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Post by bringbackcaro on Feb 4, 2017 14:51:38 GMT -5
1) So your benchmark is the lousy coaches who were at Northwestern before him? And what exactly does it prove if he won more games than this benchmark? Sounds like a similar benchmark to using DR as the benchmark for an AD. 2A) A .703 winning percentage for a BIG10 team against an OOC schedule that weak is not exactly a great achievement. 2B) There were two years in which NW was 13-2 and against OOC schedules ranked 292 and 309 (both years followed up with 7-11 records in the BIG10), and if you remove those two outliers against the weakest schedules, the winning percentage drops to .660. 3A) The argument has never been that he is a bad coach, but rather that everything other than two years (19 and 20 years ago) with Pete Carrill's players and using the exact same system that Pere Carrill taught to those players, the resume is extremely average. 3B) There was a pretty noticeable drop after Carmody's first two years and having Carill's players and system already installed to Sophs-Seniors in Year 1 and Juniors-Seniors in Year 2 (who accounted for 100% of the scoring and ~95% of the minutes played in the NCAA win over UNLV), as they went from 24-4 and 27-2, to 22-8, to 19-11 in Carmody's final year, with that slide continuing under JTIII with 16-11 and 16-12 records in the next two years. Parsing the numbers for Carmody's tenure at Northwestern doesn't tell the real story. The main point is that before Carmody arrived the NU program was a the doormat of the Big Ten. In effect, Carmody was being asked to animate a corpse, a task that wasn't easy because NU had arguably the worst facilities in the Big Ten, zero basketball tradition, and actually had admissions standards. Carmody recruited better players and raised the program to respectability. Collins has now taken a respectable program to the next level, the results of this week's game at Purdue notwithstanding. I understand the circumstances at Northwestern, and I don't think anyone has suggested that Carmody should have miraculously turned them into Duke overnight. I don't think anyone is denying that Carmody performed better than the (lousy) coaches before him, bringing the Northwestern program forward from where it had been before. However, it's pretty clear that the program plateaued as a bottom-tier team in the BIG10, recruiting was not up to par to compete in that league, and by all accounts the system was too rigid to adapt and find a way to get over the hump. Unless the talent on the team is drastically improved (which it was not at Northwestern), I see us plateauing in this system that doesn't make our whole greater than the sum of our parts, and doesn't put us in a position to beat teams with more raw talent than us -- the same thing that happened at Northwestern.
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Post by timholycross on Feb 4, 2017 15:16:20 GMT -5
What I remember the most often-related story being (when I started at HC a year after Texeira left) was that Donahue felt that Keith Hochstein (who was 6-5 on a "tall" day) was a better center and Texeira (6-8)was put at forward. Ron didn't think the position suited him, got frustrated after a while, and hung it up.
There were no more ballplayers from CM at HC until JD left; that's for damn sure.
Nowadays, given that centers are few and far between, Tex would have been a forward shooting 3s like everyone else long before he put on a purple jersey.
In fact, I wonder at which point with the Canadians Jack changed his offense....it was very pivot-centric;the ball went inside and rarely came back out.
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Post by jkh67 on Feb 4, 2017 16:34:41 GMT -5
What I remember the most often-related story being (when I started at HC a year after Texeira left) was that Donahue felt that Keith Hochstein (who was 6-5 on a "tall" day) was a better center and Texeira (6-8)was put at forward. Ron didn't think the position suited him, got frustrated after a while, and hung it up. There were no more ballplayers from CM at HC until JD left; that's for damn sure. Nowadays, given that centers are few and far between, Tex would have been a forward shooting 3s like everyone else long before he put on a purple jersey. In fact, I wonder at which point with the Canadians Jack changed his offense....it was very pivot-centric;the ball went inside and rarely came back out. Texeira may not have liked playing forward, but he was a tall finesse player not well suited to the rough and tumble of the key. He also had small hands for a big guy. Keith Hochstein, on the other hand, was the ultimate physical warrior and played taller that Texeira could ever hope to do. A veritable beast down low. As for Ed Siudut (RIP), what a sweet stroke from the corner. I especially remember him lighting it up one night at the Auditorium against a very good NYU team. Texeira, Hochstein, Siudut. We can only dream of getting players of that caliber these days. How the mighty have fallen!
