cthomas

College basketball coaching contracts are like most other professions where there are industry standards and, if you want to compete for top talent, you follow them. Like it or not, and I don't, you better be prepared to play that game.

Tough game at full strength. Missing two starter quality players turns the hill to climb into a mountain.

The real danger is that a coach does just enough to not get fired. The murky area between good enough and not is what we have to worry about. If finances are an issue and CAM does just enough to satisfy the decision makers, then an extension is likely and we will continue down the very same path.

Nothing like having our program mentioned in a story like that. The kid obviously had talent. Whatever pushed him into the drug business ruined the young man's life. Honestly, it makes me sad to see how this turned out. Fandom aside, I hope all of these young men achieve their dreams.

Just from my personal experience, I tend to trust brother-in-law's slightly more than sister-in-law's.

Immediate eligibility could be a disaster for a bunch of teams and coaches, including our own.

I wonder if he cares all that much about the money. Given his dad's NBA career, he is probably getting good advice. I tend to think it will come down to whether he sees any benefit to staying in college another year. He can always take his chances on the NBA and, if it doesn't work out, have a long career overseas. Based on how this season is going, it's hard for me to imagine that he wants to come back next year.

As I said in a different post, we aren't the only ones who are not playing the way the fans think we should based on our talent. The blame always falls on the coach, but in reality it a large portion of it should fall on the kids. I doubt that there are many bad coaches at the highest level of college basketball. Maybe they can't connect with the kids, maybe they can't find a way to motivate them, but I'm pretty sure they know what they are doing. It takes a certain combination of factors to be successful at this level and it is maybe luck as much as anything else that makes it work. Look at UK, UNC, Duke, and Kansas this year. Do you really think those coaches suddenly forgot how to coach a team? It's just a different time.

After a sampling of college basketball, almost everything we complain about with how IU plays could be said about nearly every other team. I fully understand wanting excellence in our program, but there is some ugly basketball being played everywhere. Let's not forget that one of the best offensive basketball teams in the country went 11 minutes without a field goal at home against us. Not an excuse or justification. Just an observation.

Best thing about this win is the board is way less surly this morning.

Don't know if it's just me, but CAM seemed more feisty than usual in his post game presser. Even cut one questioner off mid question.

I suppose that there was no real downside to coming a year early, but he has not looked ready for this level at all. Not knocking him at all, but he looks like a high school kid when he is on the court. If he sticks with it, he can have a great future.

You are entitled to your opinion, but from my viewpoint that is the wrong hill to die on.

Does that really matter. If you want excellence, just slightly better than the current guy is not going to get you there. Plus, you may be willing to forget the Pierce incident but I am not. I didn't want to believe that Alford did what some were saying. I did the research and it was worse than anything that was rumored. I have daughters and granddaughters and I don't want anyone who would do what he did anywhere close to a university I respect.

That's probably true. The Iowa incident is a bridge too far for me. How he handled that cannot be forgiven in my mind.

Seriously doubt it. He had a shot in the B1G and it wasn't pretty.

Brad Stevens seems like a very intelligent man. He went to the NBA because he thought it would be a better situation for him and his family. If the NBA doesn't work out, I can see him moving on to some other profession rather than returning to coaching in college. I really think it's delusional to continue thinking that he might ever coach at IU. The same for Donavan. To me it's like college coaches going back to the high school level. Our best path forward is a hungry coach looking to move up. I see no reason why a successful coach at another high level D-1 school would want to come here unless the raise in pay was too good to pass up. And I don't see IU making that offer. We might be the most delusional fan base in the country. We were a blue blood for a long time. We haven't been since for a long time. If we want that status again, we're going to have to earn it on the court. Only this old man's opinion.

I said he adapted to a point. But I also remember watching his teams try to run out the clock with three minutes left and a three or four point lead. His motion offense was designed to work off of screens until the defense made a mistake. It was innovative and worked until the shot clock and three point line made it obsolete. He gave up some control with Isaiah because he was a once in a generation point guard, and still probably the best player I have ever watched at IU. My opinion of course. The bigger point was that it's not that easy to find those kind of coaches. We are more likely to be disappointed again than we are to find the next great coach who hangs multiple banners.

Getting the right coach may not be as easy as some think. Branch McCracken and Bob Knight won all five of our banners. I doubt many here watched the McCracken teams, but let me just say, they were fun. They weren't called the 'Hurryin hoosiers' for nothing. Then we got Coach Knight. That was culture shock. If you think we are boring on offense now, you should have seen Knight's offense pre shot clock. Especially in the early years. He adapted to a degree but not enough to understand the changing nature of kids. Our basketball legacy is built on the backs of two coaches. Speculation is fun, I guess, and hope springs eternal..... I hope, when the time comes, we find the right one. Maybe, at this point, we are due.

I have no idea what the perception of the Indiana job is among other coaches. But I suspect that it would decline in desirability pretty quickly if we start tiring coaches after a year or two. Throw enough money at it and it might be worth the risk to some. I'm pretty sure the Coach Knight model won't work today. Truthfully, it wasn't working the last few years he was here. So, rather than just throw out names of candidates, I think we should start with the characteristics of the coach we want here. From reading through this thread, that's not an easy task. We have fans that just want to win, no matter what it takes. We have others who value integrity above all else and just about everything in between. There are so many moving parts involved in managing a program at this level that it seems almost impossible. Personally, I'd like a balance between offense and defense with a flexibility to adapt to game conditions on the fly. Though it goes against everything that I hold dear, it needs to be something that modern kids want to play. I have no idea who that coach is. I've never been for or against CAM. I always said his performance would determine his fate. Fair or not, I think time is beginning to run out.

LCS, the pebble in the shoe of BTB.

One of the most unfortunate aspects of this virus is that it is stealing the college experience that these kids should have had. Don't want to get into a COVID argument, but these are years and experiences that the kids will never get back. Young people are resilient and they will undoubtedly be fine, but it just seems a shame. As a senior, I feel bad that they are sacrificing for me. But yeah, the bubble seems impractical.

Talent makes a difference. We can try to over achieve all we want, but at the end of the day, talent matters.

Can't stand either of these teams. I respect how good they are, but not necessarily how they got there. Integrity still matters to me.

What?