I think Butch coached at Furman for 9 years. 4 losing seasons including his last 2. One 20 win season. 5 winning seasons. Good coach, yes. Great coach ?
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FU vs. ETSU (Semifinals March 4th 6:30pm)
Those of us who support Furman generally expect and want to win, and we do not care for excuses. BR can win here, we want him to win here, and we expect him to win here. ETSU has some advantages we do not have, but we have plenty they do not have. I would assess that, right now, Steve Forbes is the best coach in the Socon, followed by Mike Young and Wes Miller, with Bob and Hoffman in the top pack. A few years ago, I would have said that Wes Miller was over his head.
Coaching is an art and not a science. You get better at it with experience. Bob has tons of upside, and I think we have the right guy for Furman. I am bummed the run ended, but I am happy with the direction. We have a program in which the University can take pride, for work on and off the court.
Coaching is an art and not a science. You get better at it with experience. Bob has tons of upside, and I think we have the right guy for Furman. I am bummed the run ended, but I am happy with the direction. We have a program in which the University can take pride, for work on and off the court.
Butch is great in comparison to any of the three coaches that came after him...Each one made Furman supporters long for a "good coach" again...Furman got that with Medved and Richey, although I don't think Davis was necessarily bad...Just not the right fit for Furman hoops...Good guy though...He at least seemed committed.
Keep winning and we will get a big kid like the Haas kid at Purdue wanting to come to Furman.
"Now remember, when things look bad and it looks like you're not gonna make it, then you gotta get mean. I mean plumb, mad-dog mean.
'Cause if you lose your head and you give up then you neither live nor win. That's just the way it is.”
Josey Wales
'Cause if you lose your head and you give up then you neither live nor win. That's just the way it is.”
Josey Wales
Your opinions carry some weight, john. I could not agree more about JJ. His relegation to the end of the bench this season is a mystery.
That is generally very true but there are often other considerations that can cloud that decision making. That can be a factor in player evaluation for instance when a coach has recruited one player very hard and has a closer relationship with that player over another - it's human nature. I am not referring to any specific players or situations with this team and have no knowledge of any. Plus it only applies to players of very similar talent levels.The Jackal wrote: ↑Mon Mar 05, 2018 12:32 pmI'm sure I can second guess coaches, but there comes a point when you have to recognize that (1) one guy is in charge, (2) he is at every practice and every game, and (3) there is nobody (literally nobody) that has more riding on the success of the team than he does.Jasper wrote: ↑Mon Mar 05, 2018 12:08 pmYou are reading my mind today, 91. Jonathan Jean's absence is a total mystery to me. He is a penetrating, slashing guard with great court vision and finishing moves. He looks good every time he gets a bit of playing time and was a substantial spot contributor in past years. I have no idea what kind of practice player he might be however.Paladin91 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 04, 2018 9:01 pmI think Bob Richey had a tremendous year for his first year. It will be interesting to see this team next year without Sibley, Davis, and Fowler. Maybe it's just me, but I'm not sure why Brown is a starter on the court. You get a lot more athleticism out of Mounce. And whatever happened to Jonathan Jean? He didn't look bad in late minutes against WCU, but never gets playing time.
If a guy does not play, I presume that the man with the most at stake has a good reason for making that decision.
Back to the game, here are some not so fun facts:
FU's 52 points was by far the lowest score of the year, next lowest was 61 against Tennessee.
It was ETSU's second lowest point total by 2 points, they scored 61 against Kentucky.
That is what makes last night's game hard to swallow. ETSU was very beatable and had one of their worst games too. If FU just plays an average game, a win was probable. Unfortunately we all know FU had it's worst game of the season.
FU's 52 points was by far the lowest score of the year, next lowest was 61 against Tennessee.
It was ETSU's second lowest point total by 2 points, they scored 61 against Kentucky.
That is what makes last night's game hard to swallow. ETSU was very beatable and had one of their worst games too. If FU just plays an average game, a win was probable. Unfortunately we all know FU had it's worst game of the season.
Against WCU he was 2-4, 2 layups, 0-1 from 3, no rebounds, no assists. This was in the last 4 mins of a game where the other team was down 25 and had given up. Why does this warrant a starting position or increased PT. Brady Schuck was 1-2 from 3, maybe he needs more PT? I think I will refer to CBR that sees all payers every day. Hope JJ is awesome next year. If he is I am sure he will get PT. BTW so far the championship game is just as ugly as the 2 semi-finals. Man this tournament was so winnable. I am sick!
