I’ve never been a Princeton fan, but for decades I’ve been a fan of their longtime basketball coach Pete Carril, who died this week. 

Those of you who think that basketball begins and ends with Kentucky Blue, Carolina Blue, or for that matter UCLA Blue, maybe surprised to learn that the orange-and-black-wearing Princetonian is also in the Naismith Hall of Fame. I would never say that it’s easy to become an Adolph Rupp, a Dean Smith, or a John Wooden – clearly it is not – but what Carril did might’ve been even rougher: He recruited for a place that offered no athletic scholarships (and a price tag at the top of the college food chain), had insanely difficult admissions procedures, and didn’t lighten up on the players once they arrived, and he made them competitive. 

He knew that his players couldn’t keep up with the five-star recruits if he played their game of strength and speed, so instead, he relied on what they had – their smarts. 

“The strong take from the weak, but the clever take from the strong, he often said, quoting his father, an immigrant who worked in a steel mill. In short, he slowed the game down, played a ball control offense, and made supposedly better (or at least better heeled) teams look foolish with picks and backdoor cuts. 

"Anybody can coach basketball. I can tell you that right now. It's not that hard to know about a pick-and-roll, a back-pick, the shuffle-cut, I mean, it's not that hard," Carril once said. "But what is hard is to see how to develop something, to have an idea how your team is going to play. And that comes under the header of thinking." 

At several points throughout his tenure, his teams made the basketball establishment take notice, most notably in the 1989 NCAA tournament, when his 16-seeded Tigers lost to top-seed Georgetown by a single point. Many people still contend that Georgetown’s Alonzo Mourning got away fouled Princeton center Kit Mueller on the last play of the game. “We’ll take that up with god when we get there,” Carril said. Now he’ll have the chance. 

What does this have to do with fishing? 

Most of us will never have the innate skills – let alone the work ethic – of a Kevin VanDam, a Jacob Wheeler, or a Brandon Palaniuk. If you try to compete on their terms, whether at a Bassmaster Open, a Toyota Series, or your local club derby, you’re going to get your teeth kicked in more often than not. Sure, the underdog can win far more often in fishing than in hoops. A solid regional tournament might beat KVD a few times out of a hundred, whereas he’s never going to beat Alonzo Mourning, LeBron James, or even a 50-something Kit Mueller (now a hedge funder). 

You can, however, try to close that gap a little through Carril-like logic. Find matchup differences. Play small ball. Control things that you can. Make the game come to you. That still might not help you win a slugfest, or take an AOY title, but it can tilt the field just enough to make it close.