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Message: [QUOTE="Lefty2one, post: 2078189, member: 1001"] Somehow we're in an even bigger nightmare of a situation than I thought possible when we got booted to the AAC. I figured at worst we'd consistently be a Top 3 program in the conference, similar to what Memphis was under Calipari in CUSA. A lot of 16-2, 15-3 conference records. I don't think anyone expected us to be a middle of the road program in this god awful conference... We're 42-30 in conference play in four years in the AAC. We've never finished in the Top 3 of the regular season standings. We needed a miracle 65-footer to help win our only conference title. We've missed the tourney 3 of the last 5 seasons. We're losing to teams named East Carolina and Wagner. We didn't sell out a single home game this year. The scarier part is that the numbers don't do our situation justice, the eye test paints an even bleaker picture. We aren't a smart team, we don't execute well, we don't make good decisions. We're routinely killed on the glass. We rarely have knockdown shooters. Probably the biggest concern with the program is player development - we have to get better at getting better. SMU and Cincinnati are composed mostly of 3-star recruits with a 4-star here and there and they're ahead of us as a program right now. Since Oriakhi committed in the summer of 2006 we've signed one above average big man (Drummond, who was an in-our-backyard layup and wasn't in Storrs long enough to have a big impact). Think about that, over the course of the last 11 years we've inked one difference-making big man and he was on campus for eight months. Polley and Carlton aren't going to change that trend. If we aren't going to be able to sign better bigs than we have to get better at developing them. Other programs that had to go through the painful transition of replacing a legend at least had a stable situation in a power conference. Indiana, UNC, Georgetown, etc. They struggled with their immediate successor but eventually rebounded since it remained a desirable job. We don't have that luxury. I think Ollie might have a longer leash than some think because I'm not sure who the hell is going to want to come run this program if we show Ollie the door. We're in danger of becoming the next Houston of the 80s or UNLV of the 90s. [/QUOTE]

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