Watching SJU / UCONN Big East Tourney

[SUFaninNJ]

The guitarist/bass player from Genesis now tweets about basketball? Seems like a strange retirement choice.

 

[Cuse181]

The ACC will drastically change. Will it remain Power 4? Our football is on the way up but our basketball team belongs in the Big East. A NE school in a southern conference is a hard sell for basketball recruiting. Basketball recruiting is more regional than football. I don't expect our basketball team to ever be successful in the ACC. Perhaps we will become a football oriented school? From day 1 the move to the ACC was a move to save the football team while sacrificeing the basketball team. It appears that the move will meet its goals.

Most north eastern basketball players don’t even play in the north east anymore, they go to basketball factory high schools across the country. If regional recruiting mattered then the Big 12 would be filled with scrub teams.

 

[DilemaCuse]

Alabama can get top kids from the northeast, but we can’t because of the ACC. That’s not logical.

Good point they have 2 from NYC. I think last year's elite 8 Kstate team had 3 or 4 from NYC. It's about proper evaluation and relationship building. Both had been bad the last 10 years between Jim just going through the motions and the awful PG recruiting, and trying to find tall SGs to convert them to PGs. Center recruiting, skinny projects that take time w limited offensive skills, having to play Forwards at center (Marek, Jimmy Jr, Maliq) not being able to retain Kadary, Frank A, Jessie. That's why the program has failed, has nothing to do w the ACC.

 

[AlaskaSU]

You constantly blame our struggles on the conference while ignoring the fact that other schools in the ACC, BIG and SEC are getting plenty of talent from the Northeast.

Our former coach is responsible for our mediocrity - not the ACC.

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

 

[DilemaCuse]

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

Because Duke and UNC can't collect every 5 star, lol. We actually have a 5 star signed this class. How? Relationships w Straughn, an engaged head coach etc.

 

[MSOrange]

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

Yes I'm sure PItt's situation had everything to do with the ACC and nothing to do with hiring Kevin Stallings.

You might read this link and see if it sounds familiar.

Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Bayside44]

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

Pitt fired Dixon and replaced him with Kevin Willard.

Nova is as generic as the next team now. Jay Wright figured it out at the height of his powers (and while UConn was down).

The Kenny Andersons and Adrian Autrys don't do four years at Catholic high schools anymore (neither does Donnie Freeman). These kids are extremely portable.

 

[SU91]

Because Duke and UNC can't collect every 5 star, lol. We actually have a 5 star signed this class. How? Relationships w Straughn, an engaged head coach etc.

AlaskaSU makes good points as do you. It’s a bit of everything. The program has been teetering for years now.

I think a particularly good point that AlaskaSU makes is about the fact that SU is at best third fiddle in the acc, but more likely fourth or possibly fifth. At worst we are middling or dare I say bottom tier. Whereas, in the old BE, SU is where players came if they wanted to play for conference championships and beyond. So, again, I think the point he was trying to make is, players aren’t flocking to SU anymore if it means they’ll just be playing for an also-ran. Why bother when they can just head to Duke or UNC? Or, they can go elsewhere and at least have a shot at winning while SU is stuck in neutral.

So, all the things you said are 100% accurate but the ACC move and our decline is no coincidence either.

 

[NKR1978]

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

Pitt made one of the dumbest hires in history in Kevin Stallings.

We also had years where we were at a recruiting disadvantage because of the sanctions. And on top of that, we were hamstrung by a coach who mailed it in for the last eight years of recruiting. If we had a full staff allowed to recruit and a legendary head coach who actually tried, I have a feeling we would’ve won some of those battles, despite being in the ACC and not being Duke or Carolina.

 

[NKR1978]

Pitt fired Dixon and replaced him with Kevin Willard.

Nova is as generic as the next team now. Jay Wright figured it out at the height of his powers (and while UConn was down).

The Kenny Andersons and Adrian Autrys don't do four years at Catholic high schools anymore (neither does Donnie Freeman). These kids are extremely portable.

Kevin Stallings. Much worse than Kevin Willard.

 

[FrancoPizza]

You constantly blame our struggles on the conference while ignoring the fact that other schools in the ACC, BIG and SEC are getting plenty of talent from the Northeast.

Our former coach is responsible for our mediocrity - not the ACC.

Some people just find it easier to invent excuses than to accept reality.

 

[Cusefan0307]

Look at Pitt. They were a perennial Nationally ranked team. Look at Nova they stayed and won. UCon is back in the BE and is doing a 1,000 times better than us. NE teams have trouble recruiting in the ACC. Why should a 5* who wants to play in the ACC go to Cuse instead of Duke or Carolina?

USC, UW etc. are about to find out that their future recruiting will not what it was.

