Siena: It's easy to see

McCaffery's Saints now have a prayer

Fran McCaffery has a program that went 6-24 three seasons ago now making some noise. (CHRIS O'MEARA/Associated Press)

TAMPA - If you had studied Fran McCaffery's coaching history, you could have seen it coming at the start of the season, not just a few weeks ago.

You would have seen stops at Lehigh and UNC-Greensboro that included trips to the NCAA Tournament in his second or third year.

You would have had a better understanding why Siena, the No. 13 seed of the Midwest Regional, is one of the Cinderellas of a Tampa site that has produced four of them - including Villanova, San Diego, and Western Kentucky.

You would have known the foundation of a program being built at Siena, a small Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference school in Loudonville, N.Y., just outside of Albany.

When McCaffery arrived three years ago, he found a program in need of major repairs, if not reconstruction, as McCaffery replaced Rob Lanier after a 6-24 season. McCaffery promptly guided the Saints to a 15-13 record his first season, which improved to 20-12 last year, and 23-10 this season, which will continue today with a second-round game against 12th-seeded Villanova at St. Pete Times Forum.

Surprise? Not really.

"[The coaches] brought a team together that can work together," said junior guard Kenny Hasbrouck, who scored 30 points in the 83-62 win over No. 4 seed Vanderbilt in the first round and has been one of the cornerstones of the Saints' success.

Yesterday, guard Tay Fisher, the only senior on the roster, marveled at how far the program has come in three years.

"In the beginning, we were good," said Fisher. "You know, when I came in Coach Lanier brought them to the tournament, so they had success before I came. We just happened to have a bad year my freshman year, which was 6-24.

"But when Coach Mac came in, right from the beginning we changed the program around. We started wearing suits. We started being more business-like. Everybody started growing up. We started doing everything different from our approach on the court and off the court. He just did a great job. He's going to continue it.

"Every year we have gotten better. So I really don't know how far we'll go. But I know that next year, I wish I had another year, but I'm pretty sure that they'll keep going further and further. Who knows what this team will be capable of doing? We're doing a good job putting Siena on the map, so I'm pretty sure we'll be all right."

The rebuilding process wasn't easy.

"Well, I had heard the team had lost [24] games," said McCaffery. "I think it was probably the low point in our Division 1 history as a program. So there was a lot of expectation on the coaching change and hopefully what we would be able to do. I had entered a similar situation six years earlier in Greensboro and it was much easier because all the players stayed. We had some good players that were there and we recruited well, and we got to the tournament in Year 2.

"But the first thing that happened was the two players that had committed to us both opted not to come. Our leading scorer transferred to Miami. Another starter was in such serious academic difficulty he was dismissed. We had probably our best player in the program blow his Achilles' tendon out traveling with the MAAC All-Star team in China. And the first seven players that visited all said no.

"So, of course, we're talking about maybe a six-to-eight-week period where it was one negative after another. I think fortunately for me, I had great family support at that time. We had a staff who I had brought with me from Greensboro. So we sort of, as they say, hit the ground running and kind of knew what we wanted to do.

"We felt, I felt, that it was important that we identify what we needed and not waver from that despite the dire straits that we were in. There was a time when we had, I think, eight or nine players. That was it. We had no size. Now ultimately we got Kenny Hasbrouck to say yes. That was probably the most excited I've ever been to get a yes. Because I felt like not only did someone say OK, I believe in what Coach McCaffery's saying and I want to go there and help him build it, but I knew he was good. And I knew he had the kind of character that we needed. I knew that he was a valuable piece of the puzzle.

"The first year we were picked 10th [in the MAAC], we came in fourth. I remember driving to work one day, I was listening to the radio and a guy said, 'They are going to go winless. They're not going to win a game. They have no players.' And I thought we had some players. We won 15 games that year, so I was very proud of that team. One of my favorite teams that I'd ever coached."

McCaffery likes this season's team as well, and it may turn out to be the best he's ever coached.

Mark Blaudschun can be reached at blaudschun@globe.com.