Torrence Johnson never planned on going into coaching.<\/p>\n
He figured\u00a0he\u2019d\u00a0play basketball for as long as he could and see where his path took him beyond that.<\/p>\n
But, in a post-COVID world where there\u00a0weren\u2019t\u00a0as many\u00a0opportunities\u00a0to play professionally in the states or overseas, Johnson adjusted on the fly.<\/p>\n
He gave coaching a try and loved it.<\/p>\n
A Beverly native and Morgan Park High School (MPHS) graduate, Johnson is in his first year as an assistant coach at Chicago State University on Coach\u00a0Landon Bussie\u2019s staff.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve\u00a0been telling a lot of people this;\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0really excited to be at Chicago State,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cI\u2019ve\u00a0been riding past Chicago State for 20 years. It always felt like home when I played there. With coaching,\u00a0it was never anything I really foresaw. It was OK to put the ball down. I\u00a0had\u00a0a great career, and\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0still having fun and enjoying myself with basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n
Johnson is a 2014 MPHS graduate. He helped\u00a0lead the Mustangs to\u00a0back-to-back Class 3A state\u00a0championships\u00a0in 2013\u00a0and\u00a02014.<\/p>\n
After high school, he played collegiately\u00a0at Northern Arizona University and then Wake Forest University. He graduated from Wake Forest in May 2020 with his master\u2019s degree, but as he looked to pro ball, there just weren\u2019t many opportunities to keep playing in the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n
Instead, he took a 9-to-5 job working at a car rental company\u00a0and then at Amazon.<\/p>\n
Away from basketball for an extended stretch for the first time since he was a youngster, Johnson felt the deep pull of the sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was working, had a couple jobs, but basketball was such a big part of my life,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cMaybe coaching\u00a0was something I could still do where basketball could still be a part of my life, the game I love.\u201d<\/p>\n
Johnson dove in headfirst into coaching, ready to start at the bottom and work his way up.<\/p>\n
He spent a year at UNLV as a graduate assistant and then spent two years at Navarro College, a junior-college program in Corsicana, Texas, before landing a job at Chicago State.<\/p>\n
Johnson said the biggest jump from playing to coaching came from just finding his voice as a coach.<\/p>\n
Normally a more soft-spoken player, a lead-by-example type, Johnson quickly found out that wouldn\u2019t fly.<\/p>\n
Positive or negative, good cop or bad cop, he had to be more vocal.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven when I was at Wake Forest, [Coach Danny Manning] challenged me to talk more in practice,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cNaturally, I\u2019m more of a quiet person. With each step, it\u2019s learning where I can push more and get out of my comfort zone. It\u2019s talking as loud as I can, bringing the energy and always trying to talk and communicate. Now, it\u2019s all I know.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Chicago State, Johnson has done a little bit of everything on Bussie\u2019s staff, including organizing a multiple-day showcase for high school teams to play in the university\u2019s gymnasium.<\/p>\n
Johnson said a huge part of his job is the X\u2019s and O\u2019s with the players and overall player development. In other words, plenty of time in the gym with the players.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know the work. Player development, that\u2019s where I started and tried to build myself up,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cI\u2019m getting in the gym with players, rebounding, getting there early or staying late. It was that mentality for me at every program I was at. It\u2019s all about the work for the players. People respect the work.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Chicago State men\u2019s basketball program has struggled to put together winning seasons over the years.<\/p>\n
The Cougars last finished above .500 in 2008-09 when the team went 19-13 overall. In 41 seasons, the team has only had a .500 or better record in three seasons.<\/p>\n
So, Johnson knows the challenge that awaits.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s low expectations, but such a high-reward type of situation,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cThe program hasn\u2019t done as well as you\u2019d like with the win-loss record. You try to build that winning culture within the program and a winning season. Coach Bussie and his staff, we understand how college basketball works and what it takes to be good.\u201d<\/p>\n
From Johnson\u2019s perspective, he\u2019s looking forward to the continual grind and getting to the practices and games for the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a player, I\u2019ve always had that underdog mentality,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cThis is a great opportunity. Winning solves everything. We can turn things around. There\u2019s something good going on at Chicago State.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Torrence Johnson never planned on going into coaching. He figured\u00a0he\u2019d\u00a0play basketball for as long as he could and…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":121789,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[1339,75562,75563,1317,1337,1338,62,75561,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-121788","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-chicago-state-university","10":"tag-landon-bussie","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-basketball","13":"tag-ncaabasketball","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-torrence-johnson","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114978065686676938","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}