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Post by hchoops on Jun 19, 2019 20:25:36 GMT -5
It will be a challenge to improve the PL record significantly, no matter who is coaching.
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Post by WorcesterGray on Jun 19, 2019 20:46:52 GMT -5
It was going to be a challenge anyway. At this point, a change in directions may be more important than results in the near term.
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Post by possum on Jun 19, 2019 20:55:20 GMT -5
An unexpected development from the offseason is the loss of potential all league players by American, BU and Lehigh
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Post by bringbackcaro on Jun 19, 2019 20:58:59 GMT -5
It will be a challenge to improve the PL record significantly, no matter who is coaching. A challenge to improve upon a 6-12 10th place finish? A challenge to improve upon a .389 PL winning percentage? The guy replacing Emmett Davis at Colgate had bigger shoes to fill in terms of PL performance than HC’s next coach.
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 19, 2019 21:10:05 GMT -5
Can we just wish Bill Carmody, his wife Barbara, and his entire family the best? Many wanted him to retire. He has. Maybe not when some wanted him to but we don't know yet, and may never know, the circumstances of his timing. That is not something anyone can do about now. He's gone. Either wish him well or keep your silence.
Let's look forward and stop rehashing the past. He's gone. Milan Brown is gone. Sean Kearney is gone. Ralph Willard is gone. No fear that any of them are coming back. And, yes, Nate Pine and Dick Regan are gone too. They aren't coming back either.
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Post by Sons of Vaval on Jun 19, 2019 21:20:24 GMT -5
This is actually a really exciting time for HC athletics. Brand new facility, young and energetic football coach, young AD who has a chance to prove himself by hiring a great basketball coach.
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 19, 2019 21:20:44 GMT -5
Can we just wish Bill Carmody, his wife Barbara, and his entire family the best? Many wanted him to retire. He has. Maybe not when some wanted him to but we don't know yet, and may never know, the circumstances of his timing. That is not something anyone can do about now. He's gone. Either wish him well or keep your silence. Let's look forward and stop rehashing the past. He's gone. Milan Brown is gone. Sean Kearney is gone. Ralph Willard is gone. No fear that any of them are coming back. And, yes, Nate Pine and Dick Regan are gone too. They aren't coming back either. After reading this I have a strange desire to watch Jack Nicholson in "The Departed." I wish Coach Carmody and his family well. I enjoyed getting to know the coach through his interviews with Dick Lutsk. He started out reserved but loosened up as he and Dick got to know each other and moved beyond coach speak. Now it will be enjoyable to get to know a new coach via the pre and post game interviews.
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 19, 2019 21:24:23 GMT -5
Glad if I brought a smile to your day.
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Post by unhfan on Jun 20, 2019 7:16:37 GMT -5
There was such excitement when Coach was hired and now celebrated that he’s gone ya a tough business.
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Post by rgs318 on Jun 20, 2019 7:33:52 GMT -5
I hope we return to the Q+A session with a CROSSPORTS representative that we had in the now distant past. Perhaps it is time for a thread on "what would you like to ask the coach?" again. I also find the attitude of a coach toward doing such a session can be quite revealing as well as informative. It does help to establish a connection of the coach with HC fans early on. How about it, Dave...up for taking on the task?
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Post by lou on Jun 20, 2019 7:52:39 GMT -5
There was such excitement when Coach was hired and now celebrated that he’s gone ya a tough business. Celebrated by some, not celebrated by all.
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Post by alum on Jun 20, 2019 8:03:08 GMT -5
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 20, 2019 8:29:17 GMT -5
Very nice tribute. One thing I can celebrate about Holy Cross is we have not yet sold the naming rights of the head coach position. Posters on the Princeton Board have to type in two first names, two last names, two middle initials, one hyphen and one class year everytime they want to rip their coach. We don't have to, yet.🙂
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Post by jkh67 on Jun 20, 2019 8:32:24 GMT -5
There was such excitement when Coach was hired and now celebrated that he’s gone ya a tough business. I was one of the many who were excited by news that Carmody had been hired, but Iost a lot of my enthusiam after his media introduction. I may have misread him, but he struck me then as a low energy guy without a great deal of enthusiasm...as someone who might see the HC job as a relatively cushy transition from the Big Ten to retirement. Whether or not my initial assessment was fair, there is no disputing the reality that the program continued to flounder on his watch. That being said, basketball is just a game when all is said and done and I certainly wish him and his family (especially his wife) good fortune as they move on from Worcester to the next stage in their lives. I'm sure everyone else in the HC community does as well.
