To all those predicting our demise.

[superjohn]

Nice revisionist history.

You know I offered it leading up to the night and Tom said you were bogus and no exchange was allowed.

 

[Waquoit]

Fully agree.
and that line is starting a fracking petition or signing it.

Also agree, because we all know the first step is a strongly worded letter. I'm stuck. Ollie's our only hope, but I think he's hopeless. Now what? Survive and advance.

 

[David 76]

How long is that and that alone supposed to keep someone employed? Its not like he climbed a hill to get there - he started at the top and then fell right off

Exactly the type of overly negative stuff the OP is referring to. What hill did KO start on top of? Great program that had taken a huge nosedive. Top of the hill my

 

[businesslawyer]

@businesslawyer I think that golden state vs bulls fits your question to a t.

I feel like our basketball program should be run like a top tier SEC Football program. Top 25 every year.

Fits my question to a tee? I have no interest in judging NBA teams on anything other than wins and how far th eybgo in the playoffs. Good for you if you care at a much deeper level, but please understand that almost no one does

 

[huskyinfl]

Fits my question to a tee? I have no interest in judging NBA teams on anything other than wins and how far th eybgo in the playoffs. Good for you if you care at a much deeper level, but please understand that almost no one does

I don't care about anything other than crushing that question with a thrillingly awesome answer. I just wanted to see where you were going with that analogy. It was a cliffhanger.

 

[Husky68]

So this is KO's record:

1. Comes in to take over a short handed team with no expectations at the last minute, facing a post-season ban, and keeps them in the last Big East title race all year long somehow.

2. Wins national championship. While folks are complaining about regular season losses.

3. Has letdown/rebuilding year after national championship. Like we had even under the great one in years like '10 and '12. Terrible year but hardly shocking or problematic.

4. Has perfectly acceptable year, with conference tournament championship and getting to round of 32 in Tourney.

5. Has terrible year where we lose 3 players -- potentially 2 of our best 3 players -- for basically entire season, and have to fight through other injuries and illnesses with a roster of 7 and a half players, 3.5 of whom could only handle the ball in the paint. Yes, we got off to an unprecedently bad start before the injuries hit -- blame KO for a bad November.

6. Are 6-2, which is where we expected to be before knowing the injuries we'd be fighting through.

If you lay that out as a record, and looked at someone elses's coach doing that, you would think people calling for his head are just dumb. So why would that not be the analysis here?

I agree. I watch other teams and don't see this super ball movement, cutting for all layups, taking all open 3 point shots and stealing every other pass for break away dunks that it seems "fire Ollie now" detractors use as comparisons to UConn's play. Michigan vs. Ohio State today was so crappy I turned it off to do this! Did not Ollie coach a team that beat Vill, MS, Florida and Kentucky (coaches who have 5 national championships between them) in the course of 3 weekends - I don't care what coach the players were recruited by 2 or more years prior.
This team seems very hard working and in general a very likeable bunch of guys. Why the over kill on them. Ollie seems to be getting them to progress and using what he has, why the over kill on him - he doesn't criticize his players enough or seem disappointed enough on close wins or blow outs, his demeanor on bench isn't acceptable, he doesn't get refs to make better calls.
I like the talent we have and see upside for all of them, enough to get to NCAA not sure (no AG is not a help) but it isn't over after 8 games.
UConn has played 3 top 100 teams and for rest of season has 4 more out of conference and 10 in conference; that's lot of games against good competition. Get half of those and win 7 of 8 from triple digit opponents and are 20-10 into AAC tournament and chance at NCAA's.
Why are so many taking Ollie still being coach as like a personal affront? Is there some back story I am missing?

 

[JMick]

Exactly the type of overly negative stuff the OP is referring to. What hill did KO start on top of? Great program that had taken a huge nosedive. Top of the hill my

By hill I was speaking in regards to trajectory. If this chart were reversed we wouldn't be having this conversation

 

[intlzncster]

Should have been a FF team that year. Way too talented of a team to be a 9 seed.

You're not serious. I know you're shizzle and capable of great leaps of faith when it comes to logic*, but you're not serious here.

*I like to call that 'shizzling'.

