Oillie vs Hurley recruits | The Boneyard

Oillie vs Hurley recruits

Matias

Matias

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I've lost track of which players on the current roster are Ollie recruits vs Hurley ones. Is it the case that some players who joined in Hurley's first year are Ollie recruits?

Can anyone list them out or tell me where I could look this info up?

Thx!

T
 
Matias said:
I've lost track of which players on the current roster are Ollie recruits vs Hurley ones. Is it the case that some players who joined in Hurley's first year are Ollie recruits?

Can anyone list them out or tell me where I could look this info up?

Thx!

T
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Click the link to get to the UConn media guide. Players on current roster that were on the 2016-2017 roster are KO's recruits. All others are Hurley's recruits.

UConn Media Guide
 
Ollie: Vital, Gilbert, Whaley, Carlton, Polley, Wilson
Hurley: Adams, Akok, Bouknight, Gaffney, Cole, Springs

And no, none of the players who joined in 18-19 were Ollie’s recruits. The guys he signed (Akinjo, Matthews, Kisunas) all went somewhere else.
 
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David 76 said:
Emotionally, I don't think there is a difference anymore.
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Very much agree. I also don’t think it’s a divisive question. There’s almost always going to be some disruption with a coaching change of any kind, which we can see with the ‘18 class, but the roster is in good shape, both with talent and balance in the classes.
 
calluke said:
Thanks hurley.
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The weird thing now though is people are reversing their arguments. Used to be the old coach got credit if a player improved greatly under the new coach. Or vice versa.

As for me, I've always held that the new coach & the payer should get the credit if a player improved under him. So Hurley gets the credit for Whaley. But I have to be consistent with this when I look at Ollie.
 
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upstater said:
The weird thing now though is people are reversing their arguments. Used to be the old coach got credit if a player improved greatly under the new coach. Or vice versa.

As for me, I've always held that the new coach & the payer should get the credit if a player improved under him. So Hurley gets the credit for Whaley. But I have to be consistent with this when I look at Ollie.
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Like 98% of the board knows Ollie did a great job his first two seasons and then turned into a trainwreck after.
 
raf46 said:
Ollie's player have been coached UP by Hurley and staff.
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Definitely agree here. Ollie did not seem to have a knack for bringing in a freshman and seeing them improve. Carlton looked lost his freshman year made improvements last year under Hurley and seems to have taken a step back this year. That is on Carlton. Not sure if he HAS it? A few Calhoun recruits seemed to bloom very late under Ollie however you want that breakout junior year to build on and go into their senior year which is what Hurley seems to be doing better. Seems to be much more structure with everything they are doing now. Hands down we will be bullying teams for years to come in the future:)
 
upstater said:
The weird thing now though is people are reversing their arguments. Used to be the old coach got credit if a player improved greatly under the new coach. Or vice versa.

As for me, I've always held that the new coach & the payer should get the credit if a player improved under him. So Hurley gets the credit for Whaley. But I have to be consistent with this when I look at Ollie.
Expand ...

Hurley absolutely gets credit for coaxing something out of Whaley, and for at least reducing Vital's worst instincts on the court.

KO gets credit for coaxing something out of Daniels, bringing along Shabazz as a leader, and getting Boat to buy in and improve his game.

The issue for KO was with his own recruits. He either couldn't identify kids who were coachable in addition to talented, or didn't put in the effort to motivate or coach them up.
 
Kevin's recruits didn't pan out and his later teams were known for getting behind big early and clawing back, usually to then falter late. Or falling behind early and then getting blown out. It was not good basketball to watch. What I've seen this year is simply better basketball.
 
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inWV said:
Kevin's recruits didn't pan out and his later teams were known for getting behind big early and clawing back, usually to then falter late. Or falling behind early and then getting blown out. It was not good basketball to watch. What I've seen this year is simply better basketball.
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This year's team, under Hurley, with both his and KO's recruits, is actually fun to watch. That's the difference.
 
