The road ahead - Part II

It's the PL
What happens if everybody loses every game?

If everyone is healthy, no reason not to win a play in game on the road.

I agree.  It is highly likely the bballs get put away a week from tomorrow.  (Of course in today's age, the balls never get put away, at least for long.  What a commitment these men and women make).  

People were more or less healthy yesterday.  If this inconsistent team plays well next Tuesday, they should be able to win.  They still need to play well

Based on Coulibaly's lack of participation in senior day, I suspect there are no scholarships available unless someone slated to be on the team next year leaves through the portal

Pretty close to a full healthy season this year.  26 out of 29 games played.  Only two players have played in every game, 

Wills wasn't and Batch had a subpar game.   Wills was sorely missed yesterday.   Any idea what the recovery time is for whatever ails his finger?

I would say yes, he does. I like seeing how the team has developed this year (as opposed to recent years) and I believe we have some good talent on the way thanks to his staff's recruiting.

Limiting portal defections after the season will be telling. DP already saved Bo last off-season which is encouraging.

If anyone thinks this first season is some kind of new experience for Paulsen:

Bucknell:
2008 (Flannery): 12-19
2009 (Paulsen): 7-23
2010 (Paulsen): 14-17
2011 (Paulsen): 25-9
2012 (Paulsen): 25-10
2013 (Paulsen): 28-6

Mason:
2015 (Hewitt): 9-22
2016 (Paulsen): 11-21
2017 (Paulsen): 20-14
2018 (Paulsen): 16-17
2019 (Paulsen): 18-15

CDP has more than a bit of experience with rough first years in new gigs. Ironically, it took longer to turn things around at Bucknell, but he reached a much higher ceiling there, with a quicker turn to 20 wins at Mason that proved not sustainable.

I think DP's situation when he took over at Bucknell was VERY different than the situation he inherited at HC.    Yes, Bucknell had gone 12-19 the previous year, but the three previous years, which were still fresh in the minds of the players DP's staff recruited, were:

2007 (Flannery) 22-9 (13-1 PL) - reguar season co-champ
2006 (Flannery) 27-5 (14-0 PL) - regular season champ, PLT winner
2005 (Flannery) 23-10 (10-4 PL) - PLT winner

Also note that those teams played FAR tougher schedules than any that a Brett Nelson team played.  And all three teams were in the nation's top 100 (Pomeroy).   As you likely recall, the 2006 team finished in the nation's top 25 in the USA Today Coaches Poll.   That kind of success was only 13 months removed when the DP era began at Bucknell and they began recruiting.

One further piece of background info is that the 2008 team was plagued by injury.   Their starting center suffered a serious knee injury halfway through the season.  Starting PF tore his ACL in July - returned in less than 5 1/2 months but was not the same player.   Part-time starting wing tore MCL and missed significant time.  Part-time starting SG had several different injuries and saw very limited playing time.   And during this time, Flannery was battling serious health issues that eventually forced him to step down.    So it was a down year, but certainly not a program that had collapsed, and there were two highly recruited players about to arrive.

One other thing that helped the DP regime recruit was the Bucknell fan base and arena.  Despite the bad year in 2007-08, BU still averaged 3400 fans per game - the best in the PL by a wide margin - and was playing in the nicest arena in the PL.   All of that helped recruiting, as Bucknell was way ahead of most northeastern mid-majors in those categories.    It was a great job to inherit, which is why they had a huge number of applicants, including Joe and James Jones, Sean Kearney (who thankfully was quickly eliminated), and a bunch of others with name recognition.