Interesting Stat

[UConnDan97]

I think I just figured out the hardest part of this entire thread; the OP may have been trying to reference Sebastian Maniscalco...

 

[navery12]

Vance especially gives you one additional shooter.
That also gives JA one more option.
He would be the best pure shooter on this team which makes all your shooters better.
Enoch probably would have given us a legit big but who knows how much he learned in the off season shooting 3’s in Eastern Europe somewhere doesn’t help us much.
Durham is a wildcard what does he really have left of that once great talent.
We never saw enough of him to find out .
Playing as few minutes as he did on a team with such a short bench tells you he was not ready to play last year. But he might be a stud this year who knows.
This is Basketball one player at the right position is a game changer.

I had the same mindset the past few years. On paper I always convince myself we'll have a good team. But at a certain point it points to a bigger issue when year after year players don't live up to expectations. And when players repeatedly go other places and succeed (and they have, whether it's another school or the NBA/D-League) that points to a larger issue that needs to be addressed

 

[KembaStepback]

I had the same mindset the past few years. On paper I always convince myself we'll have a good team. But at a certain point it points to a bigger issue when year after year players don't live up to expectations. And when players repeatedly go other places and succeed (and they have, whether it's another school or the NBA/D-League) that points to a larger issue that needs to be addressed

Year after year has been 2 seasons. They've had some ridiculous bad luck during these 2 seasons. If it were 5 seasons Id be right there with you. Last yr the lost Larrier and Gilbert. No team in the country could survive losing 2 of it's top 3 players. This yr, we lost Gilbert again and Larrier for stretches. We reasonably cant expect a team to be good losing this amount of talent. What we have seen this year, though, is the development over the season of Carlton and Whaley. That's 2 big men for the record. If they continue to develop can we put the "cant develop big men" stuff to bed? I know I've said it 1000x and people keep thinking I'm insane but Id like to give Ollie another couple years to play this out. If after those 2 years there is no progress, then we can fire him.

 

[navery12]

Year after year has been 2 seasons. They've had some ridiculous bad luck during these 2 seasons. If it were 5 seasons Id be right there with you. Last yr the lost Larrier and Gilbert. No team in the country could survive losing 2 of it's top 3 players. This yr, we lost Gilbert again and Larrier for stretches. We reasonably cant expect a team to be good losing this amount of talent. What we have seen this year, though, is the development over the season of Carlton and Whaley. That's 2 big men for the record. If they continue to develop can we put the "cant develop big men" stuff to bed? I know I've said it 1000x and people keep thinking I'm insane but Id like to give Ollie another couple years to play this out. If after those 2 years there is no progress, then we can fire him.

There's really 2 points I disagree with here, and I've recently flipped on both.

"We reasonably cant expect a team to be good losing this amount of talent."
This is part of the issue, we had tons of playing time available and yet we weren't able to keep those 3. And either KO was too blind to see what was happening and try to recruit players to replace them, or he didn't think we needed to. Either way, I think that's an indictment on his judgement. Part of coaching is retaining players once they're here and recently that's been an issue.

As for giving him more time, I don't think we can afford to. I truly believe KO can be a good college coach, but I don't think it can happen at UConn. We don't have the luxury of waiting for him to work through these struggles. The brand has already taken a massive hit, to the point I have serious doubts about how quickly we can recover. Waiting another 2-3 years on KO could be a death sentence for this program

 

[Bryan Lord]

Louisville playing miami tonight. Enoch 0 points 0 boards. #Sad

 

[Ewekon]

Louisville playing miami tonight. Enoch 0 points 0 boards. #Sad

Lol

 

[KembaStepback]

There's really 2 points I disagree with here, and I've recently flipped on both.

"We reasonably cant expect a team to be good losing this amount of talent."
This is part of the issue, we had tons of playing time available and yet we weren't able to keep those 3. And either KO was too blind to see what was happening and try to recruit players to replace them, or he didn't think we needed to. Either way, I think that's an indictment on his judgement. Part of coaching is retaining players once they're here and recently that's been an issue.

As for giving him more time, I don't think we can afford to. I truly believe KO can be a good college coach, but I don't think it can happen at UConn. We don't have the luxury of waiting for him to work through these struggles. The brand has already taken a massive hit, to the point I have serious doubts about how quickly we can recover. Waiting another 2-3 years on KO could be a death sentence for this program

We are talking about a coach who has won a NC here. Yes, hes had some errors in recruiting/retention. He missed on some of the bigger targets and didn't focus on shooting. It was a big mistake, no question. I think he realizes this and will right the ship. Like ive said in other threads, I don't think VJ leaving was foreseeable. Enoch was useless and Durham showed no loyalty. That's also only happened once. Hamilton went pro because he thought he could. I don't think that's an indictment on Ollie.

I know people hold last yr against Ollie, but I really don't. Losing Larrier and Gilbert is brutal. I don't think people weigh it enough.

Also - Im not going to speculate who would or wouldn't be available to be HC if KO were to be fired....but I think we'd be better off keeping Ollie than hiring someone and having there be a mass exodus and starting from scratch. It would set the roster back BADLY.