Kenya Hunter Potential Replacement

[navery12]

Gotcha. You are old man yelling at clouds.

You trust the coach who runs the program, you trust his ability to evaluate talent and you trust him to figure out how to build his staff. You're just mad at what the result of all that may end up being.

No I'm not mad about whoever he chooses, I simply have a preference. Why don't you go yell at the other 50 posters who have said the same thing as me?

 

[Waquoit]

This will be a good hire and it will pay off down the road. Just like how other decisions Hurley made were met with some early headscratching yet proved beneficial later.

 

[Watchdog]

Very 20th century heteronormative thinking there.

Maybe his uncle's name is Richard?

 

[7774]

Where did you get your "facts"?
Why post something denigrating Kevin's qualifications for the position without doing some research?
247 shows the following during Kenya's five years at Nebraska and we don't know how many recruits were his responsibility. Only #76, in 2015, showed specific involvement with Kenya.

Summary:
17 recruits in those 5 years;
4 recruits in the top 150 (not 9); and
only one recruit from the DelMarVa region which some here are saying is Kenya's strength and the reason we don't want Kevin. Plus, how do we know who actually recruited the 4 top 150 guys? Kevin's #178 guy, in only his second year of recruiting, would be the 7th highest rated recruit among the list below.

2014: 3 recruits (#'s 196, 278 and unranked), from OK, NJ, and KS.
2015: 5 recruits (#'s 76, 111, 263, 335 and unranked), from Australia, IA, MI and IL (2).
2016: 3 recruits (#'s 133, 161, and 176), from IL, MA and MO.
2017: 3 recruits (#'s 103, 187 and unranked), from NH, IL and Iceland.
2018: 3 recruits (#'s 341, 357 and 364), from NE, MD and FL.

If you want to give Kenya credit for 2019, that class had four high school kids (#'s 168, 192, 326 and 473) and two JuCo's (#'s 17 and 27 from NE and UT JC's).

Yeah I was just quoting the article I linked in my post, so I’m pretty sure it is factual, and if not I guess you need to take it up with the Daily Nebraskan.

 

[Chin Diesel]

No I'm not mad about whoever he chooses, I simply have a preference. Why don't you go yell at the other 50 posters who have said the same thing as me?

#MikeArescoCertifiedNotMad

 

[Watchdog]

As others have said, I wanted someone with connections in the DMV area to help what our recruiting is losing with Kenya. The job postings are written after a candidate is already chosen so of course he would meet all those qualifications

We heard a great deal about his strength in DelMarVa but Hawkins was the first guy we've picked up from there. Check the results for his five years at Nebraska. Only one recruit from DelMarVa in the six years (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019) in which he may have had at least some involvement in recruiting. That is not what we expected after hearing of Kenya's connections and may not be what Hurley expected either.

 

[brasssbonanzaa]

This is a wildly wrong read on Chambers. He's a very good coach in a tough job, and statistically he's produced three of the four best PSU teams ever over the last three seasons. If Wright leaves Nova for the NBA, Chambers is a guy they'll take a long look at.

Knew him and watched him here at BU when he was head coach. Great personality, engaging, players loved him. Results aren't there at PSU. Nine seasons - no conference regular season or tournament championships, no NCAA appearances, one NIT appearance - that he won, finished over .500 in B1G play once, finished above 10th in the B1G twice, has an overall sub-.500 record at PSU.

Where are these three best teams ever? The NIT Championship year was nice, but he followed it up going 14-18. Then went 21-10 this year and would've got his first NCAA appearance as a 6-8 seed. This is what you're hanging your hat on as three of the best teams ever at PSU? They've made the Sweet 16 four times.

I agree it's not a great CBB job by any means and he's fighting an uphill battle. But he has a B1G recruiting budget, a decent facility, a well-known brand name, and has done absolutely nothing to improve the trajectory of the program.

There's nothing wildly wrong about calling his tenure very mediocre. If Villanova hired him to replace Wright, that'd be comical - even if he was Wright's top associate 10 years ago.

To bring the point back to where it started, Freeman working under him for two seasons isn't any kind of significant resume builder.

2011–12	Penn State	12–20	4–14	T–11th
2012–13	Penn State	10–21	2–16	12th
2013–14	Penn State	16–18	6–12	T–10th	CBI Quarterfinal
2014–15	Penn State	18–16	4–14	13th
2015–16	Penn State	16–16	7–11	10th
2016–17	Penn State	15–18	6–12	T–12th
2017–18	Penn State	26–13	9–9	T–6th	NIT Champion
2018–19	Penn State	14–18	7-13	T-10th
2019–20	Penn State	21–10	11–9	T–5th
Penn State:	148–150 (.497)	56–110 (.337)

 

[superjohn]

We heard a great deal about his strength in DelMarVa but Hawkins was the first guy we've picked up from there. Check the results for his five years at Nebraska. Only one recruit from DelMarVa in the six years (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019) in which he may have had at least some involvement in recruiting. That is not what we expected after hearing of Kenya's connections and may not be what Hurley expected either.

What???

 

[7774]

This will be a good hire and it will pay off down the road. Just like how other decisions Hurley made were met with some early headscratching yet proved beneficial later.

