ILL in IA
- Iowa City
Just ask Paul Finebaum. Went in on Kirk yesterday.
2017 Coaching Carousel
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BS, recruits' parents have nothing in negotiating contracts and a contract hardly gives a recruit any guarantees. Contracts provide coaches/administrations financial terms, but recruits know if a coach under performs, he will get fired. Groce surviving is no guarantee he will be here for a recruit's career under any scenario (whether he squeezes into tournament or not). You are trying to build a strawman that of a pretend not-firing to trap 2017 recruits. That theory is hogwash.
Kirk Ferentz and the Iowa administration have absolutely nothing to do with Groce and the UI administration will do. Not even the same sport, nothing to do with what Whitman will potentially do or will not do.
But talking about Iowa and basketball, you still avoided responding to your admiration of Fran McCaffrey as a "big fan", when Fran missed the tournament 3 straight years, 4 years if you consider losing in the play-in games (IIRC you do not consider that making the tournament). Yet, you are a big fan of Fran. That does not make any sense.
FinalFour88
- Charlotte, NC
I'm feeling pretty similar to this too. I'm tired of the "this team will get better/progress as the season goes on..." forecasts. At this point, all I care about are objective stats. Wins and losses. If the team goes 10-8 in the Big Ten (or better), Groce has done his job for this season and should stay. If they go 8-10 or worse, that will make five seasons of below .500 in conference. That's not winning basketball and he'd need to go at that point. If the Illini go 9-9, it will be a tough decision for Whitman.
And I don't care about how the team "finishes." If they go 8-10 in the Big Ten, I don't care if they won four of their last five and finished on a hot streak. A losing record is a losing record.
I get this train of thought (W & Ls are all that matters), and it's your opinion, but it's not a very good way to look at it.
Illinois is 1-2 right now with embarrassing losses and a win at home against what is turning out to be a B10 bottom feeder. So you're saying if they scrap out 9 more wins, down to the buzzer, blow leads, look like garbage but Abrams banks in a last second 3 (to improve to 1/7 for the night) to win against MI, Iowa x2, Penn State x2, Northwestern x2, @ Rutgers & Nebraska you're good with staying with a bad coach another year (really, extending him another 2 years for 4 years total)? In this same scenario, Minnesota stomps us at home, Maryland gets out to 20-0 lead and we never get close (on ESPN2), and Tate plays 20 minutes in all our other losses.
Even typing out those games I can't imagine that scenario even happening, but if it does, I'd fire Groce yesterday. That resume won't even make the tournament
mattcoldagelli
- The Transfer Portal with Do Not Contact Tag
Real talk everyone, this is a pipe dream.
FinalFour88
- Charlotte, NC
Saying "I'm good" with it is a stretch; I wouldn't be real excited going into next year. I'm just trying my best to be reasonable and realistic here. At 10-8, I don't see any way that Whitman fires Groce. Is 10-8 a great season, and does it make Groce a great coach? No, but I think that conference record justifies giving him another year and evaluating him. Again, I'm not really excited typing this, but I think it's reasonable.
That said, if Groce is as poor a coach as many of us think he is, 10-8 will probably not be achieved, in which case my reasoning for keeping him is moot.
+ 1 it's entirely possible we only win one out of those 4.
Meh- I am pretty sure I'd rather have most of those guys in the fired category than the guys in the hire category. With the exception of Marshall.
The rest of those guys are just the unknown for the most part. Maybe they've had some success but the only reason they look better to people is because they're unknown and no chance to struggle at a higher level yet. They are the greener grass or the new girl in town.
FinalFour88
- Charlotte, NC
Iowa x2 isn't likely either, is it?
That's fair. I still don't think it will happen, because, as I wrote, there's a way (several ways) to get to 10-8 in conference and still not make the tournament because we have no quality wins.
And I agree with everybody that even the scenario I put forward is unrealistic, I was just trying to pick the easiest wins. Which is why I think this is all moot and we've got a ceiling of about 8-10 in the B10 and Groce is gone.
mattcoldagelli
- The Transfer Portal with Do Not Contact Tag
"I would rather have the guy currently failing than the guy who might fail at some later point" is an interesting POV.
