EtomicB
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Post by EtomicB on May 9, 2024 13:08:11 GMT -5
when the coaching staff(s) is/are not coming close to maximizing the talent they currently have. Gonna have to disagree on that. We're talking subjective words here, but last year's team was pretty clearly undermanned. We had two types of games: ones in which we hung, mostly because we shot well early, and then we had games where we got blown off the court by athleticism and talent. Creighton, UConn, Marquette -- the talent gap was immense. I think that's telling. There was a zero percent chance we'd win those. (Syracuse was another example of a team just too athletic for us.) In the rest, I think our talent, without taking into account coaching or some of the players' mindsets, could have gotten to about 5-9 in the other games. Road games were going to be tough aside from DePaul. We crumbled down the stretch in about 4-5 Big East games ... well, against DePaul as well, but they are worse than us. We can't expect to win all those (and I'm taking the non-con win against TCU) but taking two of those probably should have happened if not for complete bone head decisions by Heath and Massoud and the utter inability to get a stop. You can put that on Cooley, I guess, but I suspect our record in close games goes up this year with better options. They caused a unique amount of pain (Heath, at least, shot us into some of those games before he shot us out). So yeah, maybe we should have been a win or two better by talent. But not much more. I have no idea why people think the talent on that team was anything more than a 5 win BE team at its best.
I think you just have a super rosy view of the talent. And whether or not Cooley did a good job, that team couldn't get to .500 in the BE with the best coach out there. So regardless of Cooley's coaching, we needed to upgrade. Pretty sure the consensus for wins was between 4 & 6 games in BE play. Honestly, you're not disagreeing with me, saying they were 3 games shy of their max is the same as saying the team underachieved last season which is my point. Going 3-9 against SH, X, PC, STJ, Butler & Nova would have been bad but excusable going 0-12 was inexcusable. I don't have a super rosy view of talent, I just feel that talent alone isn't always the answer to a team's problems. I believe that comfortability in a program/system matters a lot in the success of players and teams. I won't be surprised at all if an experienced player like Richmond struggles a bit adjusting to Pitino's system which is different from Holloway's. Having said that I do expect the frosh & transfers to struggle some next season and as always the hope is that they'll be better in March than they were in November regardless of record if they do that I'll think the season was a success. Again, I recognize the need to bring in other players but a foundation has to be built at some point for the program to develop into the contender Cooley & fans want.
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wolveribe
Bulldog (over 250 posts)
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Post by wolveribe on May 9, 2024 13:18:49 GMT -5
Gonna have to disagree on that. We're talking subjective words here, but last year's team was pretty clearly undermanned. We had two types of games: ones in which we hung, mostly because we shot well early, and then we had games where we got blown off the court by athleticism and talent. Creighton, UConn, Marquette -- the talent gap was immense. I think that's telling. There was a zero percent chance we'd win those. (Syracuse was another example of a team just too athletic for us.) In the rest, I think our talent, without taking into account coaching or some of the players' mindsets, could have gotten to about 5-9 in the other games. Road games were going to be tough aside from DePaul. We crumbled down the stretch in about 4-5 Big East games ... well, against DePaul as well, but they are worse than us. We can't expect to win all those (and I'm taking the non-con win against TCU) but taking two of those probably should have happened if not for complete bone head decisions by Heath and Massoud and the utter inability to get a stop. You can put that on Cooley, I guess, but I suspect our record in close games goes up this year with better options. They caused a unique amount of pain (Heath, at least, shot us into some of those games before he shot us out). So yeah, maybe we should have been a win or two better by talent. But not much more. I have no idea why people think the talent on that team was anything more than a 5 win BE team at its best.
I think you just have a super rosy view of the talent. And whether or not Cooley did a good job, that team couldn't get to .500 in the BE with the best coach out there. So regardless of Cooley's coaching, we needed to upgrade. Pretty sure the consensus for wins was between 4 & 6 games in BE play. Honestly, you're not disagreeing with me, saying they were 3 games shy of their max is the same as saying the team underachieved last season which is my point. Going 3-9 against SH, X, PC, STJ, Butler & Nova would have bad but excusable going 0-12 was inexcusable. I don't have a super rosy view of talent, I just feel that talent alone isn't always the answer to a team's problems. I believe that comfortability in a program/system matters a lot in the success of players and teams. I won't be surprised at all if an experienced player like Richmond struggles a bit adjusting to Pitino's system which is different from Holloway's. Having said that I do expect the frosh & transfers to struggle some next season and as always the hope is that they'll be better in March than they were in November regardless of record if they do that I'll think the season was a success. Again, I recognize the need to bring in other players but a foundation has to be built at some point for the program to develop into the contender Cooley & fans want. Not gonna have a lot of continuity between any teams these days you also cant just keep players only because they were on the team the year prior. If a player doesn't fit, or isnt good enough, you gotta let them go unless its a developmental piece, where that is expected.
