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Message: [QUOTE="RF2044, post: 2007943, member: 40"] Are you also familiar with the expression that hindsight is 20/20? It is easy to criticize things now, with the season unfolding as a natural disaster, but not one poster expected nor predicted things to happen the way that they have. Because this level of debacle is unprecedented in the Jim Boeheim era. It wasn't "irrational" nor "exuberance" -- none other than James Arthur Boeheim himself told Andy Katz before the season that "this is [B]the best[/B] team we've had in a long time.'' This is a coach who normally sells expectations short, and is hardly effusive with praise. He did the opposite this preseason--was he "irrationally exuberant," or do you think he genuinely believed that this team had the potential to be something great? Nobody saw this epic disaster coming--and it would be completely revisionist to claim otherwise. What we're seeing play out defies explanation--it honestly does. In JB's 40+ years at the helm, it isn't a stretch to suggest that we've never had a team perform as badly as this one has, or underachieve to the extent this one is. Systemic failures on many levels, from the coaching staff on down to the players. The whole is exponentially less than the sum of the individual parts. I can definitely accept that some of my predictions were wrong--most notably the one about this being a top 5 wire to wire caliber team. I've never been a poster who's even cared much about my predictions coming true, or what I say proving right.** Who cares? I do these practice reports because I'm lucky to have a limited ability to have access to hoops practice, and I offer them as my observations / insight as a former player, lifelong fan, and student of the game. People are free to read them, consider them, agree with them, or disagree with them. But I try to be pragmatic and objective about the observations and the player analysis, and I'm still occasionally wrong. Just like everybody else. But I think it is safe to say that JB--a HOF coach--had similar expectations for this team as what I suggested in this write up, based upon his preseason comments. It wasn't "irrational exuberance." Some of the players haven't played to their potential, this group collectively isn't gelling, and the majority of them seem to not play with the necessary level of effort. I couldn't have predicted that latter issue--I figured coming off of a Final Four run, that Lydon, Howard, Roberson, and Coleman were keenly aware of what it takes to succeed at that level and would whip the rest of the team into shape. I also though that Howard / Gillon / Battle would play much better than they have. Oops. **I'll admit that one issue that stuck in my craw and made me dig in my heels this year was the arguments over whether White had the skills to be a 2. But that is because there was so much negative backlash directed my way over my observations over his limitations. I stuck to my guns and pushed back, and got dragged into a bunch of tiresome arguments over this issue that could and should have probably been avoided, and which were probably quite tedious for the rest of the board. [/QUOTE]

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