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 20, 2019 9:01:47 GMT -5
Good points. RW was the outlier among the five post Blaney coaches. Let's go get another outlier.
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Post by purplehaze on Jun 20, 2019 10:07:04 GMT -5
I'm always amazed how irrelevant our program has become. This story is two days old and the espn basketball page has not picked it up (while there's stories on Idaho U, and Loyola's lax player, Spencer). The PL site has not put the story out which is surprising. Only Princeton's site says something about Carmody ? Did the Globe or Herald have a story, did anyone see this in the 'transactions' section of their paper's sports section ?
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 20, 2019 10:50:55 GMT -5
I'm always amazed how irrelevant our program has become. This story is two days old and the espn basketball page has not picked it up (while there's stories on Idaho U, and Loyola's lax player, Spencer). The PL site has not put the story out which is surprising. Only Princeton's site says something about Carmody ? Did the Globe or Herald have a story, did anyone see this in the 'transactions' section of their paper's sports section ? I just did a search for Carmody at the Boston Globe. No mention of our Carmody and I noticed that the Globe no longer has a college heading in their sports section. High School sports retains a section, but not college. I've read the Globe (most) every day for sixty years and they used to have great college sports coverage. Ironically, the separation of BC from the other Regional D-1 schools may have played a factor. There is no need to cover the fabled BC-HC regional rivalry when it exists only in memory. I didn't bother searching the Herald. If a sink hole opened up in front of their office and swallowed a bus they wouldn't have the staff left to cover it. The T&G had a nice story but there were no reader comments a couple of days after when I checked. When Ralph left there were several comments after some of the articles IIRC. HC Sports has become the proverbial tree that falls in the forest.
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Post by timholycross on Jun 20, 2019 11:30:25 GMT -5
Glad if I brought a smile to your day. "Next time I tell you to dump a body in the marsh, I mean IN THE MARSH!. Not where some guy from John Hancock goes every Thursday......"
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Post by timholycross on Jun 20, 2019 11:35:23 GMT -5
I'm always amazed how irrelevant our program has become. This story is two days old and the espn basketball page has not picked it up (while there's stories on Idaho U, and Loyola's lax player, Spencer). The PL site has not put the story out which is surprising. Only Princeton's site says something about Carmody ? Did the Globe or Herald have a story, did anyone see this in the 'transactions' section of their paper's sports section ? I just did a search for Carmody at the Boston Globe. No mention of our Carmody and I noticed that the Globe no longer has a college heading in their sports section. High School sports retains a section, but not college. I've read the Globe (most) every day for sixty years and they used to have great college sports coverage. Ironically, the separation of BC from the other Regional D-1 schools may have played a factor. There is no need to cover the fabled BC-HC regional rivalry when it exists only in memory. I didn't bother searching the Herald. If a sink hole opened up in front of their office and swallowed a bus they wouldn't have the staff left to cover it. The T&G had a nice story but there were no reader comments a couple of days after when I checked. When Ralph left there were several comments after some of the articles IIRC. HC Sports has become the proverbial tree that falls in the forest. Other than Shank's downer article about last year's BC/HC game (no one writes a downer article better than old Dan, class of 1975) when was the last time one saw anything in The Globe about Holy Cross? I don't think they even had anything about Gibbons getting suspended. As far as BC goes, they recently wrote what seemed like an overly positive article about a grad transfer they picked up from USC (the guy's stats were not particularly noteworthy). Nothing about Blossom getting the HCAD job.
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Post by Pakachoag Phreek on Jun 20, 2019 11:49:14 GMT -5
Circulation of the T&G in 2017 was 33,000, a drop of 23% from 2016, and a far cry from the days when daily circulation was 125,000, and Sunday's probably higher yet. In 2018, daily circulation was 22,400. There are over 300,000 households in Worcester County, so the T&G is being delivered to one in 14 households.