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hoyaguy
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,863
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Post by hoyaguy on May 9, 2024 13:57:54 GMT -5
Met Coach Cooley at an event this week with a pretty nice Q&A. Lee Reed was there as well, who mentioned that he encouraged sharing info since there's a lot of misinformation around. Here's what Coach said: - Last season was the toughest of Coach’s career - Recruiting is the "Wild West on steroids". There were stories of recruits coming to visits with an agent from LA. And players averaging 1ppg with big asks. - Recruits just care about NIL and not the degree at all in the current environment. - Cooley, unprompted, said we need a center - Still says his goal is to contend for a title in year 3 - Hoping to play a game on the west coast against UCLA, Stanford or Gonzaga - Trying to hire someone with international ties to help recruit abroad I also will add that the staff and alums (who all had seemed to spend a lot of time with Cooley) really had high praise for Cooley. Great read thank you. I really like the note on international players, the basketball infrastructure in other countries is too good to ignore (the nba mvp race was between three International players and the biggest draft pick in years is also an international. Which in my opinion was kind of inevitable). Georgetown is also a pretty well known place abroad in certain countries so why not see if any of that can be leveraged. And if internationals can’t earn NIL that’s a great plus and also education and good coaching can actually matter more too
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EtomicB
Blue & Gray (over 10,000 posts)
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Post by EtomicB on May 9, 2024 14:28:13 GMT -5
Pretty sure the consensus for wins was between 4 & 6 games in BE play. Honestly, you're not disagreeing with me, saying they were 3 games shy of their max is the same as saying the team underachieved last season which is my point. Going 3-9 against SH, X, PC, STJ, Butler & Nova would have bad but excusable going 0-12 was inexcusable. I don't have a super rosy view of talent, I just feel that talent alone isn't always the answer to a team's problems. I believe that comfortability in a program/system matters a lot in the success of players and teams. I won't be surprised at all if an experienced player like Richmond struggles a bit adjusting to Pitino's system which is different from Holloway's. Having said that I do expect the frosh & transfers to struggle some next season and as always the hope is that they'll be better in March than they were in November regardless of record if they do that I'll think the season was a success. Again, I recognize the need to bring in other players but a foundation has to be built at some point for the program to develop into the contender Cooley & fans want. Not gonna have a lot of continuity between any teams these days you also cant just keep players only because they were on the team the year prior. If a player doesn't fit, or isnt good enough, you gotta let them go unless its a developmental piece, where that is expected. You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era.
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Post by hoyawoodhoops on May 9, 2024 14:38:27 GMT -5
Thanks for the summary, Calihoya. I assume your event was in NorCal. I'm attending a simialr event tonight -- at the Editedula Hotel, no less -- here in L.A., and if either the Coach or Lee Reed says something additional/meaningful, I'll report on it.
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Post by hoyawoodhoops on May 9, 2024 14:39:07 GMT -5
Hilarious edit!
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smokeyjack
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,300
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Post by smokeyjack on May 9, 2024 14:44:51 GMT -5
Yes, yes it is. Ryan couldn't play dead...ever. Burks hasn't had the start to his college career that he hoped to have, but he's 10x the athlete. Or if you want to look at the absurdity from another angle - are you really going to compare not logging big minutes for a top 25 team that finished second in the SEC to not logging minutes for a talent-desperate team that won 2 league games in 2 seasons? Come on man! Be better.
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wolveribe
Bulldog (over 250 posts)
Posts: 377
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Post by wolveribe on May 9, 2024 14:46:16 GMT -5
Not gonna have a lot of continuity between any teams these days you also cant just keep players only because they were on the team the year prior. If a player doesn't fit, or isnt good enough, you gotta let them go unless its a developmental piece, where that is expected. You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era. Its a new world in college basketball. Kids are going to want to play and up their NIL deals every season. Its on the staff to determine who is worth the money to retain and who to let go. Thats just the way the world turns now, its not an excuse. PE coached in a different era. The staffs priority isn't to retain all the players, its to retain the right players at the right price.