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Post by rgs318 on Feb 4, 2017 16:43:53 GMT -5
Right with you until that last shot. Was it necessary? Do you think it surprised anyone?
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Post by hchoops on Feb 4, 2017 20:13:31 GMT -5
What I remember the most often-related story being (when I started at HC a year after Texeira left) was that Donahue felt that Keith Hochstein (who was 6-5 on a "tall" day) was a better center and Texeira (6-8)was put at forward. Ron didn't think the position suited him, got frustrated after a while, and hung it up. There were no more ballplayers from CM at HC until JD left; that's for damn sure. Nowadays, given that centers are few and far between, Tex would have been a forward shooting 3s like everyone else long before he put on a purple jersey. In fact, I wonder at which point with the Canadians Jack changed his offense....it was very pivot-centric;the ball went inside and rarely came back out. Even when Texeira did not play with keith, when tex played freshman ball with Ed Suidut, Tex rarely scored from the low post. So he did not leave the team because he did not play low. He was more comfortable facing the hoop, but lost interest in playing. Jack D played to his team's strengths. That was Ed S inside and moreso outside for his 3 years, even when he played with Keith.
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Post by jkh67 on Feb 4, 2017 20:58:38 GMT -5
Right with you until that last shot. Was it necessary? Do you think it surprised anyone? Did my last comment surprise anyone? Of course not. Was it necessary? Absolutely! Like a number of folks on this board, I was on the Hill when HC was a big factor in both football and basketball. But especially basketball. We played b'ball at a "very high level" in those days, as George Blaney put it in an interview a few months ago. If confirmation were needed, Coach Self said about the same thing before our game with Kansas last year. Those days are gone forever, however much we we diehards may wish it were otherwise. The decisions to join the Patriot League and not to join the Big East in the mid-80s were the keys. Much though I hate to admit it, I don't think a small school like HC could have been successful in the Big East without corrupting itself academically. As for football, the PL with its Ivy connection is clearly where we belong until we can show we've outgrown it. Then maybe the CAA if that makes sense...athletically and academically. Bottom line: The old days are gone forever. No one mourns their passing more than yours truly. No one. But they ain't coming back. Until we succeed consistently in the PL, ain't no purpose in ruminating about other opportunities for football and b'ball. In hoc signo vinces.
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Post by sarasota on Feb 4, 2017 22:15:02 GMT -5
jkh67- Exactly. We would have been the perennial doormat in the BE.
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Post by cmo on Feb 5, 2017 13:18:05 GMT -5
Could have been Providence, no?
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Post by jkh67 on Feb 5, 2017 18:22:44 GMT -5
Could have been Providence, no? In my time, HC, Providence and UConn ruled New England basketball. We were never as good as Providence. So, I expect that we would have been behind them in the Big East as well. Hard to imagine we would not have been bottom of the barrel or close to it most years. The problem with big time college basketball is that it is a race to the bottom academically. This month's Crusader Nation features a nice article about George Blaney. It notes the time HC played then no. 1 West Virginia on national TV and Blaney guarded Jerry West in a 96-90 loss. Do I miss those days? Boy, do I. But times have changed and HC's academic reputation is much more important to me now than the success of the basketball team.
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Post by Xmassader on Feb 5, 2017 20:46:13 GMT -5
jkh67 Not as good as Providence in the mid to late '60s and early '70s. Every bit as good in the late '70s (Potter, Vicens, Perry era) when the Big East was formed. Doubt we would have been the Big East doormat in the early BE years. Probably better than Seton Hall, UConn and BC. On a par with Providence. Behind St. John's and G'town. And for an idea of where HC could be now in hoops, look no further than Xavier whom we beat in a home and home in the early '80s and now has ascended to the Big East. As for the impact on academics, look no further than the comparative academic standing of G'town, BC, Villanova and Xavier vis-a-vis HC when the BE was formed and now. In each case, HC's position was better in 1978-79. There's simply no evidence that HC in the Big East would have been academic Armageddon any more than when HC was a de facto Big East team from 1945 to 1978.
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Post by hchoops on Feb 5, 2017 21:25:31 GMT -5
Would we have been able to recruit similar basketball ability players with higher to significantly higher academic credentials than X, G'town, BC , Nova etc ?
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Post by Crosser on Feb 5, 2017 23:39:54 GMT -5
Yes
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