For Drexel, the Madness started way before March and never stopped | Mike Jensen

You’re in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 25 years, you follow directions. Drexel’s men team was told to get to Indianapolis early. The Dragons didn’t wait for the Selection Sunday draw. They flew out Saturday, the first team to check into their hotel.

Bring on the Madness … Wait, what’s this?

Walking in the lobby, knowing this whole thing was going to be a bubble — all these kids were strolling around. A volleyball tournament had taken over the hotel.

» READ MORE: Join the Madness! Fill out your 2021 NCAA Tournament bracket.

Not to worry, they were told. The volleyball teams were clearing out, all of them gone by the next day. The Dragons, trained now in such things, took a wide route around, got all checked in, got to their rooms … time for their official NCAA quarantine.

Asked about how this all was different than when coach Zach Spiker went to the NCAAs as a Cornell assistant, he joked, “Once-in-a-lifetime pandemic aside, how is it different?”

In their own minds, Drexel’s path to March was maybe equal parts basketball improvement and dealing with the pandemic. That didn’t change upon check-in.

» READ MORE: A Sweet 16 of things to focus on in March Madness

“I do think that the NCAA has worked incredibly hard for us to even have this experience,” Spiker said on a Zoom call after the Dragons found out they were a 16 seed facing top seed Illinois Friday at 1:15 p.m. “If it’s a little bit different here or there … we practiced in a ballroom today. Great practice. It’s certainly a little different than you’d normally have.”

Getting to the hotel, “we had to quarantine for almost 22 hours,” Spiker said. “Meals delivered to our rooms. Everyone on their own.”

Nothing they couldn’t handle, or hadn’t already experienced. Time to get a COVID-19 test? Drexel players have gotten tested daily since the preseason.

The difference: This test would determine whether they were good to hear their name on Selection Sunday. Spiker explained that Elon and Hofstra were still testing their players in case Drexel came up short on the COVID front.

“I got a text last night from Hofstra — can you let us know when you clear so we can stop testing,” said Nick Gannon, Drexel’s deputy athletic director, and the sport administrator for both men’s and women’s basketball, explaining that Hofstra was still in play since after Drexel and finalist Elon, a bid would go to the surviving Colonial Athletic Association semifinalist with the highest NET computer ranking. But only until the field was selected. Now, anybody drops this week, the first four teams out are designated as the alternates, starting with Louisville.

Consider that Virginia, after joining Duke in having to drop out of the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament because of a positive COVID-19 test, isn’t traveling to Indianapolis until Friday for a Saturday game, and not practicing this week. Louisville is absolutely still in play to get in the field.

Waiting for that last pre-selection test, I asked Spiker, a little extra anticipation and anxiety waiting for it to come through?

“Which potential season-ending test was more stressful than the other, I think, is what you’re asking,” Spiker said.

Yes, it’s been stressful since October. Spiker made a point of how their missed games were because of other teams testing positive, that, knock on wood, no positives by Tier 1 Dragons. But 12 games canceled overall.

» READ MORE: Drexel men draw Illinois

“We’ve been really successful because we’ve kept it really tight — we don’t have hangers-on,” Gannon said.

He was including himself. He didn’t travel with the teams during the regular season like he often would. No sports information director, no strength coach. They all worked remotely until the postseason. (No moral judgments on positive tests. They happened, including at Drexel, just not among hoop players. This was all about cutting down odds.)

“We’ve seen other teams walking in, where there were 35 people,” Gannon said. “We’re traveling with 23, 24. I actually think the staff was as susceptible as the players …”

Probably more so, since plenty of staffers would go to home to spouses and children, have more sources of COVID entry.

Yet here they are, Drexel men and women both in the NCAAs. A chance to celebrate more than just balls going in baskets.

“Early in the season, I was a basket case every day,” Gannon said. “You just woke up every day, especially when [a team] was on the road …”

A text would come in from the trainer … Game on.

» READ MORE: Drexel women secure NCAA bid

An article of faith mentioned by players and Spiker and administrators, the most disciplined team would win.

“It’s going to be the team that handles this the best — the mental part, I mean,” Gannon said.

The kudos, he said, go to the players. Philadelphia city health guidelines were different than those for some other teams in other states. There were discussions on whether every day meant testing seven days or six times, given NCAA guidelines for a day off. They landed on seven days. Often early in the morning before 9:15 a.m. practices.

“The protocols were strict,” Gannon said, referring to city guidelines followed during the regular season. “If we had a positive, there was no contact tracing for us, we were going home [without playing a game]. Testing seven days a week, that’s a grind, and kind of hard to accept at the start. The seven days did remind everyone that every day and every night — ‘I’ve got to test tomorrow.’ "

When a break appeared on Drexel’s schedule, opponents knocked out, the break extending to 19 days, an offer came in from Kentucky. The Wildcats had just lost a game with Texas A&M. You want to come down? (Coincidentally or not, former Drexel head coach Bruiser Flint is now a Kentucky assistant.)

“We kicked it around for two or three hours,” Gannon said. “How do we get ready for March? We hadn’t played in a while. That was the appealing thing.”

Also, Kentucky had been struggling. Maybe they could steal a win. So the rewards, obvious. But the risk … Gannon mentioned how assistant athletic director for sports medicine Mike Westerfer was saying all season, “Any time you step on the floor, you take a risk.”

Especially, he said, on the road. They looked into a charter to Kentucky. Nope, not available, have to fly commercial. Regretfully, they passed, reminding themselves it wouldn’t have been the usual experience of playing at a full Rupp Arena anyway.

Even this week, if 22 hours in the room sounds tortuous, let’s point out that all quarantines are not created equal. Maybe the weirdness of it all was showcased when the men’s traveling party couldn’t even get together Saturday to watch the women secure their NCAA bid with an upset over Delaware in the CAA final. Still the yells broke through walls, and staffers put together a Zoom toast when it was over.

“We were all within 20 feet of each other,” Gannon said.

Sounds awful? Again, this was a quarantine at the NCAA Tournament.

“It’s not a bad quarantine to have,” Drexel captain James Butler said right after the selection announcement, the Dragons allowed together in a conference room. “I’m sure there are a lot of people who would love to be in this quarantine situation.”

Knowing what they were there to do, Butler said of those hours going by, “It’s always on your mind. It’s not like we’re just sitting around doing nothing. We’re getting ready for a game, trying to get mentally prepared.”

A text came in to Gannon from women’s coach Amy Mallon right after her team was in, heading to Texas next for its own NCAA bubble. How did the men celebrate winning the CAA? Eh, nothing really back at the hotel. Everybody back to their rooms. Makes sense. That’s kind of how the Dragons all got to the promised land in the first place.