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madgesiq92
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,400
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Post by madgesiq92 on May 9, 2024 14:49:56 GMT -5
It is actually the most outrageous comparison I have ever seen on this board, including GlideHoyas comparison of Sherwyn Devonish to Charles Smith, Allen Iverson and others.
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jackofjoy
Century (over 100 posts)
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Post by jackofjoy on May 9, 2024 14:50:38 GMT -5
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Post by reformation on May 9, 2024 15:15:03 GMT -5
Cooley's comments mentioned a couple of pages back generally make sense. Only observation I would add is how is it possible that he/Gtwn did not focus on international recruiting earlier instead of starting in year 3. It's such an obvious thing with Gtwn that its incredible that it was not addressed when he came in. When coaches interviewed for the job, I'm sure part of the pitch would have been how to fix recruiting--which anyone with a brain would have included a section on capitalizing on Gtwn's intl name recognition--just did not get executed. Lets hope we can fix this going fwd.
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SFHoya99
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Post by SFHoya99 on May 9, 2024 16:14:22 GMT -5
You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era. It's not a built-in pass. You evaluate the talent on the team and that becomes part of the evaluation. No one is suggesting that the talent is everything nor is anyone suggesting some kind of blanket binary good/bad pass for coaching. But pretending our talent was any good last year is a bit silly. And if it was primarily on coaching, we should be able to have a discussion on the specific level with evidence, rather than simply a big picture look at results and then claiming we can't talk talent "because that gives the staff a built in pass." There's plenty to question with Cooley, but let's take it down a notch. I think there's lots of things to question: inability of the team to learn defensive rotations; poor team focus and effort, at times; playing Massoud ever; defensive tactical choices. Let's talk 'em instead of high level blanket commentary. (Also, I don't think Ewing was a good coach for a variety of reasons, but I'd actually say that his inability to recruit and retain talent was the biggest problem. He had that one good class that imploded, but he was 9-9 in the Big East with a young, talented team before everyone transferred out. And even the BET winning team was 7-9 in conference before that, and that team was not very talented, and the talent it had was young. He definitely didn't make the most of that team, or really any of it, and I'd argue that most likely the same reason people transferred but it also probably hurt team effort and cohesion. But the talent also wasn't very good. Ewing's single biggest issue was actually probably retention, which we might actually agree on.)
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EtomicB
Blue & Gray (over 10,000 posts)
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Post by EtomicB on May 9, 2024 16:25:50 GMT -5
You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era. Its a new world in college basketball. Kids are going to want to play and up their NIL deals every season. Its on the staff to determine who is worth the money to retain and who to let go. Thats just the way the world turns now, its not an excuse. PE coached in a different era. The staffs priority isn't to retain all the players, its to retain the right players at the right price. I still believe the job of the staff is to develop the players skill-wise, system-wise & culture-wise not in any particular order.
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CaliHoya
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,188
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Post by CaliHoya on May 9, 2024 16:31:57 GMT -5
Cooley's comments mentioned a couple of pages back generally make sense. Only observation I would add is how is it possible that he/Gtwn did not focus on international recruiting earlier instead of starting in year 3. It's such an obvious thing with Gtwn that its incredible that it was not addressed when he came in. When coaches interviewed for the job, I'm sure part of the pitch would have been how to fix recruiting--which anyone with a brain would have included a section on capitalizing on Gtwn's intl name recognition--just did not get executed. Lets hope we can fix this going fwd. Yes, Cooley was specifically asked about international recruiting -- which also seemed like a no-brainer to me as well. One good piece of context is that Cooley repeated twice that it was an excellent question, so hopefully he wasn't just giving lip service.
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thedragon
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Post by thedragon on May 9, 2024 16:34:42 GMT -5
It makes me smile that the same people who sh*t on the team last year every second humanly possible now think that trying to get better players is the problem. I can't tell if I'm taking the crazy pills or they are.