 

[Sonova]

Exactly the type of overly negative stuff the OP is referring to. What hill did KO start on top of? Great program that had taken a huge nosedive. Top of the hill my

Cmon...”nosedive?” He inherited a program that was coming off of 2 and a National Championship in the prior 4 years! And he had a pretty impressive cupboard of talent to work with - so so much that they won ANOTHER Championship in his second season (after the ban btw so he didn’t have to carry that particular burden any longer). Throw in uninterrupted access to his mentor, an incredibly loyal and passionate fan base, a brand new practice facility, and (i get this may not be everyone’s opinion of an asset, it I’d argue that it was in his first few years) a weakened competition set from which to develop as a coach).

Jeez, man, clearly you’ve never been a college coach because every coach in college athletics would tell you that he got a pretty great setup from which to launch his coaching career.

 

[Stainmaster]

an incredibly loyal and passionate fan base

Where?

 

[intlzncster]

Shonn Miller was arguably the most underrated power forward in the country that year. Jalen Adams was coming off the bench. Sterling Gibbs averaged 20 pts a game at a Big East school the year before he transferred. We had Daniel Hamilton as well, and Purvis and Brimah hadn't fallen off the ledge yet, and Omar Calhoun finally decided to play like he did his freshmen year. So yea, we should have done way better than the 2nd round.

OK, you doubled down. You were shizzling hard.

Where was the elite PG? Where was a single experience PG? Everybody knows Gibbs was a 2 masquerading as a 1. Where was that ELITE playmaker that every single championship has (at least one of)? The top end of that team was Sweet 16. They just happened to run into one of the best teams in the country, and one they matched up very poorly against, in Rd 2.

 

[JMick]

OK, you doubled down. You were shizzling hard.

Where was that ELITE playmaker that every single championship has (at least one of)? The top end of that team was Sweet 16. They just happened to run into one of the best teams in the country, and one they matched up very poorly against, in Rd 2.

they got their seeding and ran into one of the best teams in the country because they played poorly during the regular season. That team underperformed.

It was not a final four contender by any means, though.

 

[jleves]

Exactly the type of overly negative stuff the OP is referring to. What hill did KO start on top of? Great program that had taken a huge nosedive. Top of the hill my

He may not have started at the top of the mountain, but he was several camps above base camp when got the program. We're back to base camp at best.

 

[intlzncster]

they got their seeding and ran into one of the best teams in the country because they played poorly during the regular season. That team underperformed.

It was not a final four contender by any means, though.

Honestly, I don't know if they underperformed. They didn't have a single experienced PG. Gibbs was effectively a shooting guard; I think that's universally acknowledged. Jalen wasn't remotely ready, and wasn't even a natural PG on top of that.

I mean, 2006 ultimately underperformed primarily because they didn't have a secondary ball handler (PG), even though they had a close to elite veteran PG.

How do you have a functioning team in MCBB without an experienced PG or at bare minimum a 1&done PG? 2016 didn't have anything there. jmo

 

[NielsisGood]

Let me tell you something about yourselves.



You aren't basketball geniuses. You are disingenuous hedgers. I see right through it.

You can look at a season start and find stuff wrong on a 6 and 2 young team. Sure. No problems there. The rest of us see it too. Let's discuss it.

But there are so many declarative "The seasons over, Fire Ollie posts" here. The way they are positioned makes the game here abundantly clear.

If we do in fact go in the toilet (and there is no way for anyone to know that now. Its a long season), you all can smugly sit here and say "Ollie needs to go Right now!" every time we lose a game. You feel good about a UConn loss, your position is made. (Even though its not ;you think it is).

But if they reel off some wins and actually get better as a team over the course of the season you will all be here reveling in the success of a young team getting better.

Its a win/win for you. You can feel like a genius in the teams misery (when applicable) to mitigate the hurt losing does to your oh so fragile psyches. And a win, hell ,is a win (because youre supposedly a UConn fan; there should be some semblance of satisfaction out of one of those still....I hope)

But its not a win/win for the program you profess to love. They need our support. The Players absolutely deserve our support. And Kevin Ollie who brought us a National title 3.5 years ago and is not going anywhere for any time soon (for a myriad of reasons)deserves our support.

You can take these fire Ollie petitions (Marc Diamonte and the 43 mouth breathers, Im looking at you) and shove them straight up your Scalitos. You can place them next to the Fire Ollie threads and the Dan Hurley threads and every other piece of premature misery that gets manufactured here.

Im no Sunshiner ,(thanks ECU for the phrase!) . But I find our fans performance more disappointing than the teams at this point in the season.

