FfldCntyFan
Texas: Property of UConn Men's Basketball program
- Joined
- Aug 25, 2011
- Messages
- 12,299
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I am at a loss as to how our fan base has become as jaded and entitled as we have become. I’ve said many times that if enduring this season was part of the cost of last season’s championship run I’ll gladly pay it. We have Boneyarders b!tching about the NIT yet after both North Carolina and Kentucky won their most recent titles each followed it up with a trip to the NIT. As far as I am concerned the current team doesn’t owe any of us anything. All but three members of this season’s roster contributed in some way to a national title. Two of those three made it clear that they will be major contributors to the program and the third did give us some valuable minutes in the conference tournament. If that isn’t good enough for some people here I don’t know what to say.
I’ve seen a number of posts alluding to how we aren’t recruiting players at the level we once did. I remember when we were (supposedly) recruiting at our best and in my humble opinion I’ll take the two season run of 2013-2014 & 2014-2015 over 2004-2005 & 2005-2006 every day of the week and twice on Sundays.
To those who believe that this conference (which I will readily agree sucks) is going to prevent our program from remaining elite I say bulls#!t. UNLV was able to spend a decade and a half as a top program in a conference worse than this one. Gonzaga has more recently done nearly the same (save the final four appearances and national title) while Memphis (in what wasn’t much different that the conference we now find ourselves in) had a very nice little run (before their best season was wiped out of the record books). If any of those schools could do it I don’t see why we can’t do better. I dare anyone to claim we cannot do better. It is in our blood to thrive the second anyone claims we cannot do it. More critical to this, it is in the DNA of our head coach to success when nobody believes it possible. While he was playing in the CBA for the Connecticut Pride in 1996, if someone said “he will end up coaching hoops” the response of 99.999% of everyone who had hear of Kevin Ollie would have responded “yeah because that’s the only way he can make a living in this sport” yet he somehow ended up playing in the league for thirteen years. Anyone who believes he won’t find a way to succeed, despite whatever obstacles may be in his way hasn’t been paying attention.
What I draw the most inspiration from in terms of our future is that from that day nearly 29 years ago when we hired the great Jim Calhoun to run our program, every time things looked bleak we came back better and stronger than anyone could have hoped. I still remember in 1989 hearing complaints that “if we couldn’t make the tournament with Cliff Robinson, what can we expect now that he is gone”. We followed that up with three straight trips to the tournament, something we hadn’t done since the Kennedy administration. When we whimpered down the stretch of the 1992-1993 season all I can remember hearing was “I guess Calhoun really didn’t have it. He did have a nice little run but it is over.”. That was followed by a three year run where we lost all of five Big East conference regular season games, were seeded two twice and one once in the tournament and won more NCAA tournament games than we had in any previous three year run. Once that ended (in a very disappointing performance against Mississippi St) many felt we blew the best chances we would ever have at a final four and that Mr Calhoun couldn’t win the big one. The three year run after that ended with win over Duke in St Petersburg. A little more than a decade later, we were told (and too many of us believed it) that we were done. We had fallen into such a deep abyss that we would never be much again and (per a few kids who were PC fans) we would spend the next few decades looking at the Friars ahead of us in the standings as well as New England hoops. Somehow after a ‘disappointing’ recruiting class where we got the wrong point guard (Napier instead of Knight), the wrong Lamb (Jeremy instead of Doron), no Selby and no Joseph, we ended up with the best four year run we’ve ever had (which is saying quite a bit we had a couple of four year runs that included a national title and a separate elite eight appearance).
If people want to gripe they are allowed but please gain some perspective. There should be more great seasons ahead, many more, but that is not why I will continue to follow the program, that will merely be a bonus I receive for following the program. I follow the program because it has been in my blood since my freshman year (which was coincidentally Corny Thompson’s freshman year). I’m in for life.
I’ve seen a number of posts alluding to how we aren’t recruiting players at the level we once did. I remember when we were (supposedly) recruiting at our best and in my humble opinion I’ll take the two season run of 2013-2014 & 2014-2015 over 2004-2005 & 2005-2006 every day of the week and twice on Sundays.
To those who believe that this conference (which I will readily agree sucks) is going to prevent our program from remaining elite I say bulls#!t. UNLV was able to spend a decade and a half as a top program in a conference worse than this one. Gonzaga has more recently done nearly the same (save the final four appearances and national title) while Memphis (in what wasn’t much different that the conference we now find ourselves in) had a very nice little run (before their best season was wiped out of the record books). If any of those schools could do it I don’t see why we can’t do better. I dare anyone to claim we cannot do better. It is in our blood to thrive the second anyone claims we cannot do it. More critical to this, it is in the DNA of our head coach to success when nobody believes it possible. While he was playing in the CBA for the Connecticut Pride in 1996, if someone said “he will end up coaching hoops” the response of 99.999% of everyone who had hear of Kevin Ollie would have responded “yeah because that’s the only way he can make a living in this sport” yet he somehow ended up playing in the league for thirteen years. Anyone who believes he won’t find a way to succeed, despite whatever obstacles may be in his way hasn’t been paying attention.
What I draw the most inspiration from in terms of our future is that from that day nearly 29 years ago when we hired the great Jim Calhoun to run our program, every time things looked bleak we came back better and stronger than anyone could have hoped. I still remember in 1989 hearing complaints that “if we couldn’t make the tournament with Cliff Robinson, what can we expect now that he is gone”. We followed that up with three straight trips to the tournament, something we hadn’t done since the Kennedy administration. When we whimpered down the stretch of the 1992-1993 season all I can remember hearing was “I guess Calhoun really didn’t have it. He did have a nice little run but it is over.”. That was followed by a three year run where we lost all of five Big East conference regular season games, were seeded two twice and one once in the tournament and won more NCAA tournament games than we had in any previous three year run. Once that ended (in a very disappointing performance against Mississippi St) many felt we blew the best chances we would ever have at a final four and that Mr Calhoun couldn’t win the big one. The three year run after that ended with win over Duke in St Petersburg. A little more than a decade later, we were told (and too many of us believed it) that we were done. We had fallen into such a deep abyss that we would never be much again and (per a few kids who were PC fans) we would spend the next few decades looking at the Friars ahead of us in the standings as well as New England hoops. Somehow after a ‘disappointing’ recruiting class where we got the wrong point guard (Napier instead of Knight), the wrong Lamb (Jeremy instead of Doron), no Selby and no Joseph, we ended up with the best four year run we’ve ever had (which is saying quite a bit we had a couple of four year runs that included a national title and a separate elite eight appearance).
If people want to gripe they are allowed but please gain some perspective. There should be more great seasons ahead, many more, but that is not why I will continue to follow the program, that will merely be a bonus I receive for following the program. I follow the program because it has been in my blood since my freshman year (which was coincidentally Corny Thompson’s freshman year). I’m in for life.
