How do you feel right now?

[Hunt for 7]

I would also like to offer my apologies. I remembered the Boneyard from many years ago. Rejoined on December 27. Since then we have been pretty bad. And judging from the reaction or lack there of related to my posts, I have not offered much in the way of interesting content.

 

[JoeyBuckets]

Losing in the 2nd round is not an accomplishment, it's an embarrassment. This is not URI. This is UConn. It's Sweet 16 or bust for this program as it has been for roughly the past 40 years. Anything past the Sweet 16 is a bonus. Anything less is a failure.

Not winning Big East Championship’s is another failure.

 

[Chasm64]

I feel like if we had one of these brilliant boneyard coaches we’d never lose another game.

 

[Hunt for 7]

I like the spirit of your post. I was disappointed of course. But as I was trying to fall asleep (Scotch did not help) my thoughts were sort of similar to yours. I have been following UCONN since the days of Wes Balaszuiknia and Toby Kimbal. OK this is bad right now yet how can I , you, or other real fans give up. It is the time that we say “ our team good or bad but it’s our team“. So yes let’s keep the faith and hope.

I like the spirit of your post. I was disappointed of course. But as I was trying to fall asleep (Scotch did not help) my thoughts were sort of similar to yours. I have been following UCONN since the days of Wes Balaszuiknia and Toby Kimbal. OK this is bad right now yet how can I , you, or other real fans give up. It is the time that we say “ our team good or bad but it’s our team“. So yes let’s keep the faith and hope.

Bialosuknia

 

[TheChamps990411]

He gets one more year to bring in his top 5 class. If he can’t figure it out by next season I’m with you

If this team falls on its face again next year DH will be on the hot seat.

 

[Skiblets]

I feel like I’m watching a remake of the underperforming team that lost to George !### Mason!!!

 

[F101Voodoo]

I feel like I’m watching a remake of the underperforming team that lost to George !### Mason!!!

I remember that game.

 

[Scoe]

I’m just gonna try not to mad anymore I will probably plan on taking a nap during the game kind of approach it as if I’m watching a movie.

 

[Conndog]

It's funny last night my wife was watching for a few minutes in between doing other stuff and said "well finally it looks like they should win" as they had an 8 pt lead. I laughed and said not for sure but here's hoping. Then the game went on as it did. I was quiet (rare), my brother who we call back and forth for every play and call at least 20 times a game called less and not at all after the 4 minute time out. And my wife came in about 10 minutes after the game and asked the final and I let her know they lost at the buzzer. She was stunned that she didn't hear me or how calm I was, playing with my pup. A loss usually puts me in a fowl mood for a while, not with everyone just pissed. I was calm last night and that's not good. I have come to expect this team to gag down the stretch, throw the ball away like Jackson and Newton did, miss the worst bunny in history of UCon basketball like Sanogo did and not box out like no one did. It's here, it's not going away this team has become what it is and I don't see the turn around in sight. They don't have the leaders with the balls, the brains or the brawn.

I feel like I'm watching the NY Giants of the the last few years prior to this fun year finally. You know what the result is so you can't even enjoy when they play good for a half because reality will set in, and it always does. The other teams make plays, get to loose balls down the stretch and we don't.

NIT, I hope they say no because being invited will be embarrassing to the program, but that's exactly how I feel right now. The excitement of going to work on a day of a game that evening is now, well nothing. Could take it or leave it not excited to watch this debacle. It may change but I've never felt like this even through the rough years prior. When you should be much better than you are and this happens, it's just unacceptable. But that's just me!

Our asses pucker up in close games. I don't want to criticize college athletes, but we look mentally weak.

In all seriousness do we have a mental skills coach or sports psychologist on staff?

We're fine when things are going well but when it starts to go the other way it's like quicksand and confidence is at an all-time low.

Halfcourt O in 2nd half was absurdly bad

We just don’t have a true leader out there! Imagine if Shabazz was on the team, or Kenna, or Khalid or Rip? You think we’d lose these games if they were on the squad? That’s what is missing, an alpha player that won’t anything but winning. We have lots of helping pieces but not that one guy.

 

[Hoophound]

"How do feel right now?"

I feel calm and contemplative, sitting on the front porch, listening to two neighbors' windchimes, and a few varieties of traffic & ambient medium-sized city sounds on a sunny 57-degree mid-January Louisville late morning.

I'm settling into the quiet of my daughter & granddaughter having departed within the past hour on the first leg of a 650-mile road trip to join up with daddy and then be in Virginia & Florida for the next 6 weeks. Things will be less chaotic & turbulent, but I will miss them deeply.