But I think all you whiners are good mojo. I will very much enjoy the victory against Syracuse tomorrow and then enjoy making sure every one of you so down on us doesnt extract any enjoyment out of it. You dont deserve it.
Save the funerals and wakes for the end of the season when talking about a coaching change has a slight bit more realism. Now is the time to get down to MSG and root your 6-2 Huskies to a victory over the super pathetic Syracuse Orange.
If you hate 6-2 Kevin Ollie more than Syracuse, I question if you were ever even a UConn fan.

Your analysis when it comes to just about anything is generally iffy at best, but I respect your recognizing that there were easy upvotes to be had and then going out and getting them.


If only Ollie could get that same hunger out of his players.

 

[superjohn]

Honestly, I don't know if they underperformed. They didn't have a single experienced PG. Gibbs was effectively a shooting guard; I think that's universally acknowledged. Jalen wasn't remotely ready, and wasn't even a natural PG on top of that.

I mean, 2006 underperformed because they didn't have a secondary ball handler, even though they had a close to elite veteran PG.

How do you have a functioning team in MCBB without an experienced PG or at least a 1&done PG? 2016 didn't have anything there. jmo

They had something like the 6th best record in the AAC with arguably the most talented roster.

 

[shizzle787]

They had something like the 6th best record in the AAC with arguably the most talented roster.

Bingo. They should have gone 15-3 instead of 11-7 in conference. That would have changed the seed and path in the NCAA tournament remarkably.

 

[JMick]

Honestly, I don't know if they underperformed. They didn't have a single experienced PG. Gibbs was effectively a shooting guard; I think that's universally acknowledged. Jalen wasn't remotely ready, and wasn't even a natural PG on top of that.

I mean, 2006 underperformed because they didn't have a secondary ball handler, even though they had a close to elite veteran PG.

How do you have a functioning team in MCBB without an experienced PG or at least a 1&done PG? 2016 didn't have anything there. jmo

We lost a lot of games we shouldn't have that season.

 

[businesslawyer]

Honestly, I don't know if they underperformed. They didn't have a single experienced PG. Gibbs was effectively a shooting guard; I think that's universally acknowledged. Jalen wasn't remotely ready, and wasn't even a natural PG on top of that.

I mean, 2006 ultimately underperformed primarily because they didn't have a secondary ball handler (PG), even though they had a close to elite veteran PG.

How do you have a functioning team in MCBB without an experienced PG or at bare minimum a 1&done PG? 2016 didn't have anything there. jmo

Please stop. 2006 didn't underperform. They were a top 5 team all year that happened to play a lousy game at the wrong time and fell a rimmed out 3 from the Final Four.

We can kill this program with our expectations if we try

 

[ASweet3781]

Please stop. 2006 didn't underperform. They were a top 5 team all year that happened to play a lousy game at the wrong time and fell a rimmed out 3 from the Final Four.

We can kill this program with our expectations if we try

Sign me up for 30-4 and a 1 seed all day everyday any day right now. Yes the GMason loss was gross but I don't know how anyone can experience the 2010, 2012, 2015, and 2017 seasons afterward and than complain about 2006 under performing. Bad ending certainly but not an under performing team. I miss that team right now.

 

[intlzncster]

They had something like the 6th best record in the AAC with arguably the most talented roster.

With no PG. Which, in MCBB, is everything. Without a PG, talent is irrelevant. Unless you have LeBron.

Gibbs <> PG. Jalen -> a freshman scoring guard who didn't know the first thing about leading a college team coming in.

To me, having an elite PG (a 1-2 punch actually) is 70-80% of the battle in MCBB. It makes up for a LOT of ills.

 

[champs99and04]

Nobody has told the truth on this topic like August. Refreshing to hear from somebody who gets it.

 

[intlzncster]

We lost a lot of games we shouldn't have that season.

If they had a great point guard, they probably wouldn't have.

 

[intlzncster]

Please stop. 2006 didn't underperform. They were a top 5 team all year that happened to play a lousy game at the wrong time and fell a rimmed out 3 from the Final Four.

We can kill this program with our expectations if we try

Great team, but did you see them that Tournament? They were not playing well the entire time. And very likely would have gotten smacked by Florida in the next rd had they beaten George Mason. I meant to write 'underperformed', as I was making a comparison between lacking players at the guard position to winning your critical games (vs expectations). That particular team was good enough that it didn't hit them until the NCAA tournament.

 

[shizzle787]

If they had a great point guard, they probably wouldn't have.

Hamilton was our power forward. He was our leading assist man in 20 of our games that year. We lost about 5 games we shouldn't have that year. 29-5 is way different than 24-10 going into the tournament.