SAN ANTONIO – When Houston basketball brings a recruit to campus, one of his first stops is a wall near the Cougars’ strength training area.
On it, program legend Hakeem Olajuwon’s likeness stretches its arms to full width. This is where Houston measures wingspan.
One of the key talking points surrounding Houston’s run to the national championship game Monday night has been coach Kelvin Sampson’s remarkable roster development. In an era defined by player movement and dollar signs, Sampson has maintained a relatively healthy, stable locker room. Four of his five starters Monday returned from last season, with a combined 13 years of experience at Houston among them.
Because Sampson tends to win through smart scouting and intensive development, there’s a temptation to paint his program as a perpetual underdog. Houston is anything but. The Cougars are the result of decades spent refining the process of building, improving and winning with a basketball team suited ideally to its coach.
Joseph Tugler, the unsung hero of Saturday’s semifinal win against Duke, is its posterchild.
“Around our program, if I say, ‘That's JoJo being JoJo,’” Sampson said, “everybody would understand.”
Houston's Joseph Tugler is blend of smarts and toughness
The day Tugler first visited the Olajuwon wall, he measured 7-6 ½.
Asked Sunday, a Houston basketball staffer wasn’t sure exactly how far The Dream stretches in full. A cursory Google search suggests Olajuwon’s wingspan topped out at 7-6. Tugler insists his isn’t quite that wide.
But that day, Tugler — affectionately known as JoJo — reached so far the Houston staff asked to measure his mother’s reach too. She stretched to 6-7.
These are the traits Sampson knows he needs. There’s a reason why, when Tugler signed, Sampson went out of his way to say Houston pushed for his commitment before the summer grassroots circuit, knowing he’d blow up.
Wingspan is crucial to Sampson’s preference for blitzing ball screens. Tugler’s footwork moves his 6-8, 230-pound body like a guard would. And he can jump a second time for the rebounds opponents are still trying to secure on their first.
“When I watched JoJo play before we recruited him,” Sampson said, “his second jump is the best, and this includes the NBA. I've never had a kid second jump like him. His third jump is as good as most people's first.”
Tugler is like Houston — all toughness and tools and togetherness and brains. One of his sisters has a Ph. D. Tugler found his in basketball, skipping with friends between the four rec centers within reach of his neighborhood growing up. If one was closed, Tugler just kept moving until he found an ...
