Best coached game by Calhoun
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intlzncster
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I get why you say that, but I'd still take our guys over the last 20 years over Duke's guys.
CTBasketball
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Duke 99'
Indiana 08'
LSU 92'
Indiana 08'
LSU 92'
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I don't agree at all. He developed wonderful game plans and most of them worked to perfection but he is far from a great game coach, making adjustments on the fly. It wasn't a part of his DNA. There was also his Irish stubbornness when he often refused to bend. Maybe that has more to do with my and other's impressions that he wasn't a good game coach. He stayed locked into his pregame mindset and that was it, win or lose! Not to say he would lose gracefully because he's always had a lot of passion.
RichZ
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1999 vs Duke -- The double bigs was crucial, but switching Ricky between Langdon and Avery on a per posession, situational basis late in the game was stunning.
1992 vs LSU -- Totally nullifying Shaq.
2012 vs Warde Manuel -- not only picked the right man to replace himself, by the timing of his retirement, he pretty much forced Manuel to go with his choice. One little bit of strategy that has won, and will win us, who knows how many more games (and chamionships).
1992 vs LSU -- Totally nullifying Shaq.
2012 vs Warde Manuel -- not only picked the right man to replace himself, by the timing of his retirement, he pretty much forced Manuel to go with his choice. One little bit of strategy that has won, and will win us, who knows how many more games (and chamionships).
intlzncster
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Love it. One of JC's greatest skills: talent evaluation. His last big home run.
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Those would be my two.
FfldCntyFan
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For those who do not believe that JC was a great game coach, which coach from the past 35+ years would you put ahead of him?
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Pete Gaudet?
nelsonmuntz
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nelsonmuntz
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Calhoun won that game with the backcourt. Moore and El Amin attacked, attacked, and attacked some more. Avery probably thought he was pretty quick until Moore spent the first half of that game b slapping him. Langdon looked like he was carrying someone on his back he was so slow.
nelsonmuntz
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If Calhoun was the greatest coach in coaching history at everything, he would have been undefeated. Can we have a thread on this board where someone makes an honest criticism of something UConn and people don't feel the need to have a "who is the greatest UConn fan" contest?
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nelsonmuntz
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Agree, although ratface lost that game as much as Calhoun won it. I believe Duke had two players with 3 fouls in the first half, right? Idiot.
intlzncster
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While I don't think he was the "greatest coach in coaching history at everything", the above doesn't make any sense. That's perfect, not best. And obviously players are a massive part of the equation.
He's a top 5 All time coach. Tough to think he'd not be a great game coach and achieve that level.
I thought his question was valid. Who would you put ahead of him?
nelsonmuntz
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I think he overdid it with the refs, a lot. I am not comparing him to spaz's like Buzz Williams or chumps like everyone that has coached at SHU and Rutgers for the last 15 years. Calhoun was good at making adjustments, but compared to the Rick Pitinos and Tom Izzos, there are coaches that are better.
Personally, I think basketball relies much less on coaching X's and O's in game situations than football. Every play in basketball has second and third options, and most basketball coaching occurs in practice, in getting players to recognize situations and react accordingly more than calling the right play at the right time, like football. This is why UConn PG's always make big jumps between their sophomore and junior years. That big list of reads on top of the big list of plays takes a long time to internalize, but when they get it, UConn PG's are tough to stop. Development is teaching athletes how to be basketball players, and goes far beyond just skills.
Jackasses like Rick Barnes call every play. Most good coaches teach an offense and then let their players improvise within the structure of that offense, but those players need to know what they are doing for that to work and not degenerate into a pickup game. Likewise, UConn runs an aggressive help defense that looks terrible if the players are not making correct split second decisions on when to help and when to stay home. That is all player development.
What makes Ollie's run this year so amazing is that most game coaches take time to develop. Calhoun used to get used by Carnesecca when he first got to UConn. He took 10 years at the highest level to become a coach that could consistently beat top teams without a significant talent advantage. Ollie outcoached Wright, Hoiberg, Izzo, Donovan and Calipari in a row, in his second year. Only Martelli got the better of him, but Brimah bailed us out there. Pretty impressive run by Ollie.
nelsonmuntz
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Good call on the LSU game. I had forgotten that.
FfldCntyFan
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I don't believe that he was the greatest at everything and yes, there were many instances where he could not get his players to respond well (2006 is glaring, especially when compared to some of his earlier accomplishments, such as the 1988 NIT where at times it appeared that the force of JC's will alone carried that team to the title).
He had many flaws as a head coach. The thing is, all of his contemporaries also had many flaws. When looking at his contemporaries, I cannot think of anyone who I can state was better in game than JC was. I may be overlooking someone but I can think of many current and future HOF coaches who have many flawed results on their resume, I cannot think one who I would put ahead of JC.
I thought the entire Kemba run was great coaching. But someday, we might see Napier and Lamb starting for OKC.
Kemba an all star for Charlotte, Roscoe grabbing ten rebounds a night and wonder how he could have lost.
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I tended to agree with you but I was most probably wrong. Calhoun had a way of seeing the big picture in a game and some moves that seemed strange ended up with a win. We are not privy as to who may have a sore knee and its not talked about for obvious reasons.
