You can't start a fire without a spark

-          Bruce Springsteen, Dancing in the Dark

Referencing a Bruce Springsteen song worked for the quarterfinals, so I've decided to stick with it here heading into the semifinals of the USA South conference tournament. I am currently writing this entry at 9:30pm on Thursday night, as the team bus heads down interstate 81 towards our destination in Rocky Mount, VA.

We all just finished watching an ESPN documentary called “Winning Time” which chronicled Reggie Miller and the Indiana Pacers' rivalry with the New York Knicks during the mid-1990s. The Knicks had long dominated the Pacers until the 1995 playoffs, when Miller scored 8 points in the last 15 seconds of Game One on the road at Madison Square Garden to “spark” the Pacers to an eventual series victory in seven games.

We will need to find our own spark against Ferrum. The Panthers are an athletic, balanced, and skilled squad. They are ranked among the top 20 teams in the nation for good reason. As they showed in their overtime victory over us two weeks ago, they are a very determined bunch who are going to give us everything they have.

With that said, we have it within us to get it done tomorrow. – even without our leading scorer Conley Taylor (out for the season with an ankle injury). There are no surprises to be had; we know Ferrum and Ferrum knows us. The game is going to be about sparking that fire and making the plays that will separate us from Ferrum. Plays like getting on the defensive boards and grabbing loose balls, sprinting back and containing Ferrum in transition, taking charges and controlling the paint on defense, and making timely shots from the field. Someone or more likely multiple guys are going to have to step up and lead us by making these winning plays.

Games like the one we have on Friday night do not come around often. A lot of times, as a player or coach, you can take for granted playing in games that have this much importance attached to them. The best teams – the championship teams – understand the opportunity they have and are resolved to make the very most of it. I am confident our guys will play with the passion and fearlessness that we expect to have in this game. It should be a fun one.

I hope you can tune in to the CNU/Pepsi Radio Network, Xtra 99.1 FM if you are in Hampton Roads or CNUsports.com and follow along. Thanks again to all of our supporters out there for being with us the entire way. For now, the bus ride, and our journey, continues into the night. As rain hits the pavement outside while the guys stir behind me, I find myself once again realizing that it's trips like these that make college basketball so special. We'll walk into Ferrum tomorrow and it'll be just the twenty or so of us against the rest of the gym. The ref will toss up the ball, and we'll know soon enough if we can rise to the challenge. There'll be no other place in the world where we'd rather be.