lillurk

He got to a final 4! The same # of them as Pearl, actually, as I keep pointing out, and Pearl has spent decades at well-funded P5 schools. I feel like I’m taking crazy pills when I read anti-Dusty screeds. He doesn’t have to be everyone’s #1 but pretending you know it’ll take years to build is not how it works in a free transfer era. Every successful coach was once lesser-known. I realize we’re not going to agree but some folks act like there are only two classes of coach: “proven winners TM” clear description excluded but it matches their preferences, and guys who’ll never be anything. I promise Dusty will be good somewhere.

Don’t care at all that he was an IU manager. Care that he’s built a team better than any Archie (or Woody) team by Kenpom and tourney success AT EFF AYY YOU. Everyone wins at Dayton. Everyone’s risky, I think he’s FAR less so than most other options. Put it this way: if we made a “wins above replacement coach” that factored in program, talent based on recruiting rankings etc. May’s performance at FAU would break the charts.

A guy who’s been to a F4 has a worse resume than Archie? The same number of F4s as your beloved Pearl in 18 fewer years as a HC?????? You can just write anything on the internet.

Here’s a decent summary of what Pearl’s done, though it omits the Aaron Craft saga at UT that got him a show cause. The cumulative facts point to someone who will bend and break rules to gain an advantage and may leave the program worse in his wake. Many of the broken rules are no longer but the process speaks loudly. All that aside: 64 next month. Makes too much at AU. Not the guy, it’s fine to like him as a coach but be realistic and honest with yourselves about whether he’ll get any consideration whatsoever.

Does it change Bruce Pearl’s birth year? Does it change whether he’s been to more final fours than Dusty May, or been to one more recently?

I do wonder if Jaylin Sellers was going to head close to home (GA) and they just already knew that. But the point @RaceToTheTop is making is valid, there were myriad options available.

The part I bolded basically sums up the whole error of the pursuit strategy Woodson has deployed. (You can criticize some tactics, like his lack of involvement, too.) Feels like an obvious fallacy to anyone who’s every played, coached, or watched, IMHO — better to have more good players than [null set empty scholarship]. The difference between Sellers and Gunn/Leal/Cupps is pretty significant, even in a backup role where X was healthy all year.

Setting Quinn’s connection aside there are lots of similarities to the tail end of the Tom Allen era here.

Yep, I’ll never root against the Hoosiers but every embarrassing thing makes it easier to build the coalition to do the necessary thing.

Like a guy who went to the F4 last year and is so much better than any prior coach at his school as to be incomparable? I guess that’s my issue with “proven” “winner,” it’s slippery and in the eye of the beholder. Nobody’s hiring away a guy on this list, and on degree of difficulty, getting FAU that far is hard to top.

Re “proven”: Dan Hurley was 2-4 in the ncaa tournament until he won six straight last year. There are no guarantees but you don’t have to pick someone who’s got a long track record, there are other ways to know if someone’s a good basketball coach.

Stop the Pearl talk — he’s 3 years younger than Woody. One middling year and we’re right back here, worried about succession plans. Plus he makes more than IU currently pays its coach. You hire a coach for his future, not his past.

Not picking on you but at IU in the era of free transfers no one should be the “give him time” candidate for very long. If you start with a totally blank slate in a sanction situation? Sure, but by year two we should see something. Same if you inherit a really barren cupboard, and have to play too many green underclassmen. But nothing like what Arch inherited should be an excuse.

I’ll never root against IU but it seems obvious what has to happen and if it takes losing embarrassingly at home to PSU, Northwestern, Nebraska, getting whooped by PU 2x…I can endure it.

His defensive awareness would be below average on the 8th or 9th grade teams the middle school/HS I played at. I don’t mean to be unkind and of course plenty of players have deficiencies, develop, etc., but still being this bad in transition, switches, etc. At this point makes me worry he may never catch on.

