Bruce Weber
2017 Coaching Carousel
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Bruce Weber
I think the reason most posters here lack excitement over a team that will probably have a starting 5 of: TJL, JCL, DJW, LB, and JT is not the talent or experience or even the proven commodities associated with it, but moreso the fact that there is a load of uncertainty. When you lose a guy like Hill, Rice, or Paul (to name our recent leaders) everybody wants to know whos gonna step up. I salavate at the thought of Black as a junior, I think he will be our leader, but its still hard for me to believe he can be a game changer like Hill is. Not to mention (JCL and Black excluded), these guys have essentially zero in game experience playing with each other. 3 of those players dont have any quality minutes even on the court.
Now to play to your point about coaching, I think it'll be interesting to see what Groce does with this team, because he will need to facilitate chemistry (one of the pieces I feel all of his teams have always lacked). A guy like Leron will help immensely because hes a vocal high energy guy. To me, I'd trade a better coach for any of our recruits, but the tricky part is getting a coach thats better. The Groce hire was a similar to the Beckman one. They were both relatively unproven and somewhat cheap options. Beckman, in my mind, was the worst coach we have ever had at UI. Groce has turned out much better, which is sad given what he's done. The Lovie higher is exactly the opposite of what Beckman and Groce were. If we go the route of a Groce-esq hire, then we are essentially flipping a weighted coin. Chances are we get another bust. The Kruger and Self and even Weber hires were similar, but they were proven to elevate there teams prior to UI. Groce had a couple tourney runs and a sweet 16 appearance that made it look like he was sliced bread. But in reality you look back and other than that one run his coaching is almost paralleled b/t Ohio and UI. If we want another coin flip like Groc, I'll take the recruits over them. But a guy like Lovie (or Self/Kruger/Weber(to an extent)) will be worth more than any recruit.
Obviously getting a new coach doesnt mean 5 guys decommit.... but I was giving my two cents on the extreme cases.
89illinigrad
- Chicago
To be fair to both Weber and Groce, I don't think any Illini coach since Henson/Jimmy Collins has been able to lock up the Chicago-City talent on a consistent basis and that includes the much heralded recruiter Bill Self.
The best teams since the 1989 Flying Illini have relied mostly on downstate players (the Peoria 3, Brian Cook), Suburbanites (Dee Brown, James Augustine) or out-of-staters (Deron Williams).
IMHO, I think the only way that changes is if the Illini start winning consistently and create a buzz around the program and/or they hire an AA coach to appease the BoT (and the CPS coaches).
That's just it. I don't think we are as dependent on Chicago city talent as what was once thought. There is so much talent throughout this State that this program should always flourish. Sure it would be nice to lock Chi-town down like Collins/Henson did but it's not essential.
Nah, Gordon's recruitment was an attempt to make up for the poor recruiting of 2005/6. The decline started years before then and can be traced to a series of lower leg injuries to Kenyon Martin and Scott May.
Yes, locking down Chicago or Illinois talent is not a prerequisite. Recruiting dynamics have drastically changed since the Henson years. But to be a successful coach at UI, a coach will have to be an excellent recruiter, despite that "locking down" not happening.
The decline began when we started making a series of bad administrative, hiring, and management decisions.
This is pretty much all that needs to be said about our situation. The buck starts at the top but they easily pass it onto the coaches. Whitman has been more savvy than Thomas ever was and it hasn't even been a year. The phrase spend money to make money exists for a reason. Smaller schools have to pray for hitting gold in a coach because they are playing with peanuts but like it has been said multiple times here, UI has every single thing you need to be a powerhouse athletic school, and now including freshly renovated/to be reno'ed stadiums and facilities. Money may not buy happiness but it buys good coaches.
Ransom Stoddard
Ordained Dudeist Priest
- Bloomington, IL
Ron Guenther
The data doesn't really bear that out generally (transfers are becoming more and more common every year), and the specific scenario you're proposing make it even more dubious in this case.
If John Groce is the wrong coach you go get the right coach. It just isn't more complicated than that, no matter how hard you try.
89illinigrad
- Chicago
Unfortunately, unlike Chicago, the downstate talent seems to come and go in waves.
Since we landed Hill in 2013, the downstate area has produced the following Top 100 players (per RSCI):
Keita Bates-Diop, 2014 (tOSU)
Jeremiah Tilmon, 2017 (Illini)
Jordan Goodwin, 2017 (SLU)
DaMonte Williams was a Top 100 talent before dropping off this year and the Illini may have found a sleeper in Pickett, but in terms of consensus Top 100 talent, there have only been 3 players since 2013. The Illini recruited them all but only landed one of them.
Of course, there is more talent on the way in coming years, such as Tim Finke, Francis Okoro, E.J. Liddell and Adam Miller, so there is an opportunity for the Illini to capitalize, but they will also have to fend off the slime as SLU, as well as the Blue Bloods.
