Herbst and Manuel blew it | Page 4 | The Boneyard

Herbst and Manuel blew it

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4UConn said:
As was stated, I think it an appropriate question to ask Herbst and Manuel how a Kentucky commuter school, with little academic pedigree, and no recent national championships, and in a much smaller market, could beat out our great university. This is not just a defeat it's a humiliation. Like many of you, I am absolutely disgusted.
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Exactly, it is a public humiliation.
 
TRest said:
This time around, who were we up against and who was able to leave? We had a lot of crap go against us off the field and court lately, and our fanbase in the stands has eroded based on a variety of factors. Hathaway was a disaster, but what has Warde done since arriving regarding marketing, ticket sales, etc? I'm not making any sense I know, but we truly are facked by this. Adding Tulane today was just a harsh reminder of what our future holds.
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The Tulane decision is truly mesmerizing, no doubt about it. I almost thought it was an April Fool's joke. And today was truly the first day that I felt that the Big East was dead. Sure, it had been in the ICU on life support for a while now, but today, I saw a flat-line. A truly truly sad day for me.

Having said that, I'm not sad at all about UConn. Arguably our most frustrating football season in a decade, and yet we have a chance to get to a bowl game in a BCS conference, albeit the weakest one. We have a "rebuilding" men's basketball team that is 5-1 and already has hardware on the shelf this year (inches away from having two trophies) with a brand new coach and already has a victory over a top 20 team. We have women's basketball team that hasn't seen the wrong end of the Top5 since FDR was president. Men's soccer is marching through the tournament right now. Women's soccer always wins more than it loses, too, with the second winningest coach in the history of women's collegiate soccer (Tsantiris). Field hockey was top25 yet again. Baseball's last four years under Penders has been the strongest it's ever been, battling in the tourney with legit teams from the south. And now hockey is stepping up to a top notch conference. Facilities are being built for multiple sports.

Why did I go off on that tirade? Because the bottom line is this: I truly believe in my heart of hearts that UConn is too good a sports entity to not be included at "The Big Table." This angst that we are all going through is because we cannot process why a university this strong in athletics is being looked over time and again by the "Big Table." I get it. I feel the pain with you all. But let's not make it out to be that we didn't invest enough, or try enough, or WIN enough....that's just not the case, my friends. Hang tight, because we still have a very bright future ahead of us...
 
Dan, sorry but it's just not possible.

When Rutgers is pulling in $30M a year and Syracuse, BC and Pitt are pulling in $17M a year and UConn is getting $1M-$2M if we're lucky, it's not going to be ok.

There is no future. There's no money to invest into facilities. There will be no money to invest into coaches. Recruiting? Forget about it.

This is the worst I've felt about UConn ever. What's funny/sad is that aside from two down years with P, we've done absolutely nothing at all to deserve this fate.
 
We haven't played a game yet in the NNNBE. It sucks that we are still hanging around like the last kid picked for kickball but the game ain't over yet.
 
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ConnHuskBask said:
Dan, sorry but it's just not possible.

When Rutgers is pulling in $30M a year and Syracuse, BC and Pitt are pulling in $17M a year and UConn is getting $1M-$2M if we're lucky, it's not going to be ok.

There is no future. There's no money to invest into facilities. There will be no money to invest into coaches. Recruiting? Forget about it.

This is the worst I've felt about UConn ever. What's funny/sad is that aside from two down years with P, we've done absolutely nothing at all to deserve this fate.
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How long had Notre Dame or South Carolina been earning double-digit amounts to our 4 million per year, only to get beat by us away from our own home? "Not possible" is not the correct term here. Difficult, yes indeed. But you know the love affair that the state of Connecticut has with the Huskies, and there is no way that we are going to allow the flagship to fall. No way on earth.

I do agree with you on one thing, though; we really have done absolutely nothing at all to deserve this fate....but we WILL survive it!
 
