Message To The Team

[gtcam]

That 86-87 backwater (Phil Gamble and company) would have beaten last year's team by 30 like everyone else did. The past glory and Blueblood status had become an embarrassment, why do you think Calhoun won't talk to KO, everything Calhoun built came crashing down to nothing, and being in a new conference (AAC) didn't help matters either.

Ridiculous statement
You can't compare JC's situation with KOs or DHs
Different circumstances and JCs "doings" that placed this team in a probationary period and other sanctions didn't do the program any favors
JC is the greatest college coach, IMHO, but even he would find things difficult in this conference with recruiting the top players vs. being in the old Big East.

 

[Yardigan]

Oh ok I got it, the only thing Hurely has to say to new recruits is "Jim Calhoun" and they will come. Only thing silly is you and a few other lifetime fans sitting on your high horse. A dynasty is only a dynasty when it ends.

My, my...you sound angry.

 

[intlzncster]

I agree Hurley took the job because UConn had won four NC's in the past with the banners and all hanging in Gampel, but going forward, any "brand" will be his and his alone.

Then why does he specifically sell recruits on the history of success, the history of turning out NBA players? Why does he bring kids into the gym and show them all those banners on the ceiling and tell them, 'that could be you'? Because that's the type of hype kids buy into.

 

[ClifSpliffy]

Oh ok I got it, the only thing Hurely has to say to new recruits is "Jim Calhoun" and they will come. Only thing silly is you and a few other lifetime fans sitting on your high horse. A dynasty is only a dynasty when it ends.

nope. not gonna do it. http://media.ifunny.com/results/2016/01/20/618lmtmwim.jpg

 

[Vuce]

For those comparing Wright and Hurley. Wright coached 10 years at Hofstra and Nova before he really hit his stride. Hurley is in his 9th year and rebuilding our program. DH is by no means a finished product and will grow as a coach just like Jay Wright did. Everyone here is starved for immediate success and return to UConn dominance. It’s coming. Patience.

 

[Doctor Hoop]

For those comparing Wright and Hurley. Wright coached 10 years at Hofstra and Nova before he really hit his stride. Hurley is in his 9th year and rebuilding our program. Dan Hurley is by no means a finished product and will grow as a coach just like Jay Wright did. Everyone here is starved for immediate success and return to UConn dominance. It’s coming. Patience.

I’m patient. No way do I think we should be contending for Final Four this year. Even making the dance is itself is perhaps a 1 in 5 proposition. But this team should not be 25 points worse in one half than this years ‘Nova. They play a fair bit harder than last year. They don’t play much smarter, in being cohesive on D, or running the offense to generate good shots.

 

[AntG168]

Message To The Team: The season is still young. Conference play is on the horizon. Ignore these fickled fans pick your arss up and go win this winnable conference. Everything you wanted to acheive before the season is still well within reach. Jalen, your legacy isnt written in stone YET. Turn up. The time is now young man. Trust the process

 

[polycom]

If an in game adjustment means benching your over hyped star, because of stupid turnovers or missed shot after missed shot, I'm all for it. Jim Calhoun was not as good a recruiter as Dan Hurely is but a much better game coach as it stands right now. Hurley is a great sideline cheerleader but needs to work on his game coaching moves with respect to his starters and his first people off the bench. Calhoun would have yanked Adams after the first minute after the first turn over and the missed way short three attempt.

This is an all-time bad take. @August_West another nominee for the worst post of the year.

 

[intlzncster]

I’m patient. No way do I think we should be contending for Final Four this year. Even making the dance is itself is perhaps a 1 in 5 proposition. But this team should not be 25 points worse in one half than this years ‘Nova. They play a fair bit harder than last year. They don’t play much smarter, in being cohesive on D, or running the offense to generate good shots.

That's really high imo. Going from 14-18, I'm happy to switch flip that record (18-14) and hit the NIT.

There's a lot to correct. A lot. We were bad in almost every area of basketball, from O/D strategy and execution, to fundamentals, to mental makeup, to practice habits, to off the court habits.

