Pagoda

Fair point. But they said it was moved to zoom/dial-in before Mike no-showed, so it wasn't even that. Just some classic Woody at the end of the day.

Woody had Walsh fill in for him lol.

Also visited UNC, Michigan, and Ole Miss. Nice group to beat out.

Nice of EJ to do that. He didn’t have the best experience at IU unfortunately…

Maybe. I hope Dolson is the new King. He might be. He built up football, which resulted in the University being showcased all season long including on Big Noon and Game Day, and he is going to increase our athletic dept revenue by way more than anyone else ever has, which everyone will notice. He was right about wanting to get rid of Woody last year. Things have changed. It's Scott's athletic dept! (fingers crossed)

Good call. I forgot he did.

My hope is that top-5 NIL carries an expectation we should be somewhat close to a top-10 or 15 team, or at least S16 in terms of the tourney. So more expectations than just making the tourney given all the money spent on the roster. Again, I'm just hoping, I get your point. Right now our NET and KenPom are mid-50's. We'll see where we end up...

You could definitely be right and I'm worrying too much -- I hope so.

I think you're spot on -- it's either fire or extend. Even in the portal era, only two years left on a deal is a serious recruiting issue. Every recruit will wonder why IU hasn't given him more years (it's a terrible signal) and if Woody will be around to be their coach. It just doesn't work. And Woody doesn't need any headwinds with HS recruiting, he is terrible at that to begin with. I'd say the fire or extend dynamic, plus the endless bad stories of how he operates, give me some hope of a change end of this year even if we get to 11 or 12 wins the B1G.

I look at last season when we won our last four regular season games and one more in the BTT. If we had lost all those games, would that have forced a coaching change? I don't know, but I suspect it might have, that would have been a mega meltdown. Instead, we won those game and fans were generally happy, and that's fine I get it. But those wins didn't get us anything except perhaps another year of Woody. So this year, I worry if we get 11 or 12 B1G wins it's sort of repeat of last year -- we don't accomplish anything but we get more Woody. I get the desire to have a good season and assume Scott will make a change end of year, but I'm not sure that's a given.

That's what made it even harder, he had to raise the money. Even worse, he had to explain that he was the person who increased his buyout three years earlier haha.

Woody was mediocre to okay his first two years -- limped into the tourney and got blown out, then won one tourney game. Still after two years fan support was strong going into year three. The fans lost hope when the team imploded and we missed on every HS recruit -- what are fans supposed to do? Our fans aren't that bad and the bar isn't too high here.

He is free and clear to hit the bars tonight... wherever is open.

I glanced and noticed what looks like the team charter from Philly that landed at 5:45PM into Indy. Monroe County airport was likely closed today, not enough snow removal equipment. It's not that bad, 5" snow and tapering off now. Worst part for the team was probably the slow bus ride down to Bloomington.

Since Spring '24 when Woody was retained, Scott got a raise/extension and his vision for FB played out, which is going to include athletic dept revenues increasing $10-20M/yr, an amazing achievement. Our Athletic Director, who makes $1M/yr and is the only one at IU who has made a good hire in the last 25 years, has plenty of influence over basketball. Things have changed since the '21 hire and '24 retention.

$15M buyout, moving on Allen deserves some credit.

Scott fired Allen, identified Cignetti, and Scott and Pam worked together to close Cignetti. They work together pretty well and I don’t think it would play out that way — they’re likely in the same page already.

Scott got a raise and an extension in May. He built up football. He cannot be fired by Quinn, who is also a lame duck. Scott has a lot of say.

Probably not giving him $6M again after they just saw $6M didn't do much. And the question really is are they going to be upset if Scott wants a coaching change? As in are they going to reduce donations? That would be their play if they were upset with Scott's decision. I doubt they do that.

One other thing I heard from my OSU friends is they have on/off issues with their DL coach too. I guess he is revered and can clash with the DC. Kinda funny. Unfortunately, their team is clicking right now.

The Cooks and Simons aren't dumb. So far this season, we have been irrelevant, which isn't what their top-5 NIL was for. And Scott Dolson matters more than both of them. Again, he did something with football that seemed impossible. He is influential. He will consult with Cook/Simon, and likely get them on board. Even if they don't totally agree, I doubt the people with their name on Assembly Hall (Simon) and the ones who run our only collective now (Cook) are going to abandon Indiana basketball to defend Mike Woodson. I bet they like Scott a lot more the Woody. The above assumes we limp into the tourney and lose the first week. We'll see, there is always a chance this team clicks despite the odds.

Here is the case he will be fired after this season: - Quinn's Chairmanship is over this summer, and he is likely leaving the board. Yes he is around this spring, but he is a lame duck and that matters. What is he really going to do? - Scott got an extension and a raise in May. He is responsible for the incredible turnaround in FB, the sport that really matters and drives the entire success of the athletic dept. He has a lot more influence now. He can't be fired by Quinn, Quinn isn't even his boss. - Cook and Simon upped the NIL, but that likely came with expectations to compete for the conference and make the second week of the tourney. I think they like Woody, but they're not a Quinn or Ferguson level allies, and I doubt they enjoyed being down 40 to Louisville or potentially inching into the tourney and not really being competitive. Basically, their NIL has been wasted to date. Keep in mind Cook and Simon also probably like Scott and respect what he has done with FB. Cook and Simon aren't mindless Woody supporters, they know IUBB is irrelevant right now. - HS recruiting has been very poor for two years. Woody had one good portal when he had bags of cash to spend. - Donations and attendance are down. Probably doesn't move the needle much, but it's another negative sign. - All these bad stories about Woody, well if you know anyone around the program, they'll confirm the stories are more or less true, and there are probably many more we don't know about. However, people around the program know all the stories. This reinforces he isn't the guy. I can't see the future, but if Woody doesn't compete for the conference and win some tourney games, IU would have spent top-5 NIL for basically no return. And last year was bad too. That's probably enough to allow Scott to make a change. Woody does still have conference play left to make a case to keep his job. It's not likely, but it's possible it happens. We have a $6M roster and quite a bit of talent despite the coaching deficiencies.

I think we will improve and win something like 11 games and inch into the tournament. Just too much talent in our roster even though we have serious coaching issues.

Yea. Our fanbase expectations aren’t that high. We jumped three spots in KenPom to #54. NET was #64 before this game. I’d guess we’ll get into the 50’s after it updates. Decent win today, it’s hard not to win some with a $6M roster, but we are still a ways off.