FinalFour88
- Charlotte, NC
It's amazing this program is in a place where 8-10 appears to be the ceiling for a team with several seniors, one of which (Hill) is a really good player. Groce said it himself that this team could be "special." If they end up below .500 in the Big Ten, it's an indictment on either his coaching or his judgment of his team, probably both.
The thing that keeps sticking out to me is the player interviews after games. Groce's positive attitude seems to have rubbed off on the players, but not for the better. I heard Hill say after the IU game that he's proud of how the team battled back -- after losing by 16 points. Groce has created a culture of losing, where the team accepts a loss by finding a silver lining in a game they lost by double digits. It's sad.
mattcoldagelli
- The Transfer Portal with Do Not Contact Tag
I was talking about this with some friends after the IU game. All the "hey, if you take away the first eight minutes...." and "ehh that wasn't a game we really needed anyway" stuff is indicative of a program and a fanbase that doesn't even know what good is anymore.
Haven't we had enough time to evaluate him though? This is year five, and we have nothing to show for it. 4-5 years usually how long you should give a coach to decide if moving on is the best option. And IMO, it's time to move on.
FinalFour88
- Charlotte, NC
Yeah, probably. I pretty much made up my mind after the Winthrop loss (my wife works at Winthrop, so I got it rubbed in my face a little extra), then the WVU blowout cemented it.
Wittsdream
- Chicago
Been an ardent follower of the program for 35 years, and that IU game is still etched into my psyche, for all the wrong reasons. Take away that improbable comeback against IU, and the resultant 2-8 Big Ten conference start, and this risible thread, contemplating Groce's "future," would just be another brown stain on the mattress.........in a long line of Orange 'n Blue nocturnal emissions worthy of the Great Wall of China.
I love Groce's attitude generally, but he really needs to stop saying that he's not a moral victories guy. He's one of the biggest moral victory guys I've seen in this business.
There is truth to that.
But there is also this.
In 2006:
Shaka Smart was an assistant at Akron
Brad Stevens was an assistant at Butler
Fred Hoiberg announced his retirement as a player
Archie Miller was an assistant at NC State
John Calipari was making his first Sweet Sixteen at Memphis after failing out of the NBA
Andy Enfield was working for a health care software company
Buzz Williams finished 14-17 as a head coach at the University of New Orleans
Ben Howland was the toast of LA beginning a run of three straight Final Fours.
Al Skinner was in the Sweet Sixteen with Jared Dudley at Boston College
Dave Leitao was surging at Virginia after reviving DePaul
Paul Hewitt was widely regarded as one of the best recruiters in the country
Seth Greenberg was a hot coaching candidate after winning ACC Coach of the Year at Virginia Tech
The talent turns over man.
The great coaches you know are not the great coaches of tomorrow. This is probably especially true right now with guys like Roy, K, Boeheim and Izzo aging out of it.
The Pontiff
- Chicago, IL
I generally agree with this tier, though in a slightly different order.
While I would agree that Keatts' work at UNC-W has been impressive, I'm not convinced that his body of work merits such a big jump to a B1G job. As we debated with the A10, the CAA is definitely steps below and his time at Louisville as an asst was fairly brief. I actually think Marshall may fall into the realistic category IF the money is there, probably close $5MM based on his current contract and what he supposedly turned down with Alabama. For one, with three straight MVC championships, I can't imagine he feels that challenged especially if it's felt that conference is waning or doesn't offer much of a ceiling. I think it's been since 2006 that the MVC has gotten more than one at-large bid. And this year, it could be zero if WSU wins the tourney or if the Shockers stumble in-conference.
However, at Illinois, he gets to challenge himself in the B1G on a much bigger stage with a bigger program budget (I assume) at a program that has proven in the past to have a high ceiling. Now, other factors could be at play that we don't know about, i.e., family firmly rooted in KS, waiting on an ACC blueblood opening like UNC or Duke.
With that in mind, my list would be Marshall, Cuonzo, Archie, Buzz, and Capel.