Whaley stepped up when Akoks injury forced the issue. Some guys just need a little more run and it works out for them. And Gilbert seems to be doing better off of the bench. Injuries have shortened the bench. Fewer options, but perhaps more cohesive play.
 
sharonT said:
So, how would Ollie's team of Akinjo, Vital, Carlton, Whaley, Polley backed up by Gilbert, Mathews, Kisunas, and Wilson be doing in league play?
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All of those guys, save Akinjo prior to the transfer, have been a train wreck. Kisunas barely plays, Matthews can’t shoot and can’t defend. And that’s without ollie’s lack of coaching.
 
Tenspro2002 said:
Hurley absolutely gets credit for coaxing something out of Whaley, and for at least reducing Vital's worst instincts on the court.

KO gets credit for coaxing something out of Daniels, bringing along Shabazz as a leader, and getting Boat to buy in and improve his game.

The issue for KO was with his own recruits. He either couldn't identify kids who were coachable in addition to talented, or didn't put in the effort to motivate or coach them up.
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Agreed on everything.
 
Ollie was capable of recruiting well at times, he proved that. The issue was player development and the culture he created. Would agree right now that everyone has bought in and they are all Hurley's guys.
 
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upstater said:
The weird thing now though is people are reversing their arguments. Used to be the old coach got credit if a player improved greatly under the new coach. Or vice versa.

As for me, I've always held that the new coach & the payer should get the credit if a player improved under him. So Hurley gets the credit for Whaley. But I have to be consistent with this when I look at Ollie.
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I've thought about this and I think that Whaley gets the credit for Whaley. This is a guy who believed in himself and did all the right things. He really saw a spike in minutes and a spike in performance when Akok went down. But Hurley hadn't played him big minutes up to that point. Love Whaley.
 
Development > Recruiting. While recruiting is important, it doesn't mean anything if players don't get better. Almost every player on this roster is better than when the season started.
 
Thanks for all the great points on this thread. My intention wasn‘t to divide but rather to see if there was any noticeable difference between each coach‘s recruits. I‘m realizing that KO actually did a decent job with recruiting talent that fit the UConn mold, but just fell short on development. I did get the feeling that we suffered in the Free Throw talent department with KO recruits. JC always had very high standards for FT shooting, although that is also probably as much training as it is natural talent. All in all I‘m happy to see progress in all the recruits.
 
At least half the board refuses to give Ollie credit for anything, including winning the national championship. The fact is that he did an OK job recruiting despite the conference realignment disaster. Three things hit our recruiting:

  1. UConn transitioning from the top conference in basketball to a mid-major was going to dramatically hurt recruiting.
  2. Transitioning from a legendary coach to the next generation is incredibly difficult, and no program pulls it off successfully without a few bumps in the road. Ollie's issue was compounded by the Interim Coach title, which effective froze recruiting for a year and a half, since it is impossible to recruit if the coach doesn't know if he will be coach nor not. We lost at least one class from this.
  3. Transfers - I think this is a combination of factors. Ollie definitely created an environment where players wanted out, but I also think the conference situation combined with the dirtiest program in college basketball coming after Enoch also impacted the exodus.

That said, Vital, Polley, Whaley, Carlton, Gilbert and even Wilson are not a terrible junior and senior class given the circumstances.

Before any of the usual idiots jump in with "Ollie sucked as a coach", no one is arguing he didn't deserve to get fired. Everyone can play amateur psychologist, but something happened after 2016 and Ollie stopped working hard, and the school had to let him go. But it doesn't mean that everything he did was wrong or bad.
 
Its been discussed ad nauseam, but I really think the Larrier and Gilbert injuries killed it for Ollie. Things fell apart from there of what should've been another great season. He could not handle the adversity as he was accustom to things falling in place for him up until then. His personal life issues affected the culture and decent recruits jumped ship. It was a Greek tragedy.

In terms of player development, Whaley is crushing it now that he's seeing the light of day. He didn't even get a chance last year and perhaps that's due to Danny turning him around. JC, TP, SW, AG and early season CV did not develop like we all expected them to. But they are fighters, so Ollie at least instilled that in them, if nothing more.

One thing is for certain, Dan Hurley can handle adversity much better than KO. To keep these kids fighting and integrate the youth movement after TP, AA & SW's injuries along with JC's & AG's regressions is impressive.
 
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