The Board of Trustees has no real choice but to fire Herbst and Manuel. Their failure will cost the university hundreds of millions of dollars over the next 10 years. It wasn't like we were competing with the University of Texas. We were competing with a Kentucky commuter college. This level of failure has to be punished.
 
nelsonmuntz said:
The Board of Trustees has no real choice but to fire Herbst and Manuel. Their failure will cost the university hundreds of millions of dollars over the next 10 years. It wasn't like we were competing with the University of Texas. We were competing with a Kentucky commuter college. This level of failure has to be punished.
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Ummm... doesn't the BOT have a hand in this (if the fate true)?
 
gwhuskyfan said:
Well now that Manuel has done nothing with this, maybe he can finally give KO a proper contract...
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I'm going to give Warde Manuel a free dollar's worth of brilliant PR.

Louisville gets the ACC invite tomorrow.

On Thursday, at halftime of the UNH-UConn MBB game, in front of a subdued crowd, full of folks who love the university but really fear for it's future, you walk to center court at halftime. You face those people. And you inform them that the rumors are true, that the athletic department has been in intense negotiations for the past several weeks on a move that is essential to the future success of the athletic department at the University of Connecticut, having reached an agreement on such a move.

That Kevin Ollie has signed a three-year contract to be the permanent head coach of men's basketball at the University of Connecticut.

You get cover for yourself, you get good PR and good press, everyone's happy (I disagree with the principle of the move, but the PR value is undeniable).

There you go, Warde. Free of charge. Don't thank me.
 
nelsonmuntz said:
The Board of Trustees has no real choice but to fire Herbst and Manuel. Their failure will cost the university hundreds of millions of dollars over the next 10 years. It wasn't like we were competing with the University of Texas. We were competing with a Kentucky commuter college. This level of failure has to be punished.
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ConnHuskBask said:
Dan, sorry but it's just not possible.

When Rutgers is pulling in $30M a year and Syracuse, BC and Pitt are pulling in $17M a year and UConn is getting $1M-$2M if we're lucky, it's not going to be ok.

There is no future. There's no money to invest into facilities. There will be no money to invest into coaches. Recruiting? Forget about it.

This is the worst I've felt about UConn ever. What's funny/sad is that aside from two down years with P, we've done absolutely nothing at all to deserve this fate.
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GUYS, CHILL OUT! It all doesn't matter since the world is going to end in 4 weeks.
 
Herbst and Manuel absolutely BLEW IT. They killed our school. No way to doubt that. We had every institutional advantage over Ville and they lost. No way to get around it. We hired a small time AD and a small time President and now we are a small time University.

So pumped for UConn vs. Tulane on Big Monday. It's over boys.
 
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campcalhoun2009 said:
Herbst and Manuel absolutely BLEW IT. They killed our school. No way to doubt that. We had every institutional advantage over Ville and they lost. No way to get around it. We hired a small time AD and a small time President and now we are a small time University.

So pumped for UConn vs. Tulane on Big Monday. It's over boys.
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Jesus...I'm really starting to think the world is going to end with this negative attitude.

Anyone who can't see that Herbst is a big time pres is blind. UConn has soared in the rankings in recent years and definitely is on pace to continue given their commitment to academics.

And of course all of this crazy talk coming from you idiots is on the heels of UConn soccer competing in the NCAA quarterfinals.

Good riddance, all of you should take a Xanax and chill out.
 
UConn hasn't budged in the rankings for years. Been 60-68 for a long time.
 
NHUConnfan said:
...they just broke the top 20 in public institutions last year. Get with the program you narcissistic and pessimistic whiny troll.
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No, you're right, this is totally the time for kittens and rainbows optimism.

I'm defending nelson. In several threads.

THAT'S how bad things are.
 
NHUConnfan said:
...they just broke the top 20 in public institutions last year. Get with the program you narcissistic and pessimistic whiny troll.
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They were Top 20, or right on the cusp, a few years ago. There is a normal variance year to year in these rankings.
 
