March 7, 2008

Born in Albany, New York in December of 1985 while his father, John Griffin Sr., was the head coach at Siena, Griffin knows all about a childhood spent in the gym. His father remained at Siena through the 1985-86 season, completing a successful four-year turn there with a 70-44 record. After a stint in the business world, he served as head coach at Saint Joseph's from 1990-95. It was during that five-year period in Philadelphia when the younger Griffin learned so much about life and basketball. "From 1990 on, I was just at Saint Joe's all the time," recalls Griffin, a scrapiron guard who plays the game like the prototypical son of a coach. He and his brother Matt, four years his junior and now a freshman guard at Rider, would get dropped off at Hawk Hill while dad was working and spend the day there. As the brothers grew older, they would simply filter to the gym. Griffin officially called his father "coach" from the seventh grade through his junior year in high school, when John Griffin Sr. worked with his AAU team, traveling with the team and dispensing advice when needed. "He obviously understood the recruiting process and knew how certain players could hurt themselves and how they could help themselves," Griffin says. "He was there to mentor certain guys. We had a great team. We had Kyle Lowry, who is in the NBA, and Sean Singletary, who is doing amazing things right now at Virginia, and a few other guys at Villanova. It worked out. Dad was there guiding me. It was almost a blessing in disguise because I probably wouldn't be at Bucknell if he was still traveling everywhere [as a college head coach]." As it became apparent that none of the Philadelphia schools would be good matches, Griffin turned his attention to mid-major programs like Bucknell, Rider, Coastal Carolina, Canisius, Monmouth and Columbia. Ultimately, Bucknell rose to the top of all the Griffin lists. "When we came here, the atmosphere was so appealing," Griffin says. "When I first visited my high school, it was all about the possibility of really expanding into a basketball culture. Bucknell was the same way. They had the new facility and they were just getting scholarships." With Abe Badmus sidelined by a minor hip injury the first week of the season, Griffin began his collegiate career in the starting lineup in Syracuse at the Carrier Dome for the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic. In two games there he went 10-for-10 from the field and averaged 17.0 points per game. While Badmus reclaimed his starting job the following week, the debut was a harbinger of things to come for Griffin, who has played in every game since then. And he's done it all with his parents as regular attendees, both home and away. While he's currently concentrating on earning his third Patriot League championship and fourth appearance in the title game, Griffin is often asked if he has a future in coaching, just like his father. "I haven't thought too much about that yet," he admits. "Maybe, if the opportunity presents itself, but I figure I'll just live in the moment for now. My mother always tells me, `there's no point in looking too far ahead; you only live once, so you should enjoy what you have while it's there.' God will find a path for me, and hopefully it's a good one." For now, life and basketball carries on. Just like it always has.