str8baller

IU loss to cuse was so bad Bohiem (of all people) was mocking Crean post game.

I didn’t really watch NW last year, so I was looking at his stats. First thing that came to mind when I saw them was that he had a shift in his role. If I had to guess he was getting a lot less catch and shoot opportunities and being asked to attack the basket a little more. Maybe lost a ball handler on the team that looked for him a lot. If he can catch and shoot 3’s at 40% clip at IU, like his soph year, he’ll see good minutes.

I agree with a lot of what was said about intangibles: effort, use the bench, better movement on offense, etc... But looking at the roster, I think it’s fair to say I’m expecting: - compete for a top 5 finish in conf. - be competitive in BTT - make the NCAA tourney with 8 seed or better I’d consider realistic, but not expected goals of making the weekend of the BTT or getting out of the first round of the NCAA on the table. (Sampson won his first tourney game and Davis made the BTT final in their first years). I think unlikely, but any one of the following would have even the National media raving about Woody: sweep Purdue, win BTT or make S16

Voice of those legendary 90’s teams.

Probably closer to the truth than the optimism that springs eternal this time of year. But.., The upside lays with coaching and more specifically accountability. Durham is my least favorite player since the Crean years. He’s the definition of “score 2, give up 3. “ Except he didn’t just give up points on the defensive end so much as he just completely let mental mistakes derail things at both ends. Archie hardly ever held him accountable. This team isn’t exactly under talented of the goal is competing in the B1G and making the tourney. It is a wreck in terms of identity and accountability. It’s biggest missing piece is high level coaching. I think we see what Franklin does at uva and regret losing him; Brunk not so much.

That’s not the type of player I’m usually excited about. With that said, we probably can use the talent infusion and we’ll have to trust the staff to integrate everyone. Sad to lose Franklin especially to a good program like UVA.

I mean if you’re gonna let Suggs drive all the way to the 3pt line without one guy challenging him, then I’m leaving and you guys can run ‘till you can’t even f****** suffer. -Mick Cronin, probably

This type of stuff gets me more hyped than I have any reason to be.

I’ve wondered this myself. He showed a lot of promise as a freshman and has just stagnated since then. If the issue was coaching—and In not exactly convinced it is—he has the talent to play to an all-B1G 3rd team type of level. If he were to turn it around, TJD flourishes and maybe one other guy can step up, I think the pieces are there to be a top five team in the conference and obviously a tourney team. Maybe even 5-7 seed. We’re obviously in the honeymoon phase here and this is all contingent on Woodson working out. But it’s looking like the player situation is going to work itself out to where we have decent talent.

Exactly where I’m at. Love to keep him for many reasons including his awareness and hustle. But he’s replaceable.

I didn’t think much of him as a coach, but he can recruit like crazy. If anything he showed how high a ceiling a place like UT has. If Beard can coach and recruit 75% as good as Barnes, they’ll challenge KU for the conference almost every year.

Absolutely. Bo did the same for Gard, who isn’t nearly the same coach but has been a nice recruiting success. Eddie Sutton did it for Sean Sutton. Lots of guys do it if they can. Credit to ol’ Roy for not doing it to UNC.

Guthridge was a failure of hire that Smith forced. Smith left him a LOADED roster which he took to the final 4. They got worse every year and he made the FF as an 8 seed when freshman Forte got hot. Then guys started rumbling about going to the pros (or football in peppers case) and they realized his recruiting was just not there and he decided to retire (or was forced to). When everyone bolted the next year Doherty was left with nothing. Guthridge is the poster boy for hall of fame coach forcing his hand picked assistant into the job. He just retired before his failure completely sunk the program.

Nobody is a sure thing. But he seems like a good coach. He gets his players to play hard tho. We’ll see if he has any trouble when he has a roster full of 5-stars who want to spend a year before they go to the nba.

I agree with this mostly. IU is a sleeping giant that has been mismanaged horribly. We easily have the upside of Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, and maybe to a smaller degree UNC if you take away coaches. I actually think UCLA is the biggest sleeping giant of them all. They have nice tradition, are in a city all the best players in the world want to live, and have a nice natural talent base. They’ve been pretty mismanaged too, but have found success with 2nd tier coaches like Howland and Harrick. So are we UCLA? Not exactly. But we are one good coach away from being a top 5 program again. I view Sampson as a second tier type coach and fully believe he would’ve had us there if he wasn’t such an idiot.

They’re great. Tough to instill that in one year or even two. Those guys move, cut and pass in a way that has to be continually cultivated. Normally freshman can’t integrate like Suggs has. He’s damn smart and skilled for a freshman. But yea... it’d be awesome if IU could get some semblance of that going.

It’s on TJD too. He’ll have to be able to improve over the summer to be able to play a little stretch 4. I’d be surprised if Woody isn’t selling him on that fact (eg. 25 min a game as the big, 10min a game to showcase his stetch 4 skills). Also, TJD’s not a center at the next level defensively and it’s taxing to have him guard other team’s 5 all game. UCLA, OSU, UM, Gonzaga, etc...all had bigs who caused smaller team’s problems because the other team was trying to play small with 6’8” guys at C defensively. Have to have that lineup in your back pocket. If not Brunk then a transfer.

If Brunk is healthy it gives us the opportunity to have maybe 10-15 min of then on the floor together with TJD at the 4.

For those that don’t know, Thibodeau is really well thought of in the nba as an Xs and Os coach, especially defensively.

Larry Brown’s turned around more teams than IU has failed coaches. I don’t know what he does at 80 freaking years old to help, but hot damn is the guy a basketball lifer. I kind of respect him trying to get back to the court one last time.

Just an assumption, but if Mattas back is still that bad a bunch of on court stuff and recruiting traveling is probably the thing he’s trying to avoid.

I don’t think you understood “the take,” or else you wouldn’t have felt compelled to interject such a misguided Davis defense. Davis took over a program and roster built by Knight, had some immediate success for which he gets credit, and then drove the program off the ledge when he was fully responsible for everything. Same with the chap who followed Dean Smith. Thus the parallel drawn. This was all in the context of the discussion of great programs not being immune from bad hires.

With a loaded roster left by his buddy Dean. (I mean...Davis took Knights players to a FF.) Then what? He never recruited and bolted on the job leaving nothing for Doherty. Who ironically recruited the national championship team for ol’ Roy. Those were still two bad hires that nobody else would’ve made. To unc’s credit they corrected them quickly... unlike IU.

And they had the other old fart before Doherty who tanked the program. Unc begged roy to come home and were lucky they had a tier 1 coach in their ranks. Ucla hired Alford who is an iu guy but wouldn’t make many top 10 lists. And lavin. UK has had a few stinkers even though pitino and now cal were big boy hires. But cal came with baggage and Pitino was a young guy walking into a dead program. Duke has had the same guy for 40+ years. Really, Kansas is the one that seems to nail it every time. We should hire ADs that are KU alums, i guess.

Just know that if you were excited about Archie and Crean then your instincts aren’t all that great. So there’s no need to trust them now that they’ve got you down. As a wise man once said, if it’s inevitable lay back and enjoy it.