College Basketball — Miami a Surprise Contender

David Santiago/El Nuevo Herald, via Associated Press

Under Coach Jim Larranaga, in his second season, the previously unheralded Hurricanes are leading the Atlantic Coast Conference.

CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Jim Larranaga always has a plan. He plans by the day, week, month and year. If anyone wonders how he stays so organized, Larranaga walks behind his desk here at BankUnited Center and opens two large cabinets, which house more than two decades' worth of Franklin Covey daily planners: thick, three-ring monstrosities the size of dictionaries.

Larranaga, the men's basketball coach at Miami, keeps track of everything in those binders. His goals. His team's statistics. His thoughts and observations. He also jots down what he expects to happen, and that includes the Hurricanes' remarkable rise this season. Larranaga was so confident in his team that he showed up at a board of trustees meeting last October and delivered a message.

"I told them this could be the best year in school history," he said this week.

It was a low bar. Long known for the success — and various suspected extracurriculars — of its football program, Miami has an unexceptional basketball past, with six trips to the N.C.A.A. tournament and a lone appearance in the Round of 16 back in 2000. Yet in just his second season, Larranaga, 63, has built the team into an improbable contender, much as he did at George Mason, which he coached to the Final Four in 2006.

The Hurricanes (22-4, 13-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) are ranked No. 5 entering Wednesday's game against Virginia Tech, and their home games regularly sell out. Fans stormed the court Jan. 23 after a 27-point victory over Duke, then ranked No. 1. The Heat stars LeBron James and Dwyane Wade have made courtside cameos. And students, who line up for tickets on a patch of real estate known as Larranaga's Lawn, wear T-shirts that feature Larranaga's face on the front along with the slogan "40 Minutes of L" — a play on the slightly more profane catchphrase of the high-octane teams at Arkansas in the 1990s.

"I thought it was hilarious," the assistant Michael Huger said, adding: "People think because of Coach's age, he can't do this, he can't do that. Can't? That's not even in his vocabulary. He's healthy, he moves well, he communicates well, and his mind is sharp as a tack."

Miami had won 14 straight games before last Saturday's loss at Wake Forest, a breakdown that was still fresh on Larranaga's mind this week. On Monday, he kept a box score in his pocket and cited what his team did wrong: "Everything." Larranaga wants Miami to limit opponents to 40 percent shooting over all and 30 percent from beyond the 3-point line. Wake Forest shot 54.2 percent over all, 58.3 percent from long range.

In coping this week, Larranaga said he was relying on one of his favorite books, "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People," by Stephen R. Covey. Citing the need for rest — part of Habit No. 7 — Larranaga did not have his players practice on Sunday and barred them from speaking with reporters until after Wednesday's game. "The thing we can't afford to do is allow our priorities to change," Larranaga said.

There are times when Larranaga, who grew up in the Bronx, would seem right at home at a TED conference, exchanging innovative management ideas. Part coach and part management guru, he has always been fascinated by numbers and strategy, dating to his college days at Providence, where he started as a math major before switching to economics. (Economics, he said, was more practical.) As a basketball coach, he believes in the data-crunching wizardry of Ken Pomeroy, whose semi-eponymous basketball statistics Web site, KenPom.com, has been an invaluable resource for Larranaga for years.

Of particular interest are his team's offensive and defensive efficiency ratings, which are based on points per possession. According to Pomeroy, the Hurricanes rank 6th in defensive efficiency and 39th in offensive efficiency. Defense, Larranaga said, is the foundation. Scoring points? "That keeps your players happy," he said.

On defense, he wants to limit his opponents to 12 points per position. In other words, if the starting point guard scores 9 points and his backup hits a 3-pointer, the limit has been reached. That also means opponents should average no more than 60 points a game. This season, opponents are averaging 59.2 points and 38.4 percent shooting. Larranaga's players get a dose of his man-to-man principles every day.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: February 26, 2013

An earlier version of a photo caption in this story misstated the name of the Miami Hurricanes' conference. They play in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

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