Catching up, no IL at work for me
An assistant who can fix all of the current problems may not be a good HC.
The discussion has just gone around about how it is hard to evaluate how a mid-major coach will recruit at the next level. We have one who is recruiting well and is on an upward (recruiting) trend. Should we throw it away for an solid x/o coach with unknown recruiting abilities?
If Groce can acknowledge his weaknesses and make the hard calls to plug those holes with new assistants, things may work out. Assistant coach at UI is a pretty big step up from most positions. Someone who can teach defense and x/o's should want it.
You can hire recruiters on the bench, too, you know. Personally, I would rather have my recruiters in the assistant role, and my x's and o's guys in the head seat. I would be OK if Groce wanted to relinquish the schemes to assistant(s), but somehow, I don't see that happening. Additionally, since assistants tend to move around a little more, I'd rather lose a recruiter from the bench (more replaceable, IMO), than risk losing the man who coordinates our schemes/system. That is a role that should be protected by a higher salary and title on the bench.
This is how I feel about crean and I feel dirty for it.
I agree. Their downfall and reason for inconsistency tends to be more bad decision making and shot taking than the sets they have, they run great sets, but have some guys like Blackmon, etc who just like to chuck. His #1 team we knocked off at AH had a bunch of guys who stuck to the system and they were a damn good team. I will leave it to you all to compare RSCI's for his current team and then, but I'm fairly certain his current team is more talented
But seriously, agreed. Hard not to put the blame on Groce. Even if you argue these guys dont mesh well or whatever its still Groces fault for recruiting them.
Obviously he wouldn't say it out loud, but I don't recall him talking about how close his previous teams were at all/with the frequency he does with this team. I'd believe it with some of the previous few teams, but I don't see a reason this team would have any meshing issues and his public comments seem to support that (not saying you think they haven't meshed, but there are teams that DO fall victim to that, and this Illini team is not one, IMO)
I normally don't like to be the guy who thinks the Illini recruit is underrated, because by in large the experts get it right. However, Frazier (at least to me) looks quite a bit underrated in the way a Mike Dudek did. Watching Dudek's film it was absolutely clear he would be a difference maker. Frazier seems similar to me. None of it really matters however if Groce doesn't improve.
Frazier is ranked where he is because he's not really playing anyone, Florida isn't exactly a basketball hotbed, I read on his twitter feed maybe that he's considered a top 3 player in his area, and he's currently not in the top 100, so that says a little about the talent level there (considering that can span multiple classes). Not an exact science, but I'm not aware of a ton of D1 prospects from his area, feel free to correct me on that. But if I am correct, there will likely be an adjustment period as he gets used to a big jump in talent level.