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HuskyfanDan said:
i can't buy this at all. the acc needs to get 1 or several teams asap to keep its league at 14 for tv contract reasons and perception reasons. if uconn is not the pick that is a lot of fuel to fire that the b10 is in fact in uconns future and thats why uconn and the acc didn't happen. no matter lville, cincy or uconn the fball is not tosu or texas so the whole rumor of fsu wants a fball school is bogus. it comes down to markets and fanbase size. we crush them in each and then we talk bball etc. this is all silly. espn and the acc pumped uconn for a bit right away and then they realized we might have better **** going on and started to pump elsewhere. uconn will be fine.
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You couldn't be more wrong. No invite means there is no chance that toe B1G is interested, and the ACC knows it.
 
zls44 said:
No, you're right, this is totally the time for kittens and rainbows optimism.

I'm defending nelson. In several threads.

THAT'S how bad things are.
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That's how delusional you've become. You've become Nelson. I'm here to pull you out!
 
CTMike said:
We haven't played a game yet in the NNNBE. It sucks that we are still hanging around like the last kid picked for kickball but the game ain't over yet.
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It's over, Mikey. IT"S OVER!
 
There's no longer any hurry for anyone to do anything. They know the leftovers aren't going anywhere. Instead of marketing themselves our leadership was island-hopping while we were being publicly misrepresented. There needed to be a loud and clear response from multiple sources within the university, politically and through the media. Instead we went down without a fight because of some FSU and AD comments and some blowhards on message boards. It doesn't matter if your the best if you don't market yourself. In that respect this was a total failure. There is no excuse or silver lining to fall back on. "We're positioning ourselves" doesn't get it done unless your getting ready to take a dump.
 
UConnDan97 said:
But you do realize what you're saying, right? You're suggesting that if someone begs hard enough to get something, that they will automatically get it. Although that might work in some households, it most often does not work in the business world. And unfortunately, the whore that is called the NCAA has turned college sports into a pure business.

These conferences are making MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR BUSINESS DECISIONS, and I can assure you that it isn't being done on the basis of how nicely Warde Manual asks to get into somewhere...
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Well Dan, what I am suggesting, no strike that, what I am stating is that we went from top candidate to an also ran in the span of couple of weeks. A commuter college was picked for conference realignment ahead of us. A commuter college that has had it's own share of scandal, that has laughable academics and inferior athletics, in a less desirable media market, a school that we beat on the field in all important football somehow passed us by. We led in all the metrics, but lost out anyway, particularly striking because we were the early favorite. That leads me to the conclusion that our case was not made effectively enough. I think that our administration got myopic on this and decided that it was done deal, and allowed 'ville to push ahead of us. That's a failure on the AD and President's part.

Make no mistake about it, the prestige of our institution just took a huge, huge hit. It will effect us in recruiting, it will effect us in coaching candidates, and it will effect us our academic reputation. Think the academics part is a reach? Think again. We were passed over by a commuter college. We are affiliated with the dregs of academia (well not all of them because Louisville left). That matters.

This happened on Herbst's watch and in Manual's wading pool. This is a big, big failure. Now I don't want to run Suzie out of town, I think she's done well up to now, but this is a huge strike against her. Manual? He's cost us recruits with the way he's handling Ollie, the football program is a shambles and now this. He's on the clock now in my view. He needs to produce and fast.

If I had to blame anyone, for our current situation, I think it would be Hathaway. That's a post I'll write later. But when you are in a position of responsibility you have got to produce. Herbst and Manual did not. That's a problem and it draws into question their ability to get the job done. That's where I am today.
 
UConnDan97 said:
But you do realize what you're saying, right? You're suggesting that if someone begs hard enough to get something, that they will automatically get it. Although that might work in some households, it most often does not work in the business world. And unfortunately, the whore that is called the NCAA has turned college sports into a pure business.

These conferences are making MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR BUSINESS DECISIONS, and I can assure you that it isn't being done on the basis of how nicely Warde Manual asks to get into somewhere...
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Dan I love how rational and level headed you are at all times on this forum for the most part, but the fact is Louisville did beg harder and won out. Louisville never stopped begging and cock blocking. We begged last year and took the high road this year. I blame Manuel more than Herbst, because I have no clue the name of Louisvilles president, but I know who Tom Jurich is and how vocal he has been about getting Louisville out of this clusterfluck we are currently in. There are no two ways about this. These guys fumbled the snap.
 
