Greenawalt's demands help Wildcats get physical with foes
By Tim Bisel
The Capital-Journal
Published Wednesday, January 31, 2007
MANHATTAN — They bench press and squat, flip tires and push football sleds.
They also sit, but not on chairs or sofas to relax. No, the Kansas State Wildcats sit with their backs against a wall and heavy weights perched on their thighs for several excruciating minutes at a time.
"We do things that are very, very hard, things that most people would just want to stop (doing) because of how bad it hurts," said Scott Greenawalt, the first-year strength and conditioning coach who oversees such workouts.
When Greenawalt first arrived at K-State, many of the Wildcats couldn't perform the wall-sit drill for more than a few seconds, even though their body weight served as the only resistance.
"Now, they're doing wall sits with 300 or 400 pounds on their legs," Greenawalt said.
Now, their legs are clearly underneath them. Entering today's 8 p.m. game against Missouri, the Wildcats (15-6, 4-2) have won five consecutive games and an unprecedented four straight in the Big 12.
Once known as a team that couldn't win on the road or protect a lead down the stretch, K-State finds itself just a game-and-a-half out of first place in the league standings and entertaining serious NCAA Tournament thoughts for the first time since 1996.
In short, K-State has the same tough-guy look as Greenawalt, a former college linebacker who is thick from the top of his bald head to the tips of his shoes.
"We're a better team," junior David Hoskins said. "We're definitely a tougher team."
No one knows that better than Missouri coach Mike Anderson, who watched the Wildcats outrebound his Tigers 41-17 and claim an 85-81 victory Jan. 13. The win propelled the Wildcats to their best conference run in 17 years.
"I think they play physical, they get aggressive and they get after you," Anderson said.
The MU coach went on to say that K-State is doing it the Bob Huggins way. But Huggins is the first to admit that wouldn't be possible without Greenawalt, who spent seven years with him at Cincinnati.
"I wasn't going to come (to K-State) without him," Huggins said. "He is, in my estimation, as good a strength coach as there is in the country.
"You can't make the kind of gains our guys have made in the weight room without experiencing pain and understanding how to deal with pain and how to deal with fatigue and how to continue to push yourself through it. To me, we are a whole lot stronger than what we've ever been, but I think we're a whole lot mentally tougher as a result of what they go through."
Make no mistake, the Wildcats go through a lot under their new strength coach's supervision.
While traditional lifts and workouts are incorporated into Greenawalt's year-round routine, he is a staunch believer that the sled pushes, tire flips and wall sits ultimately translate to on-court success.
"That's the type of stuff that I think toughens you up mentally, especially when you're tired, when it's easy to quit," he said. "When it gets hard at that 38th, 39th minute, I think it brings a confidence level to most of these kids because they know their opponent has never done that type of stuff."
The Wildcats work out three times a week during the season, breaking up into small groups so that Greenawalt can monitor each player and tailor sessions to fit individual needs. That's a vast departure from the once-a-week, 10-minute sessions they endured a year ago.
"The coaches didn't want to wear us out last year," Hoskins said. "Coach Huggins isn't too worried about that."
Initially, the Wildcats were. There were times early on when they could barely walk, barely lift their arms. There were other times, by Greenawalt's own admission, when they asked themselves, "What the heck are we doing?"
Now, the answer is clear and the question has changed.
"When we went from Berkeley (Calif.) to Fort Collins (Colo.), our guys were asking, 'Can we get a lift in?'" Huggins said. "Historically, it's been that way. When guys kind of get conditioned to doing it, they really enjoy it and know how much it helps them."
The Wildcats have seen the results. Although K-State ranks 10th in the Big 12 in field-goal shooting (.428), it is winning with a blue-collar defensive approach that has produced fourth-place league rankings in field-goal percentage defense (.392) and rebounding (37.8).
"I thought this was the most physical team that we've played all year," Chicago State coach Kevin Jones said last week after the Wildcats roughed up his Cougars, 73-36. "We've played a lot of teams, but no one was aggressive in every area like Kansas State, and it just wore us down."
Such comments, which have become the opposition's mantra in recent weeks, bring a smile to Greenawalt's face.
"Strength coaches aren't going to be millionaires, so they have to have some satisfaction for the job," he said. "Yes, actually, I do take a lot of pride in hearing that."
Just like he takes pride in working for Huggins, who offered him unwavering support from the first day they met in Cincinnati.
"If you look across the country, (Huggins) is probably the No. 1 coach about supporting strength and conditioning and the things that I do," Greenawalt said. "That makes my job easy."
And in turn, it has made the Wildcats tough.
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