Kenya Hunter Potential Replacement | Page 10 | The Boneyard

Kenya Hunter Potential Replacement

Kevin Freeman will be fine. He has experience at Penn State and will stay long term at UCONN.

Any smart and good head coach will value loyalty. As long as Hurley is the head coach, we will be fine. A really good head coach or leader elevates other guys.

PS: people on here were excited with Coach Chill and Kill as being killer recruiters. How’d did they do under Ollie? Not good. Can we judge strictly on that?
 
BGesus4 said:
Of people i would put my money on figuring it out coaching big men and recruiting without formal coaching experience, he'd be pretty high up there. No sarcasm
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I just prefer they hire coaches who actually ya know are coaches. At this level no formal coaching experience = not even close to being a candidate for the job. This isn’t plug in your favorite former player for nostalgia it’s hire the guy with the most successful proven track record imo
 
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CallMeBruce said:
Take a look at Duke's staff
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Duke can afford that because their lead recruiter is a shoe company. No one is questioning KFree the person. I would think most on here love the guy. We are concerned about his ability to recruit, primarily in an area where our best connection moved to the middle of nowhere. That matters so much more than his ability to coach up a big.
 
Dooooooomed said:
I trust in Hurley, but a staff of multiple former players will always worry me.
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Weird take.


It appears Freeman really wants to succeed in coaching. I think one probably mark against him with some people is that when he was here he was basically there on the bench, silent, and that's what many of us still see. What exactly did he do?

As a player he was a rock solid guy down low and a champion. I have no doubt he can coach that. I Hurley brings him back then UConn will benefit. Former players are an asset even on the bench. At this level there is no room for decorative hires. If Freeman is hired then he earned it and will help Hurley achieve his goals.
 
formerlurker said:
I'm Switzerland on this topic but I sure hope K Free doesn't read the BY if he ends up being the guy.
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I hope he does read the BY if he’s the guy. Maybe he’ll feel he has a chip on his shoulder.
 
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I don’t know if this was mentioned yet, but wasn’t Freeman supposed to stay on staff when Hurley was first hired? then within a real short amount of time he got the Penn St job IIRC. That would show how Hurley feels about him if he was willing to hire him in the first place.
 
Hurley had some very complimentary things to say about the two months that he worked with Kevin during the transition. I wouldn't be surprised if he is indeed the hire.
 
Chin Diesel said:
KFree didn't appear to distinguish himself as as an up and comer while on KO's staff. Who did?
PSU has been very good past few seasons and it's reasonable to believe KFree has shown his ability to coach while coaching on a top-25 program.
Overall? His resume is light but it's not an outlandish selection.
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You're right. It's hard to distinguish yourself on a staff when your position prohibits you from coaching the players and your whole job is making travel arrangements and the like.
Hurley gave great praise to Kevin when he left for PSU and had no reason to do that other than the respect Kevin earned during his limited time with Hurley.
 
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djct1999 said:
Recruiting. Recruiting. Recruiting. That is all its about. Can you name one player recruited ever by KFree? If he wasn't an alum, the boneyard would be in total meltdown over this hire.
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This is not a swipe at you, personally, but people here need to give Hurley credit for being able to identify talent and choose people who will help him build what we all want. Do you really believe he's panicking and picking some incompetent slug just because he once played here?

Kevin had a long playing career and was Asst. and then Director of Basketball Operations during his time here so he was not in a position that was allowed to recruit. He then did the smart thing and left to take an assistant's position in which he was allowed to recruit the past two years and this year was the lead on Elijah Hutchens-Everett who picked PSU over offers from Villanova, Syracuse and Seton Hall, among others.

Sure, you can say so what, but give Hurley credit for being able to identify talent and give Kevin credit for securing a kid many other prominent schools wanted. It shows he may be that "up and comer" we all wish we could find.
 
Watchdog said:
This is not a swipe at you, personally, but people here need to give Hurley credit for being able to identify talent and choose people who will help him build what we all want. Do you really believe he's panicking and picking some incompetent slug just because he once played here?

Kevin had a long playing career and was Asst. and then Director of Basketball Operations during his time here so he was not in a position that was allowed to recruit. He then did the smart thing and left to take an assistant's position in which he was allowed to recruit the past two years and this year was the lead on Elijah Hutchens-Everett who picked PSU over offers from Villanova, Syracuse and Seton Hall, among others.

Sure, you can say so what, but give Hurley credit for being able to identify talent and give Kevin credit for securing a kid many other prominent schools wanted. It shows he may be that "up and comer" we all wish we could find.
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Elijah Hutchens-Everett is the 180th ranked recruit in the country.
 
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Waquoit said:
But it is showing he can close at a level commensurate to the school he's recruiting for. That sounds like a good recruit for PSU.
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And if he plays at the level of the 90th best player in the country, KFree would have demonstrated he can identify talent at a 50% better rate than the player's ranking.
 
Waquoit said:
But it is showing he can close at a level commensurate to the school he's recruiting for. That sounds like a good recruit for PSU.
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Kenya wasn't sniffing recruits of Hawkins caliber at Nebraska. His recruiting profile before joining uconn wouldn't have made people's cut here to replace him now.
 
krinklecut said:
I'm going to be happy about whomever Hurley and staff hire, because they know way more about the program and what's best than any of us ever will.
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This is the same attitude the Ollie fans had, believing in Hurley is generally good, but blindly supporting everything he does doesn't make sense.
 
BGesus4 said:
Kenya wasn't sniffing recruits of Hawkins caliber at Nebraska. His recruiting profile before joining uconn wouldn't have made people's cut here to replace him now.
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Kenya got 9 top 150 recruits to come play for Nebraska in 3 years. Nebraska, a team that has literally never won a game in the NCAA tournament.

His profile as a recruiter when he came here was massively beyond what KFree’s is right now, and people were pumped to get him.

www.dailynebraskan.com

Basketball assistant coach Kenya Hunter leaving Nebraska for UConn

Nebraska Basketball head coach Tim Miles is losing one of his top assistants.
www.dailynebraskan.com www.dailynebraskan.com
 
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