A lot of decisions were made with info we did not have and he was not about to revel to his opponent.
nomar
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Every team's fanbase has criticisms of their coach. Lord knows how many times I said "that game's not going on JC's highlight reel." Like I said before, nobody's perfect. If you had to pick someone to be your coach for a single game, who would it be?
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Please stop repeating this as if its true. You are not a fraction as witty as you think you are.
Tony Robertson, Taliek Brown, Ben Gordon, and Emeka Okafor would all easily be listed ahead of Selvie on any list of "best players" on the 2002 team. If not all four of them, then without question, at least ONE of them, thereby invalidating your foolish quip that you seem so proud to repeat at every possible opportunity.
nelsonmuntz
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Gordon and Okafor became better players than Selvie, but there is no way either was better than Selvie in 2002. Gordon was still "gentle Ben" and Okafor was completely one dimensional as a shot blocker. I am as big a Robertson fan as anyone, but he was not better than Selvie in 2002. Taliek Brown's best was never as good as Selvie.
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They were both already better than Selvie. Selvie was a decent scorer at the four, but he didn't make his free throws, he didn't rebound well, and he turned the ball over a ton.
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nelsonmuntz
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Pitino, Izzo, Donovan and Calipari are better game coaches than Calhoun. I would say Bennett, Ryan, Wright and Dixon are too. Carnessecca, Tark and Keady were three of the best game coaches I have ever seen. Coach K used to be a great game coach, but he has faded badly in recent years. I think Roy Williams is an excellent game coach, but he has faded badly on player development recently. Boeheim and Chaney might as well stayed home for games because their coaching basically ended when practice ended.
Calhoun's insane stubbornness helped and hurt at times. It helped because it inspired confidence and trust in Calhoun, it hurt because when Calhoun was wrong, he could be really wrong. Calhoun was the best player development coach in the history of college basketball, and even Calhoun critics would agree with that or at least acknowledge he was one of the best. When you are the "best ever" at an aspect of coaching that comprises 30% or 40% or 50% (pick a number) of what a coach does, you can get away with not being the best on some of the other aspects of coaching.
nelsonmuntz
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http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/team/stats/_/id/41/year/2002/connecticut-huskies
Selvie did turn the ball over a lot, but the whole team turned the ball over a lot that year. Selvie also averaged 11.4 ppg, shot over 50% from the field and averaged 6 rpg while generally picking up the other teams' best 3 or 4 (and even the occasional 2) on defense.
That said, start a separate Selvie thread if you want to argue Selvie.
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Judge it by the "oh crap, he's injured" (or in foul trouble) corollary. How much would you have been wringing your hands if any of those guys couldn't play. I think without any question, it would start like this:
1) Caron
2) Emeka
Our team would completely change without either of those two guys out there.
The third could be a close battle between the other four, but I think I'd go Ben 3, Selvie 4, Taliek 5, Tony 6. Ben could fill in for either guard and we don't lose much, but Taliek/Tony couldn't give us the shooting/floor spacing that Ben did. We only had Mike Hayes backing up the 4, so there was a drop off without Selvie and you could put him three behind Emeka, but Caron was a very good rebounder at the 3 and could get you some paint points, and Selvie's shots could have been divvied up by other guys.
1) Caron
2) Emeka
Our team would completely change without either of those two guys out there.
The third could be a close battle between the other four, but I think I'd go Ben 3, Selvie 4, Taliek 5, Tony 6. Ben could fill in for either guard and we don't lose much, but Taliek/Tony couldn't give us the shooting/floor spacing that Ben did. We only had Mike Hayes backing up the 4, so there was a drop off without Selvie and you could put him three behind Emeka, but Caron was a very good rebounder at the 3 and could get you some paint points, and Selvie's shots could have been divvied up by other guys.
FfldCntyFan
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I may give you Izzo but I am a bit hesitant at the moment. I do remember a few instances where Izzo's team did get knocked out by teams they should have beaten (although I will admit to this being very few and his consitency at final four runs was the best since K from the mid 1980's to the mid 1990's). Pitino did some great in game coaching when he took PC to the final four in 1987 but he has been hit or miss for most of his career (like nearly every other coach).
The only time I remember Calipari beating JC were two games at MSG where the talent disparity was immense. In each of those games we made early adjustments (after getting nearly blown off the court) and turned the games into very compelling contests. I don't see anything about Donovan or Wright that places either ahead of JC. If in your eyes JC's greatest fault is being to stubborn to stray from his standard approach when it isn't working, how can Dixon possibly make this list? Bennett and Ryan are good if you long possessions with a lot of motion and many passes but this is more of a style of play than it is being any type of quality or creative in game coach.
Carnessecca, Tark and Keady were all horrible game coaches. I cannot think of one instance where their teams stood a chance in an important game when the opponent could come within shouting distance of their talent. I would love to see an example of any tournament game (and the three combined coached a ton of tournament games) where they fielded an inferior team but won because they outcoached the opposition.
My take is that you are only looking at JC's warts. He's human, everyone is so perfection is out of reach. He has however had far more quality moments than he has had games where he was outcoached, especially on the biggest stage (look at his record in opening round tournament games and twll me who comes close). If the list of people who were better game coaches during his career is only a handful, littered with hall of famers and open for debate with most if not all, that tells me he was in fact one hell of a game coach.
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Duke 1999. Beat the best Duke team ever. Followed by Duke 2004 semifinal where Emeka played only half the game.
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