What amazes me when watching all these low-major tournament finals every year is how frequent it is for a dark horse, low seeded team to win the championship. 4, 5, 6, 7 or higher seeds are not unusual. Every year that FU doesn't make it (or The Citadel having never been), I always think how remarkable it is that the Paladins have never won in an upset (4 pts away in 2015) over these last 38 years. However, in looking at the SoCon record book, it just never happens. The last time a team that wasn't a regular season champion, a co-champion or in the top 2-3 won the tourney was 1988-89 with ETSU, who was fourth. I didn't go back any farther to find a lower-seeded team that won. That's stunning to me. For the SoCon it's a good thing. One of your best teams is in the tourney and has a shot at an upset. But certainly doesn't give the lower-seeded teams much hope.
If you had told me before the game that we would hold them to 63 points I would have expected a close to double digit win instead of a loss. ETSU played a tough aggressive defense and disrupted our ability to get to the basket, but if we shot the three at our average SoCon percentage we win by 5 or 6 and if we had knocked down more FTs, including the points lost by missing the front end of one-and-ones, we still win by double digits.
Simple as that. Of course, not always so simple on the court.
Simple as that. Of course, not always so simple on the court.
Yeah, the SoCon ranked between #16 and #22 of 32 conferences this year. Definitely in the middle. If the bottom five teams hadn't been so poor the conference would have been closer to#12 than #32. The top three teams are all top 100.fufanatic, why do you keep saying that the SoCon is a low major conference? I have always considered it mid-major. At one time this season I think the SoCon had 4 teams in the MID-Major poll so that alone would not make it a low-major.
I am not referring to the last 4 minutes of one game, I am talking about Jean's body of work over the previous two seasons. As soconjohn pointed out, he is a highly recruited player who saw significant playing time before this year. It is odd that a player of that caliber would slip to a walk on roll. Several posters are simply wondering why. And since you refer to the one game, his 2 "layups" were created by him with good drives to the hoop against a team that had certainly not given up. They had their first team in the game and were inexplicably full court pressing us and allowing the ball to roll up court after made shots to save seconds. That was Jean breaking that frantic press with fine dribbling and passing.apaladin wrote: ↑Mon Mar 05, 2018 9:33 pmAgainst WCU he was 2-4, 2 layups, 0-1 from 3, no rebounds, no assists. This was in the last 4 mins of a game where the other team was down 25 and had given up. Why does this warrant a starting position or increased PT. Brady Schuck was 1-2 from 3, maybe he needs more PT? I think I will refer to CBR that sees all payers every day. Hope JJ is awesome next year. If he is I am sure he will get PT. BTW so far the championship game is just as ugly as the 2 semi-finals. Man this tournament was so winnable. I am sick!
I am not sure what to say about Jean. Other than that I trust the coaches to make the right decision. His minutes were taken by Alex Hunter, who played quite well in that role.
I fully expect us to purchase another post-season tourney bid. That will enable Bob Richey to claim a school record 3rd consecutive post-season appearance. I was appalled to to see the recent post-season appearances compared (see Feb. 20 Senior Day Paladin Points) to the teams of the 70's that played in the NCAA tourney. Give me a break, we are not close to those great teams. Same goes for 4-year win totals. The 2018 class lost 11 more games than any of the 8 teams that they were compared to. I'll have to check to see how many times we beat the likes of Bob Jones, Montreat and Piedmont International back in the 70's and early 80's.fufanatic wrote: ↑Sun Mar 04, 2018 8:21 pmI think what hurts the most - besides another year of no NCAA Tourney - is that this phenomenal senior class that completely changed the program around only went to one SoCon Tourney final ... and it was their freshmen year on an awful team that got hot at the right time. Just doesn't seem right. As much as it will be hard to stomach another CIT, I hope the team gives it a go. Would be fun to win a title if their heart is in it.
In this scenario I was thinking more of the other conferences like the MAAC, Northeast, etc. But you're probably right, although I think it's right there on the border. When I think of mid-major, I think of the conferences that get more of the 10-12 seeds in the tourney, whereas the SoCon is usually in the 13-14 range (a handful of exceptions in recent years). I also think of conferences that have some success in the NCAAs, which the SoCon does not except Davidson in 2008 and Chattanooga all the way back in 1997. Before that it was ETSU in 1992 and Chattanooga in 1982. I also think of conferences that get some national pub during the year, which the SoCon usually does not. I also think of conferences that have at least one team that can sneak into the rankings during the year, which the SoCon does not and hasn't since Davidson walked out the door a few years back and Steph Curry went pro. Lastly, I think of conferences that in a really good year could get an at-large team, which the SoCon couldn't unless a team went 30-3, lost in the finals by one point and there weren't a ton of upsets across major college basketball.
However, if this group of UNCG, ETSU, Wofford and Furman can grow together, continue with some big regular season upsets, and make some noise in the NCAA/NIT, that could go a long way to cementing the status of the league as an elite mid-major. Just my two cents.
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