Your suggestion makes a lot more sense. Let JC run the program through this difficult time until his contract is up and I'm sure this is what he wants to do. In two years the same posters will be longing for the Calhoun years.No.
Calhoun rides out the remaining 2 years of his contract, where UConn puts the APR/NCAA junk of the past few years behind them, opens up a brand new state-of-the-art practice facility, and guides a team that most thought was dead in the water to one last successful season while setting it up for the future.
Why are we acting like this program has been in decline under Calhoun's watch for the last 5+ years? We are one year removed from a national championship. We are also one year away from putting all this drama behind us.
A family is in a major crisis and some fans want to replace the experienced and good father with some other unknown man to head the 'reeling' household. The only coach in the world that is capable of keeping this program on the highest level and manage the turmoil that we are in, is Jim Calhoun, no one else.
Bringing anyone else into this mess is asking for failure and regression. We don't need Championships right now we need stability and a game plan for the future. We are on shaky ground and do not need to start an earthquake in Storrs.
I think the analogy is poor. Many of us rightly fear us becoming Louisville at the end of the Denny Crum era, this has much more to do with the postseason ban than uncertainty about Calhoun's future. Was he any more certain to return last year, when we scored what we considered at the time to be three very good recruits (Boatright, Daniels, and Drummond at the end)?
The potential postseason ban and lack of a practice facility will also hinder the search for a replacement.
ok, but how? still havent heard an answer on how coach calhoun in the next 2 years will keep the program on the highest level... seems to the outside world that the earthquake began with the scoe defection.
1) Convince Napier and Boatright to stick around for their senior and junior seasons, respectively. If this happens, we'll have one of the best backcourts in the country in 2013-2014.
2) Recruit bigs for the class of 2013 and beyond. Calhoun's pending retirement will make this difficult, but how long have we been saying this now? We were able to get Napier, Lamb, Smith, etc despite everyone saying that Calhoun was going to retire at any moment. We were able to get Boatright, Daniels, Drummond despite the fact that Calhoun hadn't even announced that he would be back yet. Same for Omar.
Bottom line is, unless you can say with certainty that the 2013 recruiting class will not be good, how can you be so sure that we won't be fine after the NCAA ban is behind us?
i want to hear how everyone thinks coach is going to navigate us through this and have the program be in a better state a year from now.
i still dont understand or heard 1 quality response on how people think uconn and coach calhoun will land any impact recruits knowing that they are banned from the tourney next year and he is finished coaching after the following year.....so in two years, without napier and presumably boatright, no coach, a diluted big east and as it appears now, no tourney appearances,and a marginal roster, do these same people think at that point we will be able to land a top notch coach? i totally get the emotional attachment to coach calhoun but i dont get the fact that no one has been able to give concrete, realistic solutions to the real problems of where the program is today and how we expect to move forward....... i dont want to hear about the past, i want to hear how everyone thinks coach is going to navigate us through this and have the program be in a better state a year from now. as it stands, todays reality is that we are losing second tier recruits to cincy, st johns and perhaps, oregon. losing recruits to cincy, st. johns or oregon???? when in calhoun's recent past has that happened?
The time has come. I hate to say it, but I think it is time for Coach Calhoun to hang them up. this situation is begining to feel very much like lots of others when the legendary head coach hangs around too long. Arizona in Lute's final couple of seasons. Florida State football during Bowdens last few years. the list just goes on and on. And while I agree that he has earned the right to decide when he will leave, it would be in the best interest of the program for him to do it sooner rather than later. Next year will be a disaster. And it will be tough to recover from that and tough to recruit as players start questioning how long he'll remain. Not to mention the recent Emmerett comments praising schools forfiring coaches who had off field/court issues. While I don't think the NCAA necessarily has a vindetta aginst UCONN, they are less likely to give us a break if we screw something up than with a whole new coaching staff. The chance to bring in a great young coach (I love Smart) or even an established name is there. it will be otugher to do if we're stuck at 15-17 or an NIT contender or worse for a few years. And the "new" Big East isn't going to make it any easier. the chance for Calhoun to preserve what he has built, in an odd sort of way, is best if he retires now.
Whiel I'd love to think that people who disagree with my view will provide arguments for their position, I know that won't happen. So fire away.