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CL82 said:
Well Dan, what I am suggesting, no strike that, what I am stating is that we went from top candidate to an also ran in the span of couple of weeks. A commuter college was picked for conference realignment ahead of us. A commuter college that has had it's own share of scandal, that has laughable academics and inferior athletics, in a less desirable media market, a school that we beat on the field in all important football somehow passed us by. We led in all the metrics, but lost out anyway, particularly striking because we were the early favorite. That leads me to the conclusion that our case was not made effectively enough. I think that our administration got myopic on this and decided that it was done deal, and allowed 'ville to push ahead of us. That's a failure on the AD and President's part.

Make no mistake about it, the prestige of our institution just took a huge, huge hit. It will effect us in recruiting, it will effect us in coaching candidates, and it will effect us our academic reputation. Think the academics part is a reach? Think again. We were passed over by a commuter college. We are affiliated with the dregs of academia (well not all of them because Louisville left). That matters.

This happened on Herbst's watch and in Manual's wading pool. This is a big, big failure. Now I don't want to run Suzie out of town, I think she's done well up to now, but this is a huge strike against her. Manual? He's cost us recruits with the way he's handling Ollie, the football program is a shambles and now this. He's on the clock now in my view. He needs to produce and fast.

If I had to blame anyone, for our current situation, I think it would be Hathaway. That's a post I'll write later. But when you are in a position of responsibility you have got to produce. Herbst and Manual did not. That's a problem and it draws into question their ability to get the job done. That's where I am today.
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There's no doubt in my mind that the lower revenues will indeed hurt how competitive we are. There's just no way around that. What I'm suggesting is that the ACC would have done their due diligence and research of both universities, scandals and all, in making this multi-million dollar decision. Are there aspects of this thing that could have been handled better or differently by the leadership at UConn? Perhaps. To be honest, I'm chomping at the bit for more details to come out, because between us not getting invited and Tulane coming into the conference, I am downright f$%king sick over it!

However, I will also add this; the fact that the ACC would have done their due diligence and still decided on Louisville would suggest primarily to me that we have enemies in that conference. No surprise really (and I hate the majority of those muthaf#$kers anyways), but it seems clear to me that there are certain people or institutions in that room that just flat out don't want us in, period. I'm not sure what we can do to change that stance. We are "big time" college sports here, but we aren't so "big time" that we can overcome that resistance. God......Tulane!!!......who #$k was voting in the room that day, and were we really a part of it...:mad:
 
this is a huge hit. And as CL82 said, we totally blew an opportunity. this was maybe not Rory McIlroy 2011 Masters blown lead but we clearly were the leader in the beginning of this process. better academics, better athletic success (Louisville went to a Women's Final Four was a selling point for them...while we've won what 7 championships? There Men went to the Final Four in 2009? Hello, we did too, then followed it up with a national title in 2011, our 3rd.Their baseball team has gone to the NCAA Tournament? Please let's not even go there.) On every single metric UConn is superior. So somebody screwed up somewhere. And somebody is going to take the hit on it. My guess is Manuel becomes the scapegoat, regardless of how much actually was his fault. He won't be fired, but don't be shocked if he leaves within the next year to 18 months. I just don't see how he can be effective with donors, with the fan base or with anyone really after this. Herbst is in a different position. She is selling a different vision to a different group of donors and supporters not just athletic donors, and she can likely continue and probably will. But Manuel is a dead man walking I believe.
 
noeynox said:
Dan I love how rational and level headed you are at all times on this forum for the most part, but the fact is Louisville did beg harder and won out. Louisville never stopped begging and rooster blocking. We begged last year and took the high road this year. I blame Manuel more than Herbst, because I have no clue the name of Louisvilles president, but I know who Tom Jurich is and how vocal he has been about getting Louisville out of this clusterfluck we are currently in. There are no two ways about this. These guys fumbled the snap.
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I've felt for quite some time that Manual seems to be "in over his head" with this position, including the ridiculous manner in which he is handling the Ollie situation, which is IMO beginning to show negative effects on the recruiting trail. I hope I'm wrong about him. But I'm more concerned with your assessment that I am both rational and level-headed...:confused:
 
They blew it. Overconfident, never knew they were getting outhustled until too late.
 
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