DiMauro: “The ‘new’ Big East: Is that all there is?“

[businesslawyer]

I think DiMauro's a duck___ loser, but it's not like people haven't posted on here that Hurley's on the hot seat next year without a tournament run.

Hurley is as far from a hot seat as a Stark sitting on the throne in the North. He has made the team much better each of the three years he has been here. He has a recipe that the Athletic Department believes in == recruit well and play hard. Even if he was Jim Calhoun, he will have years where the team isn’t as good as the year before. Next year may be one of them.

Saying that not making a “tournament run” next year puts him on the hot seat is just dumb.

 

[dennismenace]

It's pretty easy to see when a media (print or other) person is egocentric instead of storycentric. Sadly, they usually never change so best to put on ignore. It's not about them and they aren't even aware that they think it's about them all the while hiding behind "the story".

 

[pepband99]

Hurley's carefully cultivated national media posse

...aaaaaand you can stop reading right there. Someone is butthurt that their podunk rag isn't on the good list. Given drivel like this, can't imagine why.

 

[Kemba Time]

This line tells you all you need to know about the story and the writer:

“Football's newly relegated status as an independent gives it a 2021 home schedule with Holy Cross, Yale, Wyoming and Middle Tennessee, among others.”

Among others is Purdue.

The only reason you would skip mentioning the Big Ten team by name when it is shorter than the words you are replacing naming it with is if you are a complete hack ignoring facts that don’t fit your agenda.

 

[Vuce]

Don’t know how old this bcu hack is but maybe he was a student at some point during UConn’s wonderfully long hoop winning streak in the 90s. That definitely left a mark on those fans and alums. Love to feel the hate from him

 

[huskymedic]

This line tells you all you need to know about the story and the writer:

“Football's newly relegated status as an independent gives it a 2021 home schedule with Holy Cross, Yale, Wyoming and Middle Tennessee, among others.”

Among others is Purdue.

The only reason you would skip mentioning the Big Ten team by name when it is shorter than the words you are replacing naming it with is if you are a complete hack ignoring facts that don’t fit your agenda.

... and Houston (which of course is an AAC school who would have likely been on the schedule anyways)

 

[Blue Idiaco]

if his point was that the NBE is a meaningful disappointment in terms of quality of play, then the article makes sense. The conference is not nearly as good as we all remembered or hoped. And if Wright leaves, there is really nothing left. Sorry, but Creighton and Butler and Xavier are mid-major programs in another part of the world. I'd argue that the BE needs UConn to succeed a lot more than anyone wants to admit. You watch the P5 teams and the athletes they have versus the mediocrity of the BE...its meaningful. And its not going to get better. The P5 will continue to wrestle away the best talent and the best coaches. And if there is a rule about staying in college for at least 2 years, then the disparity will only increase.

 

[August_West]

Hurley is as far from a hot seat as a Stark sitting on the throne in the North. He has made the team much better each of the three years he has been here. He has a recipe that the Athletic Department believes in == recruit well and play hard. Even if he was Jim Calhoun, he will have years where the team isn’t as good as the year before. Next year may be one of them.

Saying that ot making a “tournament run” next year puts him on the hot seat is just dumb.

It doesnt put him on the hot seat. He's safe and should be. But the CW here since Hurley's hire was "wait until year 3" Year 3 was pretty underwhelming on the whole, however because it was a broken season with Covid pauses, and unequal schedules, and just general mayhem, I can't really use it as a litmus test on program direction. It was a free year, and hey we did make tourney which is a positive, and showed some progress. Next year is year 4 in what I can only surmise as being as normal a season as possible considering the state of the pandemic. No one should ever expect a NC, but expecting a great regular season and a good tourney seed so we can roll our dice in the tourney like everyone else is a bar that needs to be crossed. Losing to Nova and Creighton 4x while beating everyone else will not cut it, the next test is actually winning top of league and (high ranked )OOC games. Not all of them, but Im tired of mostly rolling over for teams with a number next to their name. Thats been a troubling holdover from the previous regimes days. I think we are inching in right direction though.


One thing I dont want to hear about is injuries. Every team has injuries.

 

[MilliniumPrince]

...but he isn't wrong.

 

[Kenny11]

It’s kinda true. Getting bounced in the first round by Maryland. Isn’t going to be enough going forward. Time to start winning.

