lillurk

East being good at Mizzou for a couple years has been vindicating. I (and others) thought he’d be a high-major caliber player eventually way back when he was at New Albany. As for Bates, yeah, it’s just scoring, and he still appears “light in the butt,” as Woody says. So he’s probably fine guarding 1s but not burlier players even at the 2. And you’re right, it would be nice to see some other contributions. Especially as a shooter of that caliber, the next step is making plays for others. In addition to the issues you mention, Mizzou rebounds very poorly and is badly outscored at the line. They don’t get there often, their opponents do, and they’ve been unlucky with good opponent Ft%. I still like Coach Gates, but I wonder if he’d be well served with a dedicated defensive coordinator in one assistant spot, a la Yaklich for Beilein (if I mention that a lot, it’s because more coaches should do it with their weaker side of the ball!)

I mean: I think I know what happened. But I think it could’ve gone differently.

Happy for him, I think we all always thought he was talented. He’s only playing 2 more min/game this year than last, though he’s started 11/18 games so far. i guess my point is…what happened here? We could clearly have benefitted from him staying.

I agree and I’m glad to see you write this — really respect the way you’ve been careful with your words even in down times over the years. It makes me feel a little less nutty. I think I’m pretty well checked out of emotional investment game-to-game, until/unless next year’s team looks better I outlined elsewhere that I think a ‘25 transition seems more likely due to a variety of factors, but I’m ready for something sooner.

This is in reply to someone else but I will use it as a jumping off point for some thoughts: 1. It doesn’t seem outlandish to me for a guy in Woody’s spot and age to just call it quits any old year. That said, 2. Surely you’d like to go out on a relative high, not an ebb, and 3. I’m skeptical the friends who wanted him to have the job in the first place would suddenly decide he’s not up to the task. So 4. I would imagine he’d stick it out for at least another year. 5. Relatedly, for any number of (contractual, optical) reasons, IU isn’t going to run him off this offseason. 6. I’m not super optimistic they’ll suddenly be title contenders, but programs, teams, coaches come back much better after years like this all the time. Let’s retain some key guys, flip the roster, and let CMW ride off into the sunset with a tournament berth at least 7. I have less knowledge of FAU’s situation but a cursory glance at the roster, plus May’s decision to stay put (and impressive ability to keep it together) last offseason suggests timing makes sense for him to put together one more run at FAU after this year. 8. I get that on the surface you can see May as a Rorsharch test to project your hopes or fears onto, but man, he’s gonna get a high-major shot at some point and I think he’s got The Juice.

I really believe he loves the program…so maybe he’ll decide it’s mutually beneficial to be a grandad, golf, and hand the reigns over to someone else

Yeah I’m with you on this. The roster and lineup construction, plus the shot selection (and his defense thereof) are really concerning even if there are reasons to believe next year will be better.

He suspended like 1/3rd of the team two years ago at this time in a near must-win. The sixth year captain hasn’t started since he pulled a stupid flagrant. He’s more openly critical of his players by name in press availability than any coach I can think of. Im not saying it’s working, I’m saying it’s just plainly inaccurate, on its face, to say there’s “no accountability,” because that’s just what we see in public.

There are a lot of reasons to be mad, and sentence #1 is correct — I’ll just add that not every player is absolved of their own responsibility. Sentence #2 is plainly incorrect, and re: 3, we can quibble with it, but we know there’s been some accountability. I tend to think the team simply isn’t good enough. Also, probably a case where Woody’s gonna be more comfortable with more mature guys (as players, not speaking much to personal maturity), and this year’s older guys haven’t been able to translate that in the way the older guys his first two years were (when there were also more older guys!). Obviously Woody has ultimate responsibility and he often says that.

I will say A LOT of the issues this year can be laid at the feet of the players. X has been bad even when healthy, and hasn’t been a good leader as far as we can tell. Cupps and Gunn take the worst shots you’ve ever seen. Mgbako wasn’t ready to play defense and is still prone to lapses. Gunn and Banks seem basically the same as last year (which was an acceptable performance as a frosh!). Nobody’s blameless. But again, lots of this could’ve been addressed with the open scholarship, or better utilizing the portal

I think it’s possible this is the dumbest team I’ve watched. Ever. Stupid flagrant fouls. 2-foul autobenching killing our own chances. Not shooting enough threes, AND bad shooters launching long twos? Like it’s one thing if you take a ton of shots at the rim, but just lots of the worst shots you can take. Simply not enough good players, PLUS an open scholarship, while everyone agrees IU’s NIL is quite good? Are we to believe NO ONE was taking the cash?

