was surprising. Win or lose, Hodgson always makes himself available after games and he’s very approachable in public. But here he was, digitally hanging out with a half dozen media members, inviting us to fire away.

Q&A generally starts with an awkward silence so I decided to break the ice. I asked him about bench production – zero points from the bench against South Alabama, only fifteen against Troy. Coach Hodgson initially bristled (“Who do you consider bench players?”) and then transitioned to a thoughtful answer about playing the best players and he expanded on Derrian Ford’s tweaked ankle, an injury sustained against the Trojans. The Bench Question wan’t one with which he was unfamiliar.

“Why is so-and-so not playing?” said Coach Hodgson, “We have to use a common sense. If somebody is not in the rotation, they are either hurt or just not part of the rotation. If I was going to play them, I’m going to play them. It’s not Upwards.”

There were questions about the Red Wolves struggle against zone defenses, to which Coach Hodgson wanted to offer a clarification. “We don’t struggle against the zone. We struggle against South Alabama’s zone.” He talked about the preparation before the game, how the team worked diligently in practice on countering the Jaguars defenses. “My biggest concern was the lack of carryover from the last two days (of practice),” said Coach Hodgson.

But if there was a single message Coach Hodgson wanted to convey, it was that the team had not run short of confidence, that the sky wasn’t falling, and that the team would be more than ready when the plane touches down in Pensacola. “The world is not ending,” assured Coach Hodgson. “The team is not falling apart.”

With that message delivered, Coach Hodgson fielded an assortment of queries both salient and odd-ball. We learned he is no fan of the MAC/Sun Belt Challenge, noting that NET didn’t budge for either conference. He loves the new Sun Belt Tournament format (“I liked it a lot better two weeks ago.”). I asked him if missing out on the one-and-two seedings offers an opportunity to play without rust, and he said while such an idea is intriguing, he’d rather have the Super-Duper Bye. He revealed that his infant son Jet would participate in the Baby Race during Saturday’s halftime. When I asked him if Izaiyah Nelson should pop more threes (a dumb question I posed), his answer was “No,” and then he actually took time to dwell on the idea further, revealing that before Nelson’s foot injury, he had been working hard on developing an outside shot.

The Reader’s Digest version of Coach Hodgson’s impromptu press conference is Bryan Hodgson just wanted to talk about his team, a group of guys he’s literally crawled alongside in the mud. He spoke glowingly of his team, but also of the fans, whom he says he loves for their passion – even if they’re currently grousing over this rough patch. After all, a grouchy fan base is far better than an indifferent fan base.

“Thanks guys, appreciate you,” said Coach Hodgson signing off. And I believe he meant it.

Photos by Carla Wehmeyer – Arkansas State