It will take longer than people give credit for. You don't fix a dumpster fire over night. In year one, put out the fire and collect raw materials. In year two, you start building. In year three, you start to really see the whole structure. Year 4, high end results.

As for Nova. It's one half of basketball. It happens to everybody. Reminds me of us against UMass a number of years ago.

 

[Huskymagic]

The main message to this team needs to be that they need to play smart and not only hard. Hurley also has to take better timeouts when other teams are making those kind of runs.

The message needs to be, you WILL BE BENCHED if you take stupid shots and make stupid turnovers. Jalen Adams needs to be held accountable for his play. He's way too slow and predictable in his offense, and way too lackadaisical as a ball handler.

Adams needs to be told play up to par or you will be on the bench. Adams doesn't need a cheerleader, he needs a tough guy to toughen him up.

Christian Vital is our spiritual and emotional leader. Adams and Gilbert need to run plays for Polley and Vital on the perimeter. This will open up the lane for them.

PS: Dan Hurley needs to change roles from cheerleader of the team to disciplinarian now especially with Adams.

 

[Jaker]

Put the ball in the basket!

 

[AntG168]

That's really high imo. Going from 14-18, I'm happy to switch flip that record (18-14) and hit the NIT.

There's a lot to correct. A lot. We were bad in almost every area of basketball, from O/D strategy and execution, to fundamentals, to mental makeup, to practice habits, to off the court habits.

It will take longer than people give credit for. You don't fix a dumpster fire over night. In year one, put out the fire and collect raw materials. In year two, you start building. In year three, you start to really see the whole structure. Year 4, high end results.

As for Nova. It's one half of basketball. It happens to everybody. Reminds me of us against UMass a number of years ago.

If we lost 10 games in conference that’d be a massive under achievement. No way that’d be exceptable

 

[Tenspro2002]

The main message to this team needs to be that they need to play smart and not only hard. Hurley also has to take better timeouts when other teams are making those kind of runs.

The message needs to be, you WILL BE BENCHED if you take stupid shots and make stupid turnovers. Jalen Adams needs to be held accountable for his play. He's way too slow and predictable in his offense, and way too lackadaisical as a ball handler.

Adams needs to be told play up to par or you will be on the bench. Adams doesn't need a cheerleader, he needs a tough guy to toughen him up.

Christian Vital is our spiritual and emotional leader. Adams and Gilbert need to run plays for Polley and Vital on the perimeter. This will open up the lane for them.

PS: Dan Hurley needs to change roles from cheerleader of the team to disciplinarian now especially with Adams.

Agree completely.

I understand why he needed to cheerlead so far, to get the guys feeling confident and supporting them as long as they played hard (the fact that he felt compelled to do this is a damning indictment of the previous regime).

But he needs to crack down on dumb play at this point.

 

[Mazhude]

Please try to understand this, our defense is set up to hide our bigs inability to defend one on one It’s why Ollie tried to cover this defect with a zone after Gilbert’s injury. Hurley chose to hide this with intense guard pressure which is what Ollie did before Gilbert’s injury.
Villanova has some unique ball handling skills that most teams don’t possess.
When Wright switched to bigs handling the the ball and the little guys leading essentially taking our best defenders with them how would you adjust?
Pressuring with our bigs in th open floor?
Taking all pressure off?
Put our little guys on their bigs ?
Basically Hurley got snookered by a great coach who not only identified our weakness ,knew how to exploit it,and had the right guys to carry out the plan.
Until guys like Wilson , Polley , Carlton are no longer defensive liabilities and Whaley and Yakwe have limited offense it will continue to be something teams will try to exploit. The good is news not many teams have as many capable ball handling bigs as Nova.

This! Hurley had one trick to beat Villanova. Wright called his bluff. We don't have the talent to threaten good teams with our second option... because we do not have one. You win national titles with a first option that no one can counter, or too many reliable second options for the other team to match.

 

[ZenConn]

JC didn't get his share of highly ranked post players early in his career but ones that fit his system and tough guys - basically bangers, enforcers, lunch pail guys that basically outworked the other team.

