Some random thoughts and perspective sparked by recent posts....
Talk of Weber is kind of interesting as he was largely considered a poor recruiter, and yet he's doing fine (not great, but fine) at KSU. When he was hired here, the fanbase wanted to make the jump to elite program after Lon and Self showed we could really good. During the negotiation for Self I was optimistic we'd keep him, and I personally believed at the time we were pushing to keep him, that he would eventually win a NC because he was a determined roster-builder. But that's it's own story, and it happened so quickly that folks just moved on to the search.
Enter Bruce. He kept the ball rolling. Season 1 was great, but season 2 was MAGICAL. That team was a bunch of competitive guys recruited by Self, but coached by Weber. And Weber got BUY IN. He kept challenging those guys, and they responded...and a couple guys were NBA caliber, and Deron was All-Star caliber --a true assassin with weapons around him.
Talent + buy-in + coaching = elite success.
Later seasons had less of each of those, and how it happened is a matter of opinion, but IMHO, he recruited guys he wasn't as comfortable recruiting, lost site of what got him there, and was never going to be an elite coach. Once he lost the buy-in, it was too obvious to ignore. Everyone wanted him booted (me included). It was disgusting as a fan to lose the momentum we had.
Enter Groce, who was a bad hire, based almost entirely off recruiting ability, hopium, and being cheap. Total roller coaster. Had a nice first season with Weber guys, but couldn't hold onto the buy-in, and began to take us from mediocrity to irrelevance. Forgetable...If only I could.
Now we have a guy in Underwood who was hired for his ability to coach. And he's getting some good talent, but has 't looked very good in the process.
* Talent | Ayo, Giorgi, Kofi are fantastic gets, and there's several guys that look poised to be solid or potentially impressive (TJ, Kane, AG). BU has an ace recruiter in OA to set him up, but has had a weak closing rate. People keep saying that will get better with winning, but I have doubts. Not sure how he gets guys excited about playing for him, but that's for him to figure out. Anyway, despite the misses, talent is coming in. I think Underwood is relentless and will improve. Ayo going pro means we need in-coming guard talent, so call me worried.
* Buy-in | We have a lot of signs that the buy-in is there. [sips kool-aid] I see success barring a key injury or other disruption, and importantly, Non-Illini fans see the danger too. I expect the usual inconsistency in a team that is still growing up, but I do think we will be proud of this team.
* Coaching - Underwood struggled at times, no question. Coaching is his bread and butter, though, and I think turnover was crushing to getting the culture and system running. I'm expecting he will look smarter this year as guys can more reliably execute, and he can throw things at them that they can handle. Clearly the team was a mess for the first half of the season. That should be an outlier as we simply didn't have enough guys with talent and experience on the floor to hold it together.
No one wanted it to take 2 seasons, but I think the long trudge through the desert is almost over. Just need to see if he can get us to the dance as expected, and bring in the talent more readily. The market for talent is always very competitive, but many coaches have shown you can get to FFs by identifying talent along with a few tough recruiting wins.