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EtomicB
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Post by EtomicB on May 9, 2024 17:27:56 GMT -5
You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era. It's not a built-in pass. You evaluate the talent on the team and that becomes part of the evaluation. No one is suggesting that the talent is everything nor is anyone suggesting some kind of blanket binary good/bad pass for coaching. But pretending our talent was any good last year is a bit silly. And if it was primarily on coaching, we should be able to have a discussion on the specific level with evidence, rather than simply a big picture look at results and then claiming we can't talk talent "because that gives the staff a built in pass." There's plenty to question with Cooley, but let's take it down a notch. I think there's lots of things to question: inability of the team to learn defensive rotations; poor team focus and effort, at times; playing Massoud ever; defensive tactical choices. Let's talk 'em instead of high level blanket commentary. (Also, I don't think Ewing was a good coach for a variety of reasons, but I'd actually say that his inability to recruit and retain talent was the biggest problem. He had that one good class that imploded, but he was 9-9 in the Big East with a young, talented team before everyone transferred out. And even the BET winning team was 7-9 in conference before that, and that team was not very talented, and the talent it had was young. He definitely didn't make the most of that team, or really any of it, and I'd argue that most likely the same reason people transferred but it also probably hurt team effort and cohesion. But the talent also wasn't very good. Ewing's single biggest issue was actually probably retention, which we might actually agree on.) To me, it is if these are your thoughts on roster building. It's easy for coaches to say a player doesn't fit or lacks talent ect. when the season doesn't go as expected. "Not gonna have a lot of continuity between any teams these days you also cant just keep players only because they were on the team the year prior. If a player doesn't fit, or isnt good enough, you gotta let them go unless its a developmental piece, where that is expected."
How am I pretending the talent was good last season when I acknowledged that I would have given them a pass for going 3-9 against BE teams besides Uconn, Marq, Creighton & DePaul?
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Omega
Silver Hoya (over 500 posts)
Posts: 565
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Post by Omega on May 9, 2024 17:37:48 GMT -5
You have to see that you're giving the staff a built-in pass every year with this narrative. It took a few years but folks finally realized it wasn't just the players during the PE era. It's not a built-in pass. You evaluate the talent on the team and that becomes part of the evaluation. No one is suggesting that the talent is everything nor is anyone suggesting some kind of blanket binary good/bad pass for coaching. But pretending our talent was any good last year is a bit silly. And if it was primarily on coaching, we should be able to have a discussion on the specific level with evidence, rather than simply a big picture look at results and then claiming we can't talk talent "because that gives the staff a built in pass." There's plenty to question with Cooley, but let's take it down a notch. I think there's lots of things to question: inability of the team to learn defensive rotations; poor team focus and effort, at times; playing Massoud ever; defensive tactical choices. Let's talk 'em instead of high level blanket commentary. (Also, I don't think Ewing was a good coach for a variety of reasons, but I'd actually say that his inability to recruit and retain talent was the biggest problem. He had that one good class that imploded, but he was 9-9 in the Big East with a young, talented team before everyone transferred out. And even the BET winning team was 7-9 in conference before that, and that team was not very talented, and the talent it had was young. He definitely didn't make the most of that team, or really any of it, and I'd argue that most likely the same reason people transferred but it also probably hurt team effort and cohesion. But the talent also wasn't very good. Ewing's single biggest issue was actually probably retention, which we might actually agree on.) Man, kind of circular firing squad reasoning is going on here. Ewings young team which finished 9 and 9, underperformed... And so did his young 7-9 team... what?🤔
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SFHoya99
Blue & Gray (over 10,000 posts)
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Post by SFHoya99 on May 9, 2024 19:53:33 GMT -5
Man, kind of circular firing squad reasoning is going on here. Ewings young team which finished 9 and 9, underperformed... And so did his young 7-9 team... what?🤔 I said he didn't get the best out of his teams. I made no statement that the teams underperformed. And no, those two things are only the same if you think that the expectation is "making the most" of something. Which seems like an absurdly high standard. You also seem to ignore my bigger point: talent matters, even with Ewing.
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SFHoya99
Blue & Gray (over 10,000 posts)
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Post by SFHoya99 on May 9, 2024 19:55:48 GMT -5
To me, it is if these are your thoughts on roster building. It's easy for coaches to say a player doesn't fit or lacks talent ect. when the season doesn't go as expected. Well, we'll have to agree to disagree. That's an very binary way to look at something that clearly isn't if incorporating talent level is by definition 'giving the coaching staff a pass.' If you don't set expectations based on talent level, I don't really see the point.
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dense
Platinum Hoya (over 5000 posts)
Posts: 5,014
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Post by dense on May 10, 2024 9:19:11 GMT -5
It's accurate. They are on Keba Keita of Utah for the 5. Where are you hearing we are in on Keita? Henton was following him and his handler on IG.
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