A Case for Dusty May There are no sure things in coaching hires but I think we can approach things with more nuance than hand-waving him into a pile with coaches who’ve had one good March run and flamed out later. (Also I think lots of the coaches being dismissed that way have had pretty good careers if they ended up getting a high-major chance anyway.) In his first HC job, he is the best coach in FAU’s history by many orders of magnitude. Even setting aside weighing last year’s F4 run too heavily, the team’s best ever Torvik finish before May was 184th, back in 2011. May arrived in ‘19 and has been higher than that EVERY YEAR. FAU has been D-1 since ‘93 and he’s the third longest-tenured coach in their history. He already has 115 of their 378 all-time D-1 wins. His career win% is 64.2%, FAU before him was 35.5%. Second, even setting aside the F4 run, last year’s team was 31-3 before the tournament, with strong predictive/performance numbers. They were quite underseeded at 9. Again, at FAU. He’s cruising to an at-large, and they would’ve been so last year…at FAU. That’s not Dayton, or VCU, Gonzaga, or Wichita State, someplace with a strong hoops culture and history. Third, the manner in which his FAU roster last year and this have been built bodes well for his ability to identify and develop players. Boyd, Martin, and Davis are homegrown, and each from a different region of the country. Goldin, Gaffney, and Greenlee were down-transfers from high majors, but none of the three was an established difference maker, and 2 of the 3 had very little college game tape. As far as I can tell those are the only transfers — nothing wrong with TRs but it speaks to his ability to find and build players, not just work with top ### guys. At IU you can get in the door with those guys. If he can build some guys who’ll get NBA looks with what was available to him at FAU, he can win at IU. Occasionally I see folks suggest they’re concerned about his recruiting but that misses how the sausage is made: you are only getting top guys at FAU if you 1) parent them, 2) their parents work there, or 3) some other absurd thing like 1 or 2. If he can compete like this without obvious HS talent, he’ll be fine, and IU has had dudes under every 21st century coach. It’s also noteworthy that he kept the squad together this year. Even after last year’s success, I’m sure there were tantalizing opportunities for many (most?) of his roster. I think that level of buy-in and relationship scales up. They tend to spread minutes around, too, which isn’t always the answer but suggests mutual trust. This isn’t just a couple diamond-in-the-rough studs. I’m sure we all figured they’d be pretty good this year, but I’ve been impressed that they’ve actually met or outperformed computer projections, which thought they’d be good but could be more “bubble team” than top 25. I would rather win ugly than lose pretty, but FAU plays modern, attractive hoops and competes on defense. By % of minutes played their top 5 most-used players this year are wings or guards. They play one true big about 90% of the time…and the 10% that’s not true are minutes with no big or a hybrid forward at the 5, not plodding two big lineups. They’ve been well-rounded on both sides of the ball, i.e. their success isn’t JUST dependent on dominating the turnover battle or strong shooting or something else that’s gonna graduate with one particular class. Finally, I love his quiet confidence. He thought he could stay and win at FAU. People know he wants the IU job, even though he knows what expectations that means. Arrogance gets in the way of self-improvement, but to win at a high level some confidence is a must. I hope to watch the track record get longer, but what’s there is already really impressive, and makes me think he could jump somewhere like Louisville, Michigan, etc. and succeed quickly and for awhile. Let’s hope he does so at IU eventually. (Cc @DLG3)

Really think even if he tops out as a good backup Cupps eventually moves off that list. But probably not this year.

Still only 49. Not my cup of tea but I’m curious what he can do after Boo Buie graduates. If they can maintain some level of quality I wonder if he’ll get a look at a bigger job if he wants it eventually.

My guess too but UM and OSU both have seemingly obvious move on situations that may not work that way. UM because Warde Manuel has not been a very proactive AD and might not last long enough to make the decision, plus maybe they give Howard one more year due to health issues and the fact that they probably need to rebuild regardless of who the coach is. OSU because Holtmann isn’t the guy there…BUT they have an AD regime change effective on like 7/1/24 and so I wonder if they’ll want to move or let the new guy have a lame duck/prove it year.

Sure perhaps but that doesn’t invalidate my point

I know this year’s a disappointment and it might be nice to believe this but it simply isn’t true given the length of the contract, where the program was over Arch, etc

No reason to assume this hasn’t happened

What’s Dolson thinking? Feel like we’ve discussed it ad nauseum but he’s surely disappointed. Common sense, Woodson’s 1st two years, AND contract all mean he’s going to get at least one more year. But there will be an offseason state of things conversation. Also the worst take I’ve ever seen on here that didn’t involve hand-waving some violent crime is probably “Archie > Woodson.” No need to tell obviously lies and invalidate everything you’ll ever say about ball!

Yes and they knew it! Tried to get Knecht, Reeves, etc. Sometimes even a C+/B- option is better than nothing. Seemed obvious at the time and played out close to a worst-case.

He was VCU’s coach previously