str8baller

I’m rather expecting it. Don’t know why but I actually got my tourney hopes up a little after the MSU win. Then we laid an egg at home vs UCLA. Just very little effort.

Hard to see the logic in that for me. Otz’s half court offense reminds me of Sampsons, which is to say if the transition game breaks down I’d rather watch frogs f…(to borrow a phrase from a former coach). Maybe it’s just personal preference on my part. Maybe something more. But I’m not convinced a coach that weak on that side of the ball can win long term at IU. Drews teams are kind of the opposite where they struggle with defense at times. But if you have to be top 25 in both Deff and Oeff to win a title, Drew has built a bunch of those. Otz has a chance to get there this year…maybe…but it would be his first one. I'm not the world’s biggest Drew fan, but I’m probably at the bottom of this boards Otz’s fan club. I’ve also probably watched ten or less ISU games the past two seasons, so I probably don’t know what I’m talking about. Disregard this message.

This, but even then you’re underselling it. lol.. Baylor had went to the tournament 4 times in their entire history, and that’s largely because they had a nice little run in the late 40s. They had been to the tournament just once since it expanded to at least 32 teams. Baylor basketball was a wasteland before Drew and that’s not even diving into scandal right before he took over. What he built there is nothing short of amazing. I don’t know what that would mean for IUs future but Drew’s resume on that rebuild just about dwarfs any other candidate’s.

I would think any scenario where Stevens leaves for something like an equity stake in the NBA would have to be where he was considerably successful at IU. Like Coach K levels of prestige. Obviously he’s not going to win 5 titles but itd be one heckuva 5yr run here. He’d also leave and people would look at this job much differently. I would assume we could damn near pick a candidate at will. So I agree with you. With that said, I would be happy if they announced Drew as the new head coach.

Woody probably coached against the strongest group of Purdue teams, too. Unfathomable how bad Archie was.

My impression of Drew is from his title team. They marched through that tournament. They spanked Gonzaga in a game and against the team that had the represent Few’s—hell any coach’s—best chance at a title. If he can build teams like that at IU, sign me up.

https://www.indystar.com/story/sports/basketball/2019/01/22/which-state-birthed-most-active-nba-players-per-capita-indiana/2524079002/ https://1075thefan.com/playlist/the-top-10-states-that-have-produced-the-most-nba-and-aba-players/item/1 you can quantify many ways. But they do these nba lists every so often and Indiana is always top 5. In the one linked were 5 but basically 3 if you throw out the small pop outliers like n. Dakota. Indiana puts out more basketball talent than most and that’s largely due to our great HS system.

Conley, Oden, Guy, Zeller, May, McGary, Robinson, albrecht, Jeffries, odle, plumlee, Hayward, Howard, smith, loyer, Teague, Gardner, and probably more just this century who have won or played for, in a meaningful capacity, a national title. That’s more than 1 every other year. IU fans rightfully so sit back and wonder why the hell IU isn’t get those guys. And that isn’t even counting the tons of great players who didn’t make it to the last day of the tournament. How many Indiana guys won or played for a title elsewhere during knights heyday vs the ones that played for him? I bet the ratio was a lot lower. Montross got away, in part due to knights increasing surly relationships with people, and it was talked about quite a bit as unc rose and IU sunk.

The unearned arrogance is a problem, that I agree with you there. Mostly with our decision makers. But, if you look at the per capita numbers Indiana puts out a ton of pro level players. I think we’re like 2nd in the country. That’s a solid proxy for talent. You have to get players somewhere. The backyard is the starting point. Again, this job is hard. The HS coaches, as an institution, can be a giant PIA. They can also deliver National Championship talent. Ditto the AAU coaches. Same with our alumni…they all think they’re basketball geniuses (the irony of my dumasz typing this is not lost on me…lol) where the big dogs need to be placated often. But they can also deliver national leading NIL funds. Lots of upside but a hard job. I think watching a local kid win a title at UConn or god forbid Purdue while we pay tons for a pac 2 transplant loses you a ton of political capital.

