SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Rakim Sanders began his college basketball playing career at Boston College and Sydney Johnson started his head coaching career at Princeton.
Now both have united at Fairfield and are one win from leading the Stags to their first MAAC Conference championship since 1997 and an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
After the 6-foot-5 Sanders scored 15 of his career-high 26 points in Sunday’s 85-75 semifinal upset of top-seeded Iona, Fairfield will play Loyola Monday night for the MAAC crown (7 p.m., ESPN2).
“The 15 points in the second half, that’s all cause of these guys,” Sanders said when he was seated next to Colin Nickerson (14 points) and Keith Matthews (14) on the dais. “It’s all my teammates and just them trusting in me and giving me the confidence to do what I do.”
The 2006-7 Gatorade Rhode Island Player of the Year, Sanders initially committed to then-Boston College coach Al Skinner.
He played three years at BC but was hampered by an ankle sprain during the 2009-10 season and finished averaging 11.3 points.
When Skinner parted ways with the program in 2010, Sanders felt it was time for a change himself.
“The coach was leaving so I felt a change was needed, you get back in shape and get my mind right,” Sanders said. “So that was the reason for transferring.”
He transferred to Fairfield in 2010 because then-Stags coach Ed Cooley had recruited him to BC while he was on Skinner’s staff.
But after Sanders sat out the 2010-11 season, Cooley himself left Fairfield to take the Providence job.
Johnson, who played and coached at Princeton, was hired to replace Cooley.
Asked if there was ever any thought that Sanders might leave once Cooley did, Johnson cracked with a laugh, “He didn’t have any choice whether he was going to stay or not.”
Sanders said he was sold on Johnson after first meeting him.
“That first time meeting him, it was just like an automatic click,” Sanders said.
The bond was solidified when the team went on a trip to Italy in August 2011.
“The biggest thing with me was our Italy trip,” Sanders said. “Just seeing him with his family. A lot of times…you don’t have that mother/father thing and just seeing him out there with his kids, that’s what did it for me. And just from there, I’ve just been always happy to have him around.”
Once he got the job, Johnson said he and Sanders “spent some time” getting to know one another.
“I think that Rakim understood early on that I appreciated his abilities all over the court,” Johnson said of the player who is averaging 17 points and 8.3 rebounds. “He can pass, dribble and shoot. He’s definitely a load down in the post, but he can make 3’s, he can pass, he’s a good teammate to his teammate.
“So maybe there we just kind of had a similar understanding but we still had to go though the fire. And it’s pretty hot. I mean, we have a huge game [Monday].
“But Rakim and Colin and Keith and I and the rest of us, we still have some basketball to be played and we’re not really ready to assess the year just yet.”
Johnson and Sanders hope they will be assessing — and celebrating — an NCAA bid Monday night.
Photo: Fairfield Athletics
