Jimmy Patsos coaches to... make a statement?

If you don't know who Jimmy Patsos (above) is, he's the men's head basketball coach at Loyola (Md.) College. He's a former assistant coach under Gary Williams at Maryland, and he was around when the Terps' won a national title against Indiana in 2002.

Anyway, Loyola faced Davidson yesterday and Patsos employed a triangle-and-2 defense to try to stop Stephen Curry, Davidson's outstanding guard and a player who will more than likely be a high first-round pick in next year's NBA draft. (A triangle-and-2 defense is when two defenders shadow one or two players and the three other players on defense basically play a 1-2 zone.)

Patsos is a pretty good coach, but he figured his team had no chance to stop Curry, so he figured, hey, why not just take him out of the game and see what happens?

“If Oklahoma can’t stop him, how is Loyola College going to stop him?” Patsos asked.

Well, what happened was a 30-point loss. Then again, Curry didn't score any points, so, moral victory!

Unfortunately, some fans weren't pleased with Patsos's decision; the same goes for Davidson's head coach.

Some will remember the catcalls Patsos received from the fans when he stuck with the defense well after the game was decided. Davidson coach Bob McKillop was so annoyed he kept Curry in the game until the final minute.

“It seemed to me they were willing to risk the game at the expense of locking Steph up,” McKillop said. “When you put two people on somebody and you do it for 30 minutes and at the end of the game, you have to wonder what the reasons for that are.”

Those Maryland coaches are just off the wall, aren't they?