I definitely agree with this, I’ll just be shocked if the hire is Kevin Freeman.

 

[UCDaveD]

If Kevin Freeman didn’t play for UConn would he even be in consideration? If the answer is no, then it’s a ridiculously terrible hire.

 

[7774]

What???

Well beyond almost insinuating that Hurley could be happy Kenya left for underperforming, it appears this person believes the D in DMV stands for Delaware. So, yeah...

 

[UCfor3]

People are acting as if they know it's KFree. Some others were intimating it was most likely gonna be someone else. Do we know who it is? Is there a consensis now to the rumors or is this just hypothetical arguing at this point?

 

[tcf15]

VTech 247 says Webster is out of the running for UConn job.

 

[Watchdog]

Yeah I was just quoting the article I linked in my post, so I’m pretty sure it is factual, and if not I guess you need to take it up with the Daily Nebraskan.

So if it's in The Daily Nebraskan it must be factual?
You left out the part where they said ESPN OR Rivals. That makes a world of difference.

 

[UCfor3]

VTech 247 days Webster is out.

Out for VaTech or out for UConn job?

 

[tcf15]

Out for VaTech or out for UConn job?

Updated - out of running for UConn job.

 

[Watchdog]

What???

I know we've heard great things about his connections in the DelMarVa but, if you look at the facts, Nebraska only signed one recruit from DelMarVa in the years 2013 to 2018 (when Kenya was there) and we've gotten a commitment from one player (for next year) in the two years he's been here. That's not an indictment of him but it is a valid question to raise when we've got people saying all hell is breaking loose because Hurley MAY choose someone like Kevin.
Until Hurley flubs a major decision, he shouldn't be castigated for hiring whoever he believes will do the best job in helping UConn return to national prominence and we shouldn't be looking at the recruits we've brought in in the last three classes and imagine we brought in a bunch of players from DelMarVa.

 

[7774]

So if it's in The Daily Nebraskan it must be factual?
You left out the part where they said ESPN OR Rivals. That makes a world of difference.

I didn’t leave it out, it’s in the article. That I linked. In that post.

Can’t speak to the factual accuracy of the Daily Nebraskan, but there‘s probably a email address or phone number in the link I provided so maybe you can investigate. I’ve heard so many rumors going back years about the Daily Nebraskan trying to prop up Kenya Hunter and make him look good, so they probably did make most of it up.

 

[Chin Diesel]

If Kevin Freeman didn’t play for UConn would he even be in consideration? If the answer is no, then it’s a ridiculously terrible hire.

What if the answer is yes?

Northeast born and bred. Played HS ball in Mass and NJ. Was a starter and four year contributor on a national championship team from the northeast. Stayed in the area after college, worked in a non-coaching role on one staff and was an assistant on another staff of a northeast P5 conference team.

No one is expecting the replacement to be the right hand man to Hurley. Regardless of who gets hired they are the #3 asst coach on the staff.

 

[Huskyforlife]

What if the answer is yes?

Northeast born and bred. Played HS ball in Mass and NJ. Was a starter and four year contributor on a national championship team from the northeast. Stayed in the area after college, worked in a non-coaching role on one staff and was an assistant on another staff of a northeast P5 conference team.

No one is expecting the replacement to be the right hand man to Hurley. Regardless of who gets hired they are the #3 asst coach on the staff.

I don't see why the replacement couldn't be someone as great and experienced as Kenya. What happened?

 

[HuskyHawk]

I don't see why the replacement couldn't be someone as great and experienced as Kenya. What happened?

We have no money.

 

[Waquoit]

People are acting as if they know it's KFree.

You doubt Waquoit?

 

[BGesus4]

What if the answer is yes?

Northeast born and bred. Played HS ball in Mass and NJ. Was a starter and four year contributor on a national championship team from the northeast. Stayed in the area after college, worked in a non-coaching role on one staff and was an assistant on another staff of a northeast P5 conference team.

No one is expecting the replacement to be the right hand man to Hurley. Regardless of who gets hired they are the #3 asst coach on the staff.

Not to mention Hurley has first hand knowledge of the type of coach he is and his approach. Based on that I'd say DH has a good sense of what KFree will bring to the table.

 

[7774]

What if the answer is yes?

Northeast born and bred. Played HS ball in Mass and NJ. Was a starter and four year contributor on a national championship team from the northeast. Stayed in the area after college, worked in a non-coaching role on one staff and was an assistant on another staff of a northeast P5 conference team.

No one is expecting the replacement to be the right hand man to Hurley. Regardless of who gets hired they are the #3 asst coach on the staff.

But the thing is everything in this post except for the 2 years at Penn State was true 2 years ago, and Hurley obviously didn’t think he was one of the top 3 candidates back then when he filled 3 openings.

It just seems odd that those 2 years at Penn State would elevate him from a level where he was not in the top 3 candidates, to the top candidate now, but if tcf is correct and we missed on Webster, we may be past first choice.

 

[UCfor3]

You doubt Waquoit?

No. I have no idea who u are. Hard to keep everyone straight when half the people said KFree and half said Webster.