This is the dumbest argument ever. Our recruiting immediately upticked when JB retired. Last I checked Donovan Freeman was 5 stars.

 

[OrangeinBoston]

Can we go back to the Big East? This tourney is and always was, the pinnacle of college hoops. At MSG. Fans on the court. Crazy atmosphere... I miss it so.

Never.

 

[DilemaCuse]

AlaskaSU makes good points as do you. It’s a bit of everything. The program has been teetering for years now.

I think a particularly good point that AlaskaSU makes is about the fact that SU is at best third fiddle in the acc, but more likely fourth or possibly fifth. At worst we are middling or dare I say bottom tier. Whereas, in the old BE, SU is where players came if they wanted to play for conference championships and beyond. So, again, I think the point he was trying to make is, players aren’t flocking to SU anymore if it means they’ll just be playing for an also-ran. Why bother when they can just head to Duke or UNC? Or, they can go elsewhere and at least have a shot at winning while SU is stuck in neutral.

So, all the things you said are 100% accurate but the ACC move and our decline is no coincidence either.

Agreed, the decline is not solely from the move to the ACC, its from a combination of things.
2014-Lose Ennis and Grant, probably a year earlier than anticipated.
2015-Towards end of the season, Sanctions come. Limited our scholarships, off campus recruiting.
That led JB to having to agree to succession plan. It also made him follow his ps and Qs, meaning he cant get a 3rd NCAA violation or else he will be fired and all but banned from college coaching, it would be a really black mark on his legacy. He's lucky he survived the 2nd and it hasn't hurt him post coaching as its rarely brought up.
2016-Final 4 as a 10 seed. Not the prettiest regular season but great postseason
2017-NIT, Succession nuked, Hop leaves for UW.
Now he's recruiting w Gerry and not Hop and probably avoiding any recruit who starts asking for things out of compliance. Then Buddy comes followed by Joe and his loyalty to those 2 makes it hard to recruit a quality guard willing to play limited minutes while they start.

I could go on and on, point is, none of these things I mentioned have anything to do with the ACC. They are all our failures as a program, bad luck, leadership, letting Jim stay too long, etc.

 

[NKR1978]

Agreed, the decline is not solely from the move to the ACC, its from a combination of things.
2014-Lose Ennis and Grant, probably a year earlier than anticipated.
2015-Towards end of the season, Sanctions come.
That led JB to having to agree to succession plan. It also made him follow his ps and Qs, meaning he cant get a 3rd NCAA violation or else he will be fired and all but banned from college coaching, it would be a really black mark on his legacy. He's lucky he survived the 2nd and it hasn't hurt him post coaching as its rarely brought up.
2016-Final 4 as a 10 seed. Not the prettiest regular season but great postseason
2017-NIT, Succession nuked, Hop leaves for UW.
Now he's recruiting w Gerry and not Hop and probably avoiding any recruit who starts asking for things out of compliance. Then Buddy comes followed by Joe and his loyalty to those 2 makes it hard to recruit a quality guard willing to play limited minutes while they start.

I could go on and on, point is, none of these things I mentioned have anything to do with the ACC. They are all our failures as a program, leadership, letting Jim stay too long, etc.

And every single one of those things would’ve happened if we were still in the Big East.

 

[Bayside44]

Kevin Stallings. Much worse than Kevin Willard.

My bad! Kevin Willard is,,,ok. Stallings was awful. Great hair though...

 

[DilemaCuse]

And every single one of those things would’ve happened if we were still in the Big East.

Exactly!

We would have had struggles in the Big East if we stayed.

I remember losing to bad Gtown and St. Johns teams in recent years, soo...

 

[Bayside44]

This is the dumbest argument ever. Our recruiting immediately upticked when JB retired. Last I checked Donovan Freeman was 5 stars.

Yeah, and there were massive recruiting misses, kids being hand delivered here yet turned down. Time to move on.

 

[SU91]

And every single one of those things would’ve happened if we were still in the Big East.

I wish we could run a regression and see what variable most closely correlates with our decline. I do think the ACC move is a variable, but it’s not the only one. This horse has been beaten but as Dilemacuse points out, sanctions have to be the dominant variable in explaining the decline (and all the tangential issues that developed out of them). People like to discount them because so much time has passed but sometimes the effects take time. The NCAA’s intention was to cripple the SU program. They succeeded with their plan.