Yes, but there was a tone to the writing that Hurley has us all fooled and wants to lower expectations and he will be unconditionally praised by the fanbase and national writers. There is no evidence that is the case.

Also, other examples he used in the article were even more confusing. He shouldn't have even mentioned the women's basketball team. They are probably about to win back to back national championships and could go on one of those ridiculous winning streaks again.

And nobody said it would be easy for the football team as an independent so I'm not sure why that was brought up either.

 

[ktuck911]

Here's an idea: why not let the new writers be actual basketball players/athletes/former coaches? Some of these sports columnists are much too full of themselves....

 

[Waquoit]

...but he isn't wrong.

Of course he's wrong. We've gone from irrelevant to Top 30 in 3 seasons. If anything, we got too good too soon. We started the season hoping to just make the tournament. Now folks are throwing shade because we didn't go far enough. DiMauro and his sympathizers are on dope.

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

What's his problem? Is he another dork Hurley won't talk too?

His Twitter handle is BCGenius. He hates UConn and is a writer for a 4th tier New London based paper. His avatar has been a young boy and it terrifies me that the young boy is going to starve to death because there is no way he makes more than $20,000 a year or so. I hope the mother has a real job.

 

[Huskybass]

Don’t know how old this bcu hack is but maybe he was a student at some point during UConn’s wonderfully long hoop winning streak in the 90s. That definitely left a mark on those fans and alums. Love to feel the hate from him

He graduated from BC in 1990. If I recall correctly UConn pretty much dominated BC for a full decade right about that time.

 

[CallMeBruce]

if his point was that the NBE is a meaningful disappointment in terms of quality of play, then the article makes sense. The conference is not nearly as good as we all remembered or hoped. And if Wright leaves, there is really nothing left. Sorry, but Creighton and Butler and Xavier are mid-major programs in another part of the world. I'd argue that the BE needs UConn to succeed a lot more than anyone wants to admit. You watch the P5 teams and the athletes they have versus the mediocrity of the BE...its meaningful. And its not going to get better. The P5 will continue to wrestle away the best talent and the best coaches. And if there is a rule about staying in college for at least 2 years, then the disparity will only increase.

The Big East has one of the strongest crops of recruits coming in next year out of any league in Division 1. If you want to chat garbage, do it somewhere else. Otherwise, learn before you talk.

 

[Kolumbo]

I almost feel sorry for that guy. Some of those BC grads are simply too damaged. The combo of BCU, Pitt and Syracuse being rivals in the bottom half of a southern conference is taking its toll.

 

[Husky25]

Cut away to DiMauro looking at the click activity:

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

...aaaaaand you can stop reading right there. Someone is butthurt that their podunk rag isn't on the good list. Given drivel like this, can't imagine why.

 

[superjohn]

Cut away to DiMauro looking at the click activity:

We might just be making him enough money he can ditch Long John's and splurge for a special night out at Red Lobster.

 

[Guapo]

You guys are giving him exactly what he wants. Let his career raisin.

 

[M.S.G.]

His Twitter handle is BCGenius. He hates UConn and is a writer for a 4th tier New London based paper. His avatar has been a young boy and it terrifies me that the young boy is going to starve to death because there is no way he makes more than $20,000 a year or so. I hope the mother has a real job.

Not for nothing, but every time I've come in contact with him at one of our basketball games he's been incredibly pleasant. That's kind of his shtick though, he waits until you're gone and then sticks it to you...

Not going to defend his comment on Hurley not giving much to the local media, but he and others have kind of dug their own grave with this one - at the same time it's not TOTALLY their fault as Hurley seems to have his guys already that he gives information to (Zagoria) and you can understand why because of the NY/NJ connection. I could go on a MUCH longer rant about Zags than DiMauro.. Zags is an absolute loser in every sense of the word.

My final point is that the NL Day is not a 4th tier paper. They have stayed afloat in a completely dying market when the Bulletin and Courant have jettisoned entire departments one by one. Also, what The Day does for high school sports in Eastern CT is unmatched throughout the rest of the state. The quality and quantity of their high school sports broadcasts trumps everything the rest of the state does for their high schools.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

He's like an off-brand UConn-focused version of Skip Bayless. Hacky takes trying to stir up controversy because he's got nothing else to contribute.

 

[NJHoops]

Not for nothing, but every time I've come in contact with him at one of our basketball games he's been incredibly pleasant. That's kind of his shtick though, he waits until you're gone and then sticks it to you...