I think we're a step ahead of where JC first started and the bonus is that DH has highly ranked post players knocking on our doorstep. While it's good to have 5 star recruits at every position, I'd prefer to have a tough worker like a lesser recruited Rod Sellers than a soft 5 star recruit.

 

[polycom]

People keep saying Hurley needs to hold people more accountable but if you watched his post game comments he says that he isn’t going to do this. He also brings up all of the things that have been mentioned in the 8 sky is falling threads we have.

 

[Huskybass]

Ridiculous statement
You can't compare JC's situation with KOs or DHs
Different circumstances and JCs "doings" that placed this team in a probationary period and other sanctions didn't do the program any favors
JC is the greatest college coach, IMHO, but even he would find things difficult in this conference with recruiting the top players vs. being in the old Big East.

That is complete BS. Hurley has shown that he can recruit quite effectively right from the get go. The AAC is not the barrier to recruiting top talent that many of you pretend it to be. A recruiting class of Bouknight, Gaffney, Akok, and/or Kofi and Precious would have been fully acceptable even in the prime of the old Big East.

 

[huskyrob1]

JC didn't get his share of highly ranked post players early in his career but ones that fit his system and tough guys - basically bangers, enforcers, lunch pail guys that basically outworked the other team.

I think we're a step ahead of where JC first started and the bonus is that Dan Hurley has highly ranked post players knocking on our doorstep. While it's good to have 5 star recruits at every position, I'd prefer to have a tough worker like a lesser recruited Rod Sellers than a soft 5 star recruit.

.....or a Jake Voskul. JC had no peer in development of lower ranked kids.

 

[buddy]

My, my...you sound angry.

He is not a UConn fan. He is a troll and if you speak the truth to him he implodes.

 

[ucp990411]

.....or a Jake Voskul. JC had no peer in development of lower ranked kids.

Watching games from the late 90’s has given me a great deal of appreciation for Jake. He was terrific.

 

[Huskybass]

Watching games from the late 90’s has given me a great deal of appreciation for Jake. He was terrific.

Jake was the guy who did all the things to help you win that didnt show up on the stat sheet. Great D, solid screens, etc. An extremely valuable piece of the first National Championship team.

 

[Mazhude]

Jake was the guy who did all the things to help you win that didnt show up on the stat sheet. Great D, solid screens, etc. An extremely valuable piece of the first National Championship team.

 

[ucp990411]

Jake was the guy who did all the things to help you win that didnt show up on the stat sheet. Great D, solid screens, etc. An extremely valuable piece of the first National Championship team.

Jake brought physicality to every game. Might be my favorite Husky of all time. Along with Dan Hesford and Joe Whelton. And I go back to the days of Toby Kimball. You can tell I like tough players.

 

[uconnfan68]

If an in game adjustment means benching your over hyped star, because of stupid turnovers or missed shot after missed shot, I'm all for it. Jim Calhoun was not as good a recruiter as Dan Hurely is but a much better game coach as it stands right now. Hurley is a great sideline cheerleader but needs to work on his game coaching moves with respect to his starters and his first people off the bench. Calhoun would have yanked Adams after the first minute after the first turn over and the missed way short three attempt.

Hurley isn’t JC. That said, maybe he could be a little like him. Jalen has been a huge let down this year, but he isn’t the only one. AG hasn’t shown much leadership either.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

View attachment 37702

From the misfire of the title onward, there's been a lot of premature talk,, internal bickering, and bad energy in this thread. Until this photo, I don't even know why I came back. If the worst that's been written about last Saturday turns out to be more true than not, we'll all know within a few games. I can wait until then.

Meantime, I've got an awesome dinner of prime rib, mashed potatoes, roasted Brussels sprouts, glazed carrots, corn pudding, popovers, and even a ham on the near horizon. There's probably some great desert too. I'm 26 hours into time with grandkids and others I love. Life is feeling pretty blessed. I'm in no hurry to be 'right' about how this team isn't very good when most reliably I only know that everybody performed pretty poorly last Saturday.

Peace to all...