 

[Cheriehoop]

Agreed, the decline is not solely from the move to the ACC, its from a combination of things.
2014-Lose Ennis and Grant, probably a year earlier than anticipated.
2015-Towards end of the season, Sanctions come.
That led JB to having to agree to succession plan. It also made him follow his ps and Qs, meaning he cant get a 3rd NCAA violation or else he will be fired and all but banned from college coaching, it would be a really black mark on his legacy. He's lucky he survived the 2nd and it hasn't hurt him post coaching as its rarely brought up.
2016-Final 4 as a 10 seed. Not the prettiest regular season but great postseason
2017-NIT, Succession nuked, Hop leaves for UW.
Now he's recruiting w Gerry and not Hop and probably avoiding any recruit who starts asking for things out of compliance. Then Buddy comes followed by Joe and his loyalty to those 2 makes it hard to recruit a quality guard willing to play limited minutes while they start.

I could go on and on, point is, none of these things I mentioned have anything to do with the ACC. They are all our failures as a program, leadership, letting Jim stay too long, etc.

An addition is the huge effect of athletic director changes, direction and employees evolving from the Daryl Gross era that ended on June 2015, then the hiring of Mark Coyle and his quick subsequent resignation in May 2016 followed by the hiring of John Wildhack in July 2016. There had to be terrible confusion, lack of leadership during a critical time when we were suffering with major sanctions and so much uncertainty with and for coaches effecting the direction of SU athletics as a whole. Remember too that JB and Hop were working as Olympic assistants in 2016 in Brazil. Had to be a constant succession of wild, chaotic, uncertain times for all during a very critical period of challenges and massive changes.

 

[orangecuse]

Good point they have 2 from NYC. I think last year's elite 8 Kstate team had 3 or 4 from NYC. It's about proper evaluation and relationship building. Both had been bad the last 10 years between Jim just going through the motions and the awful PG recruiting, and trying to find tall SGs to convert them to PGs. Center recruiting, skinny projects that take time w limited offensive skills, having to play Forwards at center (Marek, Jimmy Jr, Maliq) not being able to retain Kadary, Frank A, Jessie. That's why the program has failed, has nothing to do w the ACC.

100%!

The "football drives the bus" folks weren't wrong as another poster alluded, that's a fact. Unfortunately, what no one had the foresight of knowing, was just how JB was going to operate once we got the ACC invite. His mindset, unflattering comments about the ACC move coincided with his actions, in-actions, etc. Add on his inherent rigidness and inability to adapt, etc. to a style that no longer was effective in the Steph Curry era of hoops, well, it was 'the perfect storm' so to speak of the basketball program's plight.

"You could be a meteorologist (Syracuse basketball fan) all your life... and never see something like this. It would be a disaster of epic proportions. It would be... 'the perfect storm.'"

 

[djorange1989]

well football is worse , hoops is worse , lax is worse since joining the ACC.
guess soccer drives the bus.

Better than being U Conn in football. And football isn’t worse, it was decent for two Marrone years in the BE and beyond that it mostly sucked post McNabb. No guarantee we would still be great in hoops if we stayed in the Big East, Boeheim refusing to acknowledge it was time to go crushed us. football would probably be a crappy 1-11 independent team. I hate the ACC for hoops but had to do it. Would love to go back to the BE for hoops if the moron powers that be seperate football as it’s own entity and then re-do conferences for all other sports

 

[AlaskaSU]

Pitt made one of the dumbest hires in history in Kevin Stallings.

We also had years where we were at a recruiting disadvantage because of the sanctions. And on top of that, we were hamstrung by a coach who mailed it in for the last eight years of recruiting. If we had a full staff allowed to recruit and a legendary head coach who actually tried, I have a feeling we would’ve won some of those battles, despite being in the ACC and not being Duke or Carolina.

I don't believe that JB mailed it in. His competitiveness is in his genes. He was the closer while staff recruited. The formula only stopped working when we left the BE.

 

[MSOrange]

I don't believe that JB mailed it in. His competitiveness is in his genes. He was the closer while staff recruited. The formula only stopped working when we left the BE.

Again you don't believe anything that doesn't fit your narrative.

Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[tbonezone]

Better than being U Conn in football. And football isn’t worse, it was decent for two Marrone years in the BE and beyond that it mostly sucked post McNabb. No guarantee we would still be great in hoops if we stayed in the Big East, Boeheim refusing to acknowledge it was time to go crushed us. football would probably be a crappy 1-11 independent team. I hate the ACC for hoops but had to do it. Would love to go back to the BE for hoops if the moron powers that be seperate football as it’s own entity and then re-do conferences for all other sports

sorry i guess you missed the McPherson,Graves ,Mcnabb teams. the pearl, rony/dc/sherm stevie, etc gangs , the league titles, top 20 ranked teams and that kid named carmelo . the gaits ,the powells, the final 4 lax streak...
yes the big east days were AWFUL . we are SO much better now in the ACC...NOT!!!