Don't confuse him with logic. He has an agenda.
Quite frankly, our luck is about to change.
How is the current situation any different than last year when he landed Daniels, Drummond, etc?
my bad.....this year is exactly like last.
Let me remind you: there were questions about Calhoun leaving over the summer. The recruits who came spoke of their connections to the staff, wanting to play under Ollie and the other coaches, the privilege of playing at UConn. Heck, Daniels was convinced even though he ad offers from Kansas or Texas.
or drummond was going to prep school until kriss dunn decided not to. boatright was going to wvu until huggy bear signed jabari hinds as well. daniels shocked the world by committing without ever coming for a visit. i believe his dad was quoted as saying they saw what jeremy lamb did and he believed daniels could do more. was it a stellar recruiting class? sure. but it was far from conventional. one that sort of fell into uconn's lap. do you really think that will happen again?
and this year is very different. 1. an aging coach who missed 10 games for health related issues. 2. a 2013 tourney and big east tourney ban. 3. 3 transfers 4. no frontcourt 5. a program getting slammed nationally.
Yes, a lot of things fell into place to allow the 2011 class to be as good as it was. But what about the 2010 class? There were even more questions about Calhoun - he didn't even have a signed contract extension, we were still waiting to hear about the NCAA sanctions and recruits didn't even know if a postseason ban was coming, and we were coming off a terrible season. We struck out on Knight, Doron Lamb, Selby, and Joseph and everyone said Uconn couldn't recruit anymore. We had to settle for Napier, Lamb, Roscoe, etc and all those guys did was win a championship.
Point being, it's easy to talk about why Uconn can't recruit with the current coaching situation - people have only been saying it for the last three years (at least). It hasn't actually been that much of a problem - with the exception of what the post season ban is doing to the 2012 class. But that post season ban doesn't last forever.
or drummond was going to prep school until kriss dunn decided not to. boatright was going to wvu until huggy bear signed jabari hinds as well. daniels shocked the world by committing without ever coming for a visit. i believe his dad was quoted as saying they saw what jeremy lamb did and he believed daniels could do more. was it a stellar recruiting class? sure. but it was far from conventional. one that sort of fell into uconn's lap. do you really think that will happen again?
and this year is very different. 1. an aging coach who missed 10 games for health related issues. 2. a 2013 tourney and big east tourney ban. 3. 3 transfers 4. no frontcourt 5. a program getting slammed nationally.
?? And Emeka was a spring signee and so many of our star players were similar. Heck, Kemba was very much like Boatright, an afterthought. You can't dign Calhoun for any of this.
This isnt an attack on Calhoun or whether he can recruit or not. Its a realistic assessment of where we are. The ban is less important than the fact that Coach has 2 years left and no real indication on who will follow him. Its called negative recruiting and I personally believe it has already had an impact on who really is considering UConn and the talent that coincides. Do you for one minute think that other coaches are telling kids, aau coaches, mentors etc....that uconn is a mess, that calhoun is done after this year or next, that starters from the championship team couldnt wait to get out of there. true or not, that has impact and it has and will continue to hurt UConn until clarity on the program's future is provided.
We know for a fact that other schools are negatively recruiting against Uconn and the uncertainty of Calhoun's future. My point is that schools didn't just start doing this yesterday. They did it last year and we still got Boatright, Drummond, and Daniels. They did the year before that and we still got Napier, Lamb, Roscoe, etc.
Emeka was 10 years ago. I think we all can agree that if Calhoun was 60 and not 70 all of this would be much less dire.
furthermore, from dave borges.....
"If you’re asking me as someone who would advise a kid, I’d have a hard time telling him he’s gonna play for Jim Calhoun for four years. And I don’t think, unless they have a much better year next year, that he’s going to have a guarantee he’s going to be able to name a successor. Those are pretty big sticking points."
The coach added that a coach-in-waiting would help UConn because "any time you can show continuity, where the program is gonna be, that allows a kid to make a four-year decision, regardless of whether he wants to be in college for four years."
You missed my point entirely. You showed that many of UConn's recruits this year were afterthoughts or signed on after the fact.
How is that any different than players like Kemba Walker or Emeka Okafor or a whole range of others?
In other words, what's changed?
You want me to bring up Nate Blue's quotes about UConn being done?