Adam Thistlewood was all in. So was Kendle Moore. At Drake.
That’s where Medved originally recruited both to play for him. Then he switched locations, but the vision was still the same. And the players could still see it working.
“I think the biggest thing was a winning culture,” Thistlewood said, whose choice was easy because it meant he would be playing closer to his hometown of Golden. “Not just a winning program and not just a good culture, but a hybrid of both, where we have great guys and we can win and we can play at the highest level. I think we’ve transformed this into that kind of place.”
Moore had things to consider, but he was always enamored with Medved and the program he wanted to build. When Medved brought his entire staff with him, Fort Collins felt like home.
Now, four years later, Moore will tell you the man who recruited him is the same today as he was then.
“It was basically come in here and grow into a family,” the guard said. “Make sure everybody is one on the court, everybody enjoys each other. A winning culture.
“I like it, because no matter what, even the first couple of years we were here, they weren’t the best years, but at the same time, nothing changed. His motto, his mindset was still the same of everybody building a winning culture, everybody come here and become a family. That’s one thing I like about Coach Niko. Through adversity and all of that, he stays on the same track.”
Medved was taking over a program where the preceding divorce was not exactly amicable. There were players already on roster to win over, too, but his first recruiting class was important. He needed players who could not only play, but help set a tone. Not just in the present, but for the future.
What he saw in Thistlewood and Moore were young men who would come in and work. Daily, without looking for shortcuts. Be examples.
“They’ve been everyday guys in just their approach to the work, their approach to the process,” Medved said. “Their approach is really how they’ve handled everything. It’s just so rare. You feel a sense of debt to them for what they’ve done. They believed in a vision and not what was already here. It’s been really fun to watch guys who commit to that with no guarantees of anything in the future.”
Which is the payoff for both of them entering their senior years. A lot of players help build the blocks for a vision the coach has, only to see it come to fruition after they’ve left the program. No doubt, they left their mark and helped create something, but often, they don’t get to share in the bounty.
As this season begins, the expectations could not be higher for the Rams. They’ve been picked to win the Mountain West after placing fourth in the NIT a year ago, and the program is coming off successive 20-win seasons for the first time since 2011-12 to 2012-13. And the program has never won the Mountain West championship.
Thistlewood and Moore have a chance to see the vision come true, and they definitely did their part, step by step, the first one being the toughest.
“The biggest thing for us as freshmen, we were leading by example,” Thistlewood said. “It’s hard for a freshman to walk in and say, you need to do this, you need to do this, you’re doing this wrong, whatever it was. It’s hard for a freshman to wear those shoes. Developing those habits, as the next recruiting class and the next recruiting class, building that brotherhood by getting on the same page, first, by example, and as the years have gone on, we’ve been able to be more vocal with each other.”
Medved had more room in his next class, which brought to the table David Roddy, Isaiah Stevens, Dischon Thomas, John Tonje and James Moors. They needed leaders to follow, and Medved showed them the two who came in before them.
There were older, more experienced players on the team, to be certain. But in those two, he had the blueprint for how he wanted his players to go about the daily grind, on and off the court.
“When your leaders, your older guys who have been through it, are some of your best people and hardest workers, have the best practice habits, are more about the team than themselves, then that’s easy for the new guys to come in and to look at that, that’s the example,” Medved said. “Somebody new to college basketball or Colorado State, what’s the first thing they’re going to do? Well, they’re going to come in and look across at the veteran guys who have been through it, and that’s who they’re going to try to emulate. Those guys emulate what we want from a player as well as anybody.
“You feel a tremendous amount of loyalty to them. They’ve been loyal to us. You have a feeling, to be honest, that we’re all in it together as coaches and players and we’re in that foxhole together. That’s just the feeling you have that we’re all rowing in the same direction.”
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From Start to Finish - Colorado State University Athletics - CSURams.com
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