For the 280,000+ households that don't subscribe to the T&G, how do they regularly get news about HC? That is, if they even cared.
IMO, an underlying presumption by some on this board is that the media coverage (and thus the audience) of HC sports today is not that much different from yesteryear. Hence, expectations, e.g., that HC could draw 2,500-3,000+, on average, playing HE in the DCU.
Given the circulation collapse of the T&G, and the Globe's inherent dis-interest in college sports these days (and the Herald is little more than a hollowed-out shell), how does HC get the word out on a sustained basis to generate continuing fan interest in a HC sport, whether football, basketball, or ice hockey?
The T&G newspaper is no longer locally, or regionally owned, so the owners don't give a rodent's behind about HC sports if HC students are not buying subscriptions. They do give a rodent's behind about controversy and scandal, because that sells newspapers. .
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 20, 2019 13:56:14 GMT -5
What's the likelihood that in 15-20 years, smaller colleges and universities, especially those that don't happen to have billion dollar endowments, simply say: "You know, it's nice that some of the kids get to play their favorite sport after high school but we are in the academic business of educating people and we simply can't afford to lose so much money and the [lack of] publicity that gets our good name out there isn't happening, so on a cost/benefit basis, we need to discontinue varsity sports. [If] we have facilities for the students to work out, have a pick-up game of basketball and some tennis courts, that's great."
I know, this sounds like Fr. Brooks on steroids, but I really wonder when/if this might happen. Thoughts?
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Post by KY Crusader 75 on Jun 20, 2019 14:20:34 GMT -5
I think we'll see (continue to see) smaller colleges closing shop in total with any savings that could come from cutting athletics being inadequate to save the school.
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 20, 2019 14:39:08 GMT -5
Mt. Ida College had a full varsity D-3 football team and a full slate of intercollegiate sports when it suddenly failed and went out of business. Their board and Administrators were not blessed with the same common sense that Mr. and Mrs. Sader '70, Sr. taught you. When Anna Maria and Becker implemented new full D-3 Football programs within the last decade or so I remember reading how it was not done on a whim but rather was calculated as being a necessary amenity for the upcoming survival wars. (not a direct quote) The T&G had some nice stories about the first recruits for Anna Maria Football and it was clear that many of these young men were motivated to continue the sport they loved in college and Anna Maria offering football contributed to their choosing to attend. The President also cited studies or current industry literature that showed the power of spectator sport football to knit together a college community and help it bond. We saw evidence of that in spectator sport basketball as the Nichols fans screamed all through their tournament game at the Hart Center.
But I think Mt. IDA showed you can't necessarily add amenities and programs to grow yourself out of a demographic death cycle. Each college has to figure out how to right size itself to match market realities in it's niche as well as it's underlying financial strength. My instinct would be to cut sports rather than add them if I had a say at a small college nearing the brink, and put any resources into providing the educational programs most in demand in that region. I'm sure Mt. Ida tried to do that with Funeral Services, Vet Technician and other programs but it wasn't enough.
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Post by td128 on Jun 20, 2019 14:45:24 GMT -5
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Post by hc87 on Jun 20, 2019 14:53:17 GMT -5
The Boston media has nevah really been a big college athletics boostah in general (speaking from my personal perspective of the early 1970s onward). Holy Cross football was covered by the Boston papers (particularly the Globe) back in the 70s and 80s (I think Peter Gammons covered some games in the '70s) but it dropped off once Duffner left and as others have noted here, really is hardly covered there today. The Boston TV stations used to show HC hoop highlights then too. Maybe due somewhat to both alums Brian Leary and Clark Booth working at Boston stations then.
Same factors at play as we've discussed here ad nauseum....HC is no longah playing BC routinely in hoop or football, the Patriot League may as well be the Mid American Conference to most people in Weymouth and Natick, college sports in general have taken a huge drop in interest in Greater Boston relative to the pro franchises etc etc
Holy Cross hiring a new men's basketball coach is akin to say UMass-Lowell hiring a new hockey coach today in the Boston media...actually, it's probably not as big a story as that would be sadly.
We are basically to the Boston media market in terms of athletics today.
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