Pleased with future, fond of the past

Ray Giacoletti gave up his seat on the sideline at Eastern Washington before last season for a move to Salt Lake City and the University of Utah. A year after going to the Sweet 16 with the Utes, Giacoletti finds himself rebuilding with a young roster – and missing center Andrew Bogut, last year’s Wooden Award winner and top overall NBA Draft pick.

But Giacoletti sees nothing but promise in the future at Utah, and said he remembers nothing but good things from his time in Cheney. Tonight, his Utah team takes the Key Arena floor in Seattle to face another local squad, Washington State.

S-R: How do you feel this new team is shaping up thus far?

RG: We’ve got a lot of new, young players and we’re trying to have patience and get better as we go along.

S-R: Replacing Bogut must be a difficult task. Is that the toughest part of this season for you?

RG: We basically played seven guys last year anyway. … So we have so many holes to try to fill. We’ve got a good group for next year, but that doesn’t help us here and now.

S-R: So you’ve got the talent on hand to do well already?

RG: Long-term, yes. All these young guys, new guys are playing big minutes right now. Probably more minutes than they should be playing. … We signed five others so we’ve got our work done for long term but for right now we need to try to do the best we can to find a way to get better.

S-R: That sounds similar to what Dick Bennett is saying at WSU. Do you think the teams are mirror images at this point?

RG: He’s in year three of it and it’s starting to come together, it looks like to me. It’s starting to come together very nicely. With us, we’re still a work in progress.

S-R: How do you feel about Eastern Washington now that it’s in the rear-view mirror?

RG: I do miss Spokane. My wife and I lived in Spokane and Eastern Washington was very good to us. Some of our best friends, both my wife’s and mine, are there.

S-R: And the NCAA Tournament appearance?

RG: That probably, when you look back on things, to do something that the school’s never done before, is probably my fondest memory. The other thing I remember is how hard our guys competed for four years to try and get their standards up. Even going to the NIT was something special because they had never gone. When you’re part of something for the first time, you don’t realize it at the time, but looking back on it, it was very special.