For the first time since 1976, Syracuse men’s basketball enters a season with a head coach not named Jim Boeheim. Adrian Autry, a former SU point guard, assistant coach, and associate head coach is now the guy running the ship.
Autry was born in North Carolina. At a young age, he and his family moved to Harlem, New York. “Red,” a nickname that he was given because of his reddish hair color as a child, became a star point guard at St. Nicholas of Tolentine in the Bronx. He won a State Title in 1988. He was a McDonald’s All-American in 1990, and won the three-point shootout at the event.
According to Mike Waters, a Syracuse men’s basketball reporter who began his coverage two years before Autry got to SU, Red had poise as a player even before getting to campus.
“As a sophomore (in high school) playing on a varsity team that was one of the best teams in the entire country, he was a steadying influence on the floor... he was the leader on the floor. So it was no surprise he got to Syracuse and they put him in the starting lineup right away.”
Autry started all but one game as a freshman and led the team in assists. However, he shot under 41% from the floor in both his freshman and sophomore campaigns. Boeheim would constantly give him tough love.
“Jim would challenge him. And often, challenge him in a way that that reminded him ‘You’re good. You’re supposed to be this. You’re supposed to a McDonald’s All-American... play like it,’” Waters said.
As Red got more experience with the Orange, he played better and better. He shot close to 50% from the field in each of his upperclassmen years. In fact, as a junior, he committed just 12 turnovers all season. Autry had over a 13-1 assist-to-turnover ratio in that year; however, the ‘Cuse were ineligible to play in March Madness because of an investigation into SU athletic programs.
In each season, Autry increased his scoring average. (9.7, 11.0, 13.7, 16.7). So by the time Red was a senior, Boeheim and him were in lock-step.
“Adrian becomes a coach on the floor,” Waters said. “He’s the leader now. He’s directing the play. If he and Jim talked, more often than not it was like watching a veteran quarterback in the NFL go over to the sidelines and talk things over with their head coach... There’s that level that certain players that are point guards or quarterbacks... and all of a sudden they’re seeing the game in a different way.”
Red finished his career with the Orange 5th in assists (631), 6th in steals (217), and 8th in minutes at just over 4,000. The hooper from The Bronx would also be one of just three players in Syracuse history to lead the team in total assists four times.
For his final collegiate contest against 1-seeded Missouri in the 1994 Sweet 16, Autry had a game to remember. The Orange rolled into Los Angeles after a pair of wins in Utah, and experienced a mini earthquake on the team bus on the way to the game.
Autry had 0 points at halftime of that game.
“If you can imagine what’s going through a senior’s mind when he’s got (0 points) at halftime. And watching his career, getting ready to come to an end. But to show you the mental fortitude and inner strength that Red had, he comes out of that locker room with, and he ends up leaving the court of the end of the game with 31,” Waters said.
Waters added that that was the best game of Autry’s career.
After his overseas playing days (1995-2005), Autry bounced around different coaching gigs in Virginia until he was hired by Seth Greenberg at Virginia Tech to be its director of basketball operations. Following the 2009-2010 season, he was hired as an assistant at Syracuse after the 2010 season. In 2012, ESPN named him the 5th-best assistant coach in the nation, in large part because of his ability to recruit.
“He connects with people,” Waters said. “He will talk to you. He will look you in the eye. He’ll make a connection. He’s real enough where he connects with kids... but he also can connect with moms and dads. He’s just a really down to earth person. You can tell there’s no phoniness to him. The people in basketball respect him because they remember the type of player he was. He carries a little bit of gravitas with him like ‘oh yeah, Adrian Autry. Yeah, I remember him at Syracuse.’”
This summer, months after being announced as the new head coach and telling a packed Carmelo Anthony Center that he is a “new voice” and “new face,” with “new ideas,” but the “standards that have helped build this program will not change,” Red got some advice from his predecessor.
"Do it your way," Autry said Boeheim told him. "Whatever you believe, whatever you think is right, do it your way. And you better believe in it. Because you ain't gonna get anyone else to believe in it, if you don't."
When asked after Monday’s victory against New Hampshire if there was a difference now as opposed to when he was the Associate Head Coach under Boeheim, Autry said.
“It wasn’t that much of a difference (in terms of the preparation). It’s just me being the head coach is a big difference. It was exciting.”