It can't be easy. On Tuesday afternoon, you're an assistant coach, going about your responsibilities, scouting, practicing, teaching, recruiting. As far as the outside world is concerned, you operate almost in isolation. Save the unrepresentative subset of college basketball die-hards -- or your team's fans -- no one really knows who you are. Then, on Tuesday night, you're all anyone is talking about.
That would be a weird thing for any assistant coach, or any person, really. It must have been especially strange for Greg Gard. Wisconsin's interim head coach and Bo Ryan's longtime assistant was not, even by the standards of assistant college basketball coaches, a particularly recognizable or well-known figure.