I actually like the fact that we have been able to go to other places such as Indy to get JCL or Memphis to get Leron Black. I feel like certain Chicago AAU coaches, particularly the Irvins, have this barf worthy arrogance that they feel like the fate of UI's basketball program should lie in their hands and that they should have a say in who we hire as a coach. Sure it'd be nice to land some of these Chicago guys, but I don't want one city to decide whether we can return to glory or not. I want a coach who can go elsewhere to get elite talent, and wave the figurative middle finger at arrogant pricks like the Irvins.
Please provide the data, would love to see it.
I love that those two options are considered equivalent.
For whatever it's worth, the BoT thing is over.
Thad Matta
Being born and raised in Illinois (and no where near Chicago) there is no way that he would not have been interested in the Illinois job. Thanks Guenther for making a disastrous hire after Self left. UI would probably have at least two national championships by now if they hired Matta. Just look what he was able to do at tOSU. Granted they are on the decline now.
So it's obvious that we all over hype our recruits...
...and none of us know how good the players we have are.
We obviously need S&C to tell us who we should expect what from and how much to expect. So Please S&C enlight us with your knowledge...we know you will whether we ask for it or not! Because it's clear that the only opinion that matters/is correct is always yours!
...and none of us know how good the players we have are.
We obviously need S&C to tell us who we should expect what from and how much to expect. So Please S&C enlight us with your knowledge...we know you will whether we ask for it or not! Because it's clear that the only opinion that matters/is correct is always yours!
mattcoldagelli
- The Transfer Portal with Do Not Contact Tag
Win zero national championships?
Here's a couple of articles from which you can kinda piece it together, I can't find a clean list.
The money quote:
The default assumption here is that at the moment the players enroll, the chances they abandon the program to seek other opportunities at the moment of Groce's firing goes from a relatively high number (depending on which guy we're talking about obviously) to something close to zero.
I disagree both on the basis of the raw data, and an understanding of what treating these kids and their chosen coach with such obvious, public bad faith would play out like in this specific circumstance.
Well there's no question we know transfers have been on the rise, but I haven't seen any breakouts of the numbers tied to coaching changes. I'd guess the vast majority of transfers are not related to a coaching change, so a difficult case to make.
mattcoldagelli
- The Transfer Portal with Do Not Contact Tag
It's a hard life down here in the Loyalty mines, where every poster is forced to read every post in every thread under penalty of the lash.
89illinigrad
- Chicago
To clarify, I was only talking about attracting the CPS talent. IMHO, the only way to do that is to start winning and create a buzz around the program or we hire an AA coach that will appease the CPS coaches and get them pushing players in our direction again.
While the BoT thing may be over, I don't think the CPS coaches "thing" has ended.
And while the two options may not be equivalent, it comes down to a chicken vs egg scenario in that do you need talent to win or do you need to win to get the talent?
Huh? Nowhere in the data you have provided does it say that the chances that a player transfers if there is a coaching change significantly decline or go to zero. The fact that transfers have increased is a generally accepted principle, supported by data, but that could also be viewed as a sign that a player may transfer if there is a coaching change (which is the opposite point you argue against).
You need data to show that a player will not transfer IF there is a coaching change, to support your point. That is not the data provided. Actually, an argument can be built that incoming recruits who have not played are more likely to seek other opportunities, since almost all schools would release them from an LOI if there is a coaching change. Especially higher ranked players who may have more options.
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Well my answer is you need talent to win. But there are different types of talents. Finding diamond in the rough kind of guys are the way to get to be to the point that you get the need to win to get talent guys. In other words youll have to work a lot harder finding/developing players if you want to get known commodities. So the order is first get unknown talent so you win, then you can get known talent to win even more.
I personally do not believe that finding "diamonds in the rough" is a viable or potentially consistent strategy. Excellent recruiters (who are not necessarily terrible coaches - pls no Pat Kennedy examples) get better talent than the program deserves, which is the way to go. It may not be the top ranked guys, and we have let our program slip to the point that getting on some of those guys may be very difficult, but rather better players than what we deserve based on just results (i.e., record of wins and losses).
So, we're dealing with a small sample size when we're talking about coaching changes, and obviously a player leaving a program is always going to be a he-said, she-said in terms of who the instigating party was, but since this explosion of transfers has largely happened in the last couple of years, here's just a taste:
Texas fired Rick Barnes, hired Shaka Smart, enrolled all of Barnes' signees (including two four-stars), but had two transfers.
Georgia Tech fired Brian Gregory, hired Josh Pastner, enrolled all of Gregory's signees, but had one transfer.
Oklahoma State fired Travis Ford, hired Brad Underwood, enrolled all of Ford's signees (including one four star), but had two transfers.
Arizona State fired Herb Sendek, hired Bobby Hurley, enrolled all of Sendek's signees (including one four star), but had four transfers (two of which appear to be more of a disciplinary issue)
Those were the four coaching changes of the last two years that seemed to most closely match our situation. A small sample size, but food for thought.
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