When they return, the baby will have mastered standing and very likely will be walking.

Last night, I felt frustrated, angry, sad, pessimistic, disgusted, powerless, cranky, anxious, nauseous, and relatively despairing. I have a special friend whose nearly ritual response in any such situations would apply, "Why wouldn't you?"

So many of my same emotions are on display by others posting to this thread. Again, why wouldn't they be?

I also see high levels of disagreement and dissension within this community.

I don't see any clear path to lowering the tension here and coming together except for the team to return to playing well together. I don't see much of a sense that the team will play well and win, absent better coaching. And I don't see much confidence in the team's coaching. As such, this community appears held hostage by its common bad feelings. That, in turn, leaves me feeling sad, frustrated, powerless, and unhappy as a UConn Men's Basketball fan...right now.

It is a beautiful, mild day, and earlier I read a shocking report from a rural California friend who survived and is recovering from a horrific potentially fatal attack on her by a previously loving pet donkey.

From within the baby's playpen, I video-called my sister whose birthday was Monday, and also a dear friend who is like a stepmother to my daughter. We all loved seeing & 'being with' each other.

While baby is away, I'll toddler-proof the house; travel to the Jersey shore for 10 days to care for a wonderful dog and host visiting friends from CT & NJ; have more freedom to additionally explore Kentuckiana toward deciding if I will fully relocate here; and hope to enjoy a healthy & increasingly rebalanced life after being so focused on care-giving for the past year.

If the Giants can beat the Eagles, then one sister's Eagles fans family will join me in rooting next for the Giants. Otherwise, I'll join them in rooting for the Eagles. If either of those teams goes to the Super Bowl, my other sister's family has become Bills fans. I stick with the Giants because I barely care about football anymore, but I first watched with my dad the year before my first UConn basketball game.

I've barely seen any NFL this year, but the three teams we siblings cheer for remain. That's pretty good.

The UConn Women's BB team has remained a fascinating study in dealing with the uncertainties, disappointments, and frustrations that go with an insane number of illnesses & injuries...for its 3rd year in a row. I'm all in.

I anticipate that I'll continue to watch the Men's BB games, and, like others have reported, I have watched more NCAA MBB overall this year than any since 2014.

I'm going to go inside now and cook one of my favorite dishes. I'm sorry that it felt like too much to do while my daughter was crazed & crazy-making from packing and such. The meal had been intended for her. We went out to eat instead. I'm happy that I made the disj two weeks ago for her.

We do what we can. And we start where we are.

Today, I wish us all a good measure of wisdom, serenity, and courage.

PS - I don't know why this posted in italics, and I can't turn them off.

This is a cool post. My father and grandfather used to write each other weekly letters that read a lot like this. I didn’t really understand why they didn’t just call each other more, but there was something artistic to their writing, which I think they both enjoyed. One hallmark of the letters my grandfather would send from Vermont was that each would have the date, time and temperature in the upper right hand corner. He had been a farmer earlier in life and the weather was of utmost importance to him. In his retirement, he seemed to enjoy complaining about the copious amounts of snow that would fall at his house, as he’d have to shovel it. He would always mention what he’d heard from my aunt and uncle that week, who they ran into while in town, what wild animals they’d seen etc. He also liked to describe sunrises and sunsets over the mountains. You would probably enjoy reading them. I’m hopeful that my dad has them all somewhere.

 

[Greathusky]

As bad as I feel, and as bad as many of you at the boneyard feel, think about what these kids are feeling right now, too. I am not suggesting to feel sorry for them, but these kids are not robots. As much as I want to throw the towel in, I'm gonna give them my full support the rest of the year and pray for a miracle.

 

[XLCenterFan]

I remember that game.

Even worse. I was at that game. Drove 8 hrs through the nigh, hit a bar and bought tickets on the street. After the game we slept in the car right outside the arena, woke up, and drove right home. Young and broke…always bleeding blue.

 

[XLCenterFan]

As bad as I feel, and as bad as many of you at the boneyard feel, think about what these kids are feeling right now, too. I am not suggesting to feel sorry for them, but these kids are not robots. As much as I want to throw the towel in, I'm gonna give them my full support the rest of the year and pray for a miracle.

Thanks for the perspective. I was losing my mind lately. The players are really in this.

