Do you want to give up your home court advantage?, Mike Haupt, basketball coach at St. Augustine, was asked while he watched his son play La Jolla in soccer Wed., Feb. 10.
The interchange began on the western sideline of the Saints' soccer field--right in front of a giant pit that will end up being the school's three-level sports and basketball complex.
"Home court advantage? I'm done with that," said Haupt, not with rancor. "Playing at Mesa College against Cathedral? That's no home court advantage.
"No, I'm done with that."
The Saints have to play home games where attendance is going to be large at neutral sites because of the limited size of the present gymnasium on campus.
Haupt, Saints coach for 20 years after being CIF San Diego Co-Player of the Year at Mira Mesa as a student, has long been a thorn in La Jolla's side. He enjoyed coaching against Kamal Assaf, who was Vikings coach until 2012.
Warming to the subject of the new arena on campus, Haupt explained the ultimate home court advantage: In the new facility, in which the basketball floor will be on the bottom floor, 300 seats will be positioned behind one basket--for "The Pit", the student cheering section.
At the other end of the court, guess how many seats there will be behind the basket? None.
You have to smile at the ingenuity and the brazenness of the design, totally emphasizing the power of the all-boys school's cheering section to make it hard on opponents.
For half the game, the visiting team will be shooting free throws and running its offense into the jaws of the loud, boisterous Pit cheering section behind the basket, made up of boys who attend St. Augustine and are well-known for making things impossible on opposing players.
On the two remaining sides of the court, several hundred seats will provide space for the visitors, and several hundred more for the non-student rooters for the Saints.
"It was the craziest thing. You couldn't even think," said one person who remembers his experience playing against the Saints as an opponent.
Another person, a Viking rooter, had to leave the building and has never attended a game in the Saints gym again. She was so overcome with claustrophobia and tension in the tiny, cramped building in which spectators in the front row are right next to the playing surface, that she couldn't handle it.
Haupt outlined the design of the rest of the large complex. Entry will be on the south end, on the second level. A spectator will enter the front doors to a view of the basketball floor one level below. The third level will be made up of coaches offices and the like. On the roof of the building, Haupt said with glee, will be four outdoor basketball courts for P.E. classes.
The present gym, which has seen a few years, will be remodeled into a building for the arts and other subjects.
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Haupt, who came to be friends with Assaf over their years of competing against each other as opposing coaches, had more. "I'll tell you a story about how Kamal is," he said.
"One time, when La Jolla was playing here, Kamal had a meltdown in the fourth quarter. He got a technical, and our lead went from two or three points to eight or nine. It helped lose the game for his team.
"So, later, I called him. That's how we did it. I asked him, 'How are you doing?' He said, 'Oh, I feel terrible. I lost the game for my team. I gotta take a break. I gotta get away.'
"I asked him, 'So what are you going to do to get away?' 'Go to the (SDSU) Aztecs game,' he said."
Haupt laughed, because everybody knows how much a part of Assaf's life basketball is, even after he stepped down from coaching at La Jolla.
He now coaches the middle school team at Bishop's, where he continues to be a full-time classroom teacher. He made the move in coaching because of family needs: His father was ill at the time, he was newly married, the couple soon had a daughter, his wife is a medical doctor, and her own parents were in need of caregiving. Something had to give.
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