Sounds good, but I doubt that’s really true. It’s actually just copium for Woodson fans that has bled over to the normal fan base. From what I can tell most of the best players are recruited to high majors and stay there. Karajan, Clinton, castle, etc.., all recruited to UConn. Eden, smith… same. The other top guys are mid major risers. Theres a reason p5 host schools let guys like rice, Ballo, and Carlyle go. I think IU, its next coach, and its fans are absolutely delusional if they’re going to win big by abandoning HS recruiting.

This just ignores reality. 1) IN high school coaches are some of the best in the country and can sniff out frauds like Davis and Crean. 2) IN is still one of the most fertile recruiting grounds in the country. Alienating that is plain dumb. 3) piggybacking off #2, when IN kids are winning titles or making national championship game runs at other programs while you’re spinning your wheels at IU with “national “ recruits even the little ol’ grandmas in the stands know it is over for you. I have said it before and will repeat it again hundred more times: the Indiana job is hard. Huge upside, but hard. There’s too many needles to thread. You can’t just be an ol coach off the Div 1 street and automatically win because it’s Indiana.

If we get a good coach…Big if…it would actually be nice to have Dusty up at UM and other good coaches making the B1G the best conference. If we don’t get a good coach, then…just pain

His D2 transfers are likely equal or better players than most guys in his conference. Very Top of D2 is often as good as anyone in d1 not in the high majors or highest midmajors. And those guys were the tippy top of D2.

In a vacuum? Same chances as any other mid major darling. If you’re really into him and think he has that special sauce, then maybe that ups the odds. But almost every coach in the B1G will be better than the ones in his current conference. He’ll also have to navigate recruiting at Indiana which will be different than anything he’s ever done.

For sure. I think IU fans should prepare themselves for a scenario where we’re not bringing in a National Champ type coach—Wright thru Drew and Stevens group—and very likely aren’t bringing in a promising young coach from a P5 conference—the McCasland/May types. From there we’re definitely in the territory of trying to entice an older coach who has been successful or start looking at the midmajor or Brownell/Collins categories. I honestly don’t think it takes much imagination to find ourselves in that last group. It’s the route UK, UM and UL went last year.

Coaching at NW is effectively like a mid major for recruiting purposes—different reasons for that but the effect is largely the same—with the added insult of having to play a Big Ten schedule in conference. I suspect Collins is a darn good coach. He’d be a risky hire in the sense he’d be stepping up a level in terms of program responsibility, but I would at least be intrigued to see what he could do the next few years.

If there’s one thing I know about Rick Pitino it’s that he a selfless individual with Indiana University’s best interests at heart.

Popes in his honeymoon phase. At this point in Woodys tenure everyone loved him too. UK isn’t even in the top half of the SEC. Another yer like this one next year and we’ll see how good he is at the fishbowl aspect. They’ll run him out of town too.

Could be true. OTOH, Crean, Archie, and Sampson are all lifers and grinders. The IU basketball job is hard. That’s why you get paid a lot to do it. It’s a harder job than Oklahoma and Dayton and Marquette and so on and so forth.

Dolson isn’t your problem. He wanted to hire Fitzgerald as the football coach. But his boss, a female at that, might have something to say about it…just like she did with the Fitzgerald (non) hire.

Dusty is just throwing the Michigan fans off the scent with the 30 percent raise and increased buyout.

Of course. We were told this wouldn’t go past our top 2 and #2 is off the board. Welcome coach Steven’s!!

Yea, he coached a whole 8 games before being fired. Either way, there’s good news for Beard fans: given IU’s history there’s a good chance the job will be open again in 4 years. At that time, Beard will have had about 6 seasons to rehabilitate himself and prove to people his problems were a fluke. IU could hire him then, as I suspect that time frame will give people more comfort than what is basically a season and a half at this point.

What an endorsement. It somehow makes me think more of Beard as a coach and even less of him as a person.

Indiana should look at what ND is doing in this regard for football and copy it. Basically they have a recruiting guy/asst GM and then a GM for all the NiL and transfer market stuff. They hired a guy from the Detroit lions to run it like a pro shop. This should free up the coaches to coach more and recruit less. IU could reach out to Lawrence Frank or somebody and see who the hottest young talent scout is in the NBA. I do wonder if an IU/UNC/KU level school set that’s type of turnkey operation up, if you couldn’t get a Wright or Bennett type to come back.