Not going to defend his comment on Hurley not giving much to the local media, but he and others have kind of dug their own grave with this one - at the same time it's not TOTALLY their fault as Hurley seems to have his guys already that he gives information to (Zagoria) and you can understand why because of the NY/NJ connection. I could go on a MUCH longer rant about Zags than DiMauro.. Zags is an absolute loser in every sense of the word.

My final point is that the NL Day is not a 4th tier paper. They have stayed afloat in a completely dying market when the Bulletin and Courant have jettisoned entire departments one by one. Also, what The Day does for high school sports in Eastern CT is unmatched throughout the rest of the state. The quality and quantity of their high school sports broadcasts trumps everything the rest of the state does for their high schools.

Zagoria’s source on UConn stuff is not always Hurley. He also got mad at Dan when he was at Rhode Island because he didn’t give him some stuff first.

 

[M.S.G.]

Zagoria’s source on UConn stuff is not always Hurley. He also got mad at Dan when he was at Rhode Island because he didn’t give him some stuff first.

Interesting! I wasn't aware, it just seemed like he had everything this year, I assumed.. When you assume....!

 

[CL82]

Here's the thing, whenever you take an up and coming coach you take a chance. You never know when the Peter Principal is going to kick in and you get Diaco'd. Consistently losing in the 1st round of the NCAA's is not sufficient for a coach at UConn, but getting there at all is a critical first step.

The trajectory Danny has the program on is exactly what we want it to be. He's upgrading the talent and changing expectations. That doesn't mean the team is is a finished product or that Danny is as a coach. I'd like to see his in game adjustments improve and I'm not sure that having our bigs hedge as much as they do is a winning strategy. As opposing coaches see it more they'll adjust and get easy baskets. We saw some of that this year. It's a tool, like traps or a full court press. It is better used to create a different look rather than a go to scheme. But that's just my opinion.

Hurley is exactly as advertised to this point in his career. His upside is unknown, but it looks good so far. He is a million miles away from being on the hot seat.

 

[Kenny11]

I've criticised Hurley for some bad lineups and poor in game adjustments but he clearly has us on the right track. Finishing 3rd the the big east with Bouknight missing a lot of time and akok missing the whole season was a success. The Creighton and Maryland performances were trash though.

 

[rollskies]

I like a lot of the local reporters, but honestly it never fails to baffle me that some of them will take every opportunity to bash Hurley/the program online and IN THE EXACT SAME DAY complain about how they don’t like how Hurley gives scoops to the national guys........ what did you expect to happen??

If I saw people writing obvious trolling articles for clicks I wouldn’t be lining up to tell them which guys on my team got injured.

I get that this is how they make their living, but i’m just saying they could be a bit more diplomatic on twitter instead of throwing a temper tantrum. I don’t see any other media bases acting like this. Some of these CT guys are so dramatic.

 

[Inyatkin]

The way this played out on Twitter is both BC guy and Jacobs were met with criticism (including some posters on here) who took their arguments apart and offered reasoned critiques. There were a few expletives thrown in, but mostly it was straightforward debunking of their argument. But their reaction then becomes "I'm being attacked by UConn fans!"
Not really, you're just wrong. And no one besides you guys cares who finds out when on game day that some player is doubtful with a twisted ankle or whatever.
It's a little exhausting, but also kinda sad

 

[kansashusky]

Of course he's wrong. We've gone from irrelevant to Top 30 in 3 seasons. If anything, we got too good too soon. We started the season hoping to just make the tournament. Now folks are throwing shade because we didn't go far enough. DiMauro and his sympathizers are on dope.

Wouldn't that mean making it into the round of 32?

 

[Gurleyman]

I always go back to 2004, when JC unfairly ripped Dave Solomon about the Ryan Gomes question. DiMauro and Jacobs wrote columns about JC ripping Solomon. Solomon, the victim of the tirade, wrote about basketball, not centering himself in the story.

Then later that year, UConn came through without Okafor in the BET. DiMauro and Jacobs wrote columns demanding to know why they weren’t told Okafor was out and had to find out on TV. Solomon wrote a nice piece on Josh Boone stepping up.

The columnists who are about themselves bug me. I don’t want to read about your grievances. I want to read about the team you cover.

But that was 17 years ago, so I should get over it.