Darris Nichols opens up about rebuilding La Salle basketball in NIL era
For La Salle University, the NCAA Tournament is a reminder of what it hopes to get its program back to. As they rebuild, the Explorers are turning to Darris Nichols as their new men's basketball head coach after Fran Dunphy retired.
"The people, the energy they have around this place. The enthusiasm they have to get it going in the right direction," Nichols said. "I want to embrace challenges, and that's what I felt from them in the interview process."
In four years as head coach at Radford University, Nichols posted two 20-win seasons with a 68-63 overall record.
The Explorers haven't had a winning season in 10 years. At Radford, Nichols helped turn the program almost immediately. Accountability was what Nichols preached to his Highlanders teams.
"The biggest thing is not making excuses and being flexible," Nichols said. "You have challenges at every job. I know what the challenges are here, and I'm excited about those challenges. I've seen them before. Finding guys that aren't going to complain. Finding guys that are going to buy into what you believe and the family feels."
Nichols is tasked with turning the Explorers program around in Philadelphia while also managing the new-age challenges in the game with the transfer portal.
"It's really hard," Nichols said about whether culture and transfer portal coexist. "We don't use the world 'culture.' We use the word 'environment.' I think culture is long term. It takes a long time to get that culture. A lot of times you don't have that kind of time, so we focus on the environment that we create as a program."
This is a new culture with name, image and likeness (NIL). It seems like universities with bigger budgets are able to get the top players, leaving it more difficult for small programs to compete. Nichols plans to attack that by making sure he nails player evaluations on the recruiting trail.
"It goes back to evaluation. Sometimes we've taken players where people say, 'I don't know if he's good enough,' and he turns out to be really good," Nichols said. "But we may not be able to keep that player. I'm OK with that. You have to be flexible, and your evaluations have to be spot on in what you do. You can't have a missed step with that."
Unlike modern philosophy in the game, Nichols is going big — literally — in what he likes to call, "Finish at the rim culture."
As Nichols builds out his roster, the new La Salle head coach is looking for players with one specific quality.
"We play differently. We play with two bigs," Nichols said. "A lot of people play with one, some people play with none to space the floor and shoot threes. Find the guys that fit us and are really tough guys. it's something we've had success with."
Nichols hopes to build off his success at Radford by cultivating a blue-collar team that matches the toughness of the city.