 

[1999GoodSon]

As bad as I feel, and as bad as many of you at the boneyard feel, think about what these kids are feeling right now, too. I am not suggesting to feel sorry for them, but these kids are not robots. As much as I want to throw the towel in, I'm gonna give them my full support the rest of the year and pray for a miracle.

This is why in spite of the spiral I detest the attacks on individual players. These are young men, in most cases playing their hearts out hoping to make a better life for themselves. We should want for them what we want for our own sons.

I hope they don't read this forum.

 

[Travelman6]

I feel like if this continues and spirals into a collapse, Hurley should firmly be on the hot seat next year (NOT fired, on the hot seat). Could you imagine climbing to #2 only to plummet out of the top 25 weeks later? Because that is possible now.

This can still be turned around, and nearly everything in this thread, including all of my post until THIS point could be moot.

There is still a chance to make something of this season, but it starts NOW. Not in two games, but the very NEXT game.

I hope that in the long run, this was just a mid-season slump...

 

[RF79]

As bad as I feel, and as bad as many of you at the boneyard feel, think about what these kids are feeling right now, too. I am not suggesting to feel sorry for them, but these kids are not robots. As much as I want to throw the towel in, I'm gonna give them my full support the rest of the year and pray for a miracle.

Thank you for helping me put things into perspective. I was only thinking about myself and my friends. As crappy as I feel I will fully support this squad for the rest of the season. I’ll forever bleed blue!!! Go Huskies!!!

 

[F101Voodoo]

I have thought about the SH game and as I said before I am disappointed as we all are but I realized that we cannot let ourselves lose hope. I watched the recording of the game up to the point we lost the 17 point lead. I was looking for a light in this darkness. Then I had to admit that we did something something right in the game to get to a 17 point. Obviously we lost the lead and it is the job of the coaches to figure out why we lost and for the future how do we get and keep a lead like that from this Saturday and beyond.

 

[XLCenterFan]

This is why in spite of the spiral I detest the attacks on individual players. These are young men, in most cases playing their hearts out hoping to make a better life for themselves. We should want for them what we want for our own sons.

I hope they don't read this forum.

I agree with your sentiments. In all fairness though, I feel that DH has taken the brunt of our scorn here on the BY. I may have missed a post here or there, but for the most part, no one is flat out trashing and berating the players. People are merely bringing up things each player could do better or was doing better earlier in the season. No one is saying "player X is a garbage player and should transfer." I was appalled that the team was getting booed last weekend. I did not participate. I was one of the fans cheering on Diarra to get up and keep his head up after that missed dunk. He plays so hard. You are right though, we could all be a little more supportive. We are all in this together, but the players are REALLY in this. Let's get back to fun.

 

[jibsey]

Here is something we all have lost perspective on here, these kids want to win and win badly. The teams that beat us may not have highly ranked players but so what? Lot of evenly matched talent and toughness in the BE. We were all pretty far out over our skis with that early success fed by media talking heads who jumped on the bandwagon. The season can be saved because we DO have good talent and if they execute what the coaches want then things will be fine. (I’m not Scrappy BTW).

 

[HuskyinWRNY]

Not too confident right now

 

[Billy Jack]

Patience.

 

[BIIIG]

There was a thread literally two weeks ago in here about "is the big east competition going to be good enough for UConn this year" and now everyone saying "why are they favorites every game" and "Hurley is on the hot seat" .... this is the cockiest group of people when things go well and the most negative group of people when things aren't going well. Since Hurley got here the teams overall win percentage his increased every season. Calhoun was a top 5 college coach...ever, and now anything short of what Calhoun did isn't 'good enough' for people, makes me think people don't understand how special that era was. There's still plenty of time to right the ship, and unlike in the American, playing in the Big East you can afford to go .500 in conference play. I'd rather they didn't, but if it takes a rough January stretch to figure it out for March, so be it. Show a little support for these kids instead of berating them anytime something doesn't go as you hoped. When things are going well, everyone wants to say how great they are, but the second there's adversity people are dumping all over these kids. You with them or not?

 

[Kolumbo]

Let's win one for the yipper!!!

 

[Icehawk]

I feel lied to. The first 14 games told me we were a dynamic powerhouse with a more flexible in game coach. I drank the Kool-aid and was ready to bust through some walls. Now I'm wondering if there is a reason there are a pair of new Nikes waiting for me with a fresh glass.

 

[BlueandOG]

Optimistic. We have 1) a coach who connects with players, 2) lots of talent on the team, 3) success playing and winning big games, and 4) a lot of season left. I am confident they will make the NCAA and win at least two games.