First, the Big Ten is NOT that good this season. It's an incredibly down Big Ten from most years, with at most 2 really good teams, followed by IU, and then a big old mess. This is a year we should expect to be competing with every team, every night, especially when you add in considerations for our roster. By the logic here, we should've seen 10 wins in one of the seasons where the bottom of the big was actually bad because there were free wins available, but Groce's best season is still 9 wins.
10-8 is not an auto-extension, and honestly if it continues going the way it has (neck and neck with the 'meh' at home and destroyed by the top half on the road), 10-8 should definitely not be extended. This team would need to play a really good 15 games and wind up at 10-8 for it to be a lock that he gets extended with that conference record. Even with 10-8, he'd have a conference winning % of 42 after 5 years, which is pretty horrible.
Also, the ways we lost to Indiana and Winthrop were both pathetic and unacceptable as well. Losing in what should have been regular time at home to Winthrop after having a 10 pt lead with 3 to go is pathetic for a team this experienced.
I don't really know what sort of evaluating you think we would do next year if we retain Groce coming off a 10-8 conference record against a very evenly matched Big Ten across the board when our roster will be getting objectively worse next year due to graduations. That is, unless Whitman wants to evaluate empty seats. IMO, the only 10-8 I would do more than blink at would have to include a win over Wisconsin and/or Purdue. Knocking off a bunch of bubble teams (some bubble at best) really wouldn't be very inspiring for the future for most of us still watching, and definitely wouldn't bring back the fanbase that has already tuned out the Groce era of Illini hoops.
I think we can take Iowa at home, but they will likely outscore us in at least one of the matchups. They're playing pretty well offensively, and Jok is as good as anyone in the conference shooting the ball right now. 1-1 sounds right.
:clappy:
I generally agree with this tier, though in a slightly different order.
I actually think Marshall may fall into the realistic category IF the money is there, probably close $5MM based on his current contract and what he supposedly turned down with Alabama. For one, with three straight MVC championships, I can't imagine he feels that challenged especially if it's felt that conference is waning or doesn't offer much of a ceiling. I think it's been since 2006 that the MVC has gotten more than one at-large bid. And this year, it could be zero if WSU wins the tourney or if the Shockers stumble in-conference.
However, at Illinois, he gets to challenge himself in the B1G on a much bigger stage with a bigger program budget (I assume) at a program that has proven in the past to have a high ceiling. Now, other factors could be at play that we don't know about, i.e., family firmly rooted in KS, waiting on an ACC blueblood opening like UNC or Duke.
With that in mind, my list would be Marshall, Cuonzo, Archie, Buzz, and Capel.
I've excluded Gregg Marshall because I don't think we'll be able to pry him. 3.3 million is the type of money that allows him to continue terrorizing the MVC comfortably and wait out one of the blue blood jobs that is bound to open up soon enough (UNC, if I had to guess, as Cuse and Duke appear to have coaches in waiting). I would be beyond ecstatic if we landed Greg Marshall, but have excluded him intentionally (thus my emphasis on feasibility). Keatts is very much the last option on my radar, and since that post you quoted I'd done a little digging on Buzz that would warrant moving him above Keatts, although I also question the feasibility of Buzz coming here as well.
Bruce Weber--in spite of losing 3 players to the NBA, his Illini had a 26-7 record
and made it to the 2nd round of the tourney
John Groce----Was named 2006 National Recruiter of the Year
The Pontiff
- Chicago, IL
You're probably right, but he did seem to flirt with Alabama, though maybe that was just a ruse to drum up a new contract. I'm pretty sure his son is now in college, who as a junior in high school quit his HS team to be on the bench with his dad. But I think his youngest is still in high school, which could be one of his reasons for not leaving WSU, along with the $3.5MM/yr he's pulling in into the next decade. I realize it could be a real longshot, but IF Whitman could step up with a significantly larger deal (think ~$5MM/yr), I would think Gregg would at least listen.
$5MM a year would be a MASSIVE commitment from our admins. We're not even paying Lovie that in any given calendar year.
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