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Kevin Ollie is 82-42 in the regular season as a head coach. That comes out to a winning percentage of .661. In the postseason (not including the 2015 NIT loss to Arizona St.) he is 15-3 (.833).
It's still a small enough sample where it can be ascribed to statistical deviation, but it's also not crazy to think it's more than that, especially given the competition level is, if anything, a step or two up.
I've never bought into the notion that the 2011 and 2014 teams "got hot." I thought they got better.
Our last couple teams, the most recent one in particular, played at a higher level - and looked better and more cohesive doing it - in the postseason. Fine, maybe you can call the Cincinnati win a fluke, just like you can maybe call the St. Joe's win a fluke in 2014 (I wouldn't, but they both involved more than a little luck). But after that, they pounded a Temple team that had swept them, demolished a Memphis squad that was hot, and beat a veteran Colorado team pretty convincingly. Against Kansas they got punked, but maybe that's just because Kansas was that much better than us.
Point being, they've played at a higher level, with more urgency, in March than they have at any other point in the season. The lone exception? 2013, when we were banned.
So my question is, does Ollie treat the regular season like the preseason? I'm not asking whether he should do that, I'm asking whether he is doing that.
And no, I'm not trying to rationalize the disaster this season has been thus far. They should be able to handle Wagner and Northeastern without the coach emptying the bag of tricks, and guys like Izzo, who are sometimes similarly indifferent to the regular season, always manage to field representative teams.
I wonder, though. I wonder what we're going to see in Maui and I wonder what we're going to see in New York and I wonder what we're going to see at the end of the season in Hartford. They can't be this bad forever, at least not in a conference where they have much more talent than even the second best team. I'm still intrigued.
It's still a small enough sample where it can be ascribed to statistical deviation, but it's also not crazy to think it's more than that, especially given the competition level is, if anything, a step or two up.
I've never bought into the notion that the 2011 and 2014 teams "got hot." I thought they got better.
Our last couple teams, the most recent one in particular, played at a higher level - and looked better and more cohesive doing it - in the postseason. Fine, maybe you can call the Cincinnati win a fluke, just like you can maybe call the St. Joe's win a fluke in 2014 (I wouldn't, but they both involved more than a little luck). But after that, they pounded a Temple team that had swept them, demolished a Memphis squad that was hot, and beat a veteran Colorado team pretty convincingly. Against Kansas they got punked, but maybe that's just because Kansas was that much better than us.
Point being, they've played at a higher level, with more urgency, in March than they have at any other point in the season. The lone exception? 2013, when we were banned.
So my question is, does Ollie treat the regular season like the preseason? I'm not asking whether he should do that, I'm asking whether he is doing that.
And no, I'm not trying to rationalize the disaster this season has been thus far. They should be able to handle Wagner and Northeastern without the coach emptying the bag of tricks, and guys like Izzo, who are sometimes similarly indifferent to the regular season, always manage to field representative teams.
I wonder, though. I wonder what we're going to see in Maui and I wonder what we're going to see in New York and I wonder what we're going to see at the end of the season in Hartford. They can't be this bad forever, at least not in a conference where they have much more talent than even the second best team. I'm still intrigued.