He’s following the sixth year senior’s leadership

In this circumstance then I think you have to try to make it work, yes. Especially in your scenario where he stacks another good tourney run, I think you see if you can work with Woody, Quinn etc. to massage him into retirement or some senior program advisor role or something

I’m a little inclined to write something pro-Dusty, not because IU should make a change now but because I’ve seen some folks say he’s Not It or he’s just like Arch and I think there are reasons he’s a cut above (and as far as we can tell would meet my criteria above). But idk that the time is right. The grapevine from Trilly that he wants the job is enough for me right now.

I have seen a couple “candidates must meet these criteria” lists and while I get the impulse, the actual list is much shorter than the ones I’ve seen. At IU, any head men’s basketball coach must: 1. Plausibly be able to win a national title 2. Make a good-faith effort to benefit the whole-person well-being of the players 3. Not embarrass the university with personal conduct. I reserve the right to change, but all the other stuff about style of play, etc. is either logically flawed or rolled into one of the above. (E.g. one list said, like, “play a winning style” but there are as many such styles as there are good coaches.) Quickly, Knight was sent packing when it seemed his ability to do #1 was clearly behind him and #3 became too big to continue ignoring. Davis failed #1, though of course he got close enough we had hope for awhile. Sampson had issues w/2 and 3, though he clearly seems to have learned from his time at IU in ways that benefit Houston. Crean’s seat got hot when some folks were convinced he’d never win a title and he lost his job when it became clear he wouldn’t. I’d argue the case for Miller was meeting criteria 1 was mostly based on one lucky tournament run and name recognition. And at least for me, the frustration now with Woodson is arising when it starts to feel less likely he’ll have a final 4 run at any point. In our current case, I think this year is very disappointing and some of the issues and quotes worry me about whether Woodson can make a F4, but I think it’s also reasonable to believe the next couple years can and will be better.

In re: the tiff between his father (UM’s well-regarded strength coach since Beilein) and Juwan: https://mgoblog.com/mgoboard/sanderson-not-working-bball-team-still-working-um-mlive Interesting. I’m not on the “blame Clif Marshall for shooting woes” train but should IU decide to look elsewhere…

agree with Golfman here. KY, I think we’d all agree Painter’s a better CBB coach? My point was that in 5 tries, I think Woody has clearly out-coached Painter 4 times, and I’m pretty confident the difference tonight was not about who had a better coach on the bench. Anyway, gonna enjoy my night and not spend much more time here for awhile (football season??), peace all

…enh. Not picking on you, lots of folks are gonna say stuff like this, but PU outscored IU by 3 from field goals tonight. Rebounds and TOs were close. Is Painter a better coach because his team shot 18 more FTs? Was he better when Woody out coached him in literally every prior matchup? Or maybe he’s got the best player in CBB and some pretty good role players.

I doubt it would’ve impacted the outcome but this really was one of the worst officiated college games I’ve ever seen. And an overwhelming volume favor one side. IU was physical, and earned its fair share. But the difference made a bad night worse.

I doubt we’ve won a close one. IIRC he’s been there when we run OSU out of the building or whatever.

Wife put on an IU shirt this AM, oblivious to the reason I found that notable. Good omen.

I’m sure Nate Oats and Buzz Williams have different boundaries than Woody, every coach would. But I’m wondering if it’s starting/PT/give me the keys here, as neither aTm nor Alabama typically have much compunction about $

As with similar metrics (WAB), IU avoiding any bad loss thus far means they’re actually a good win or two from a strong-ish tournament resume. I certainly understand the frustration, I’ve felt it too. But: 3 good chances coming up.

Friday was a long time ago. You’ve gotta let it go. He wasn’t good or focused on Friday but IU’s chances of winning are pretty strongly correlated with having a good performance from him.

I assume IU will make Edey guard ballscreen or handoff action almost every time down. In addition to the guards, I’d like to see Mgbako get some of them, to force Edey to commit to contesting or giving up the 3 (and opening a lane to drive if he does). Defensively, IU’s gotta disrupt with ball pressure. That’s the best way to stop Edey, IMO, is if he never touches it. I certainly understand the idea to let him get his — if he touches it, I wouldn’t bring a double every time. But don’t let him get it in the first place.