A realistic view

[Peacone36]

seeing a lot of "return to glory" and "tradition" posts in regards to our basketball program. You guys realize that our basketball programs greatness exists only in the Bobby Cremins era right? We are simply trying to re-establish competitiveness at this point. To think that we are UNC following Doherty is preposterous. We need a guy to simply make us competitive again. We aren't trying to revisit a UCLA championship run, a 90's Duke Dominance or a UNC steady hand. We are trying to get back to top level competitiveness. We have NEVER been a dominant program in terms of basketball but that doesn't mean we should strive towards it.

Bryce Drew is a good hire.
Jeff Capel would have been a good hire.

Either way I just wanna have people addres my fan hood without a giggle.

 

[Madison Grant]

I disagree. I'm not comparing us remotely to UNC in any way, but we are the victims of back-to-back crap coaches and bad contracts, and still went to the final 4 in 2004 with one of those bad coaches. And let's be honest. Cremins never really was a great coach, just a great recruiter. With a good coach, we could rise very quickly.

 

[Peacone36]

Eh. Where were we before he got here?


Don't confuse me. This program has an opportunity to be great but some of you guys treat it like Waltons UCLA and that just isn't the case. We aren't there.


But we can be very good

 

[forensicbuzz]

Under Cremins (who was notoriously a bad bench coach), we were highly competitive against very good Duke, UNC, NS State, Virginia, Wake and Maryland teams. Clemson and FSU (2nd half of Cremins's term) were just ok. We weren't world-beaters, but we were competitive. When we started falling off that level is when Hewitt was brought in.

 

[lv20gt]

Under Cremins (who was notoriously a bad bench coach), we were highly competitive against very good Duke, UNC, NS State, Virginia, Wake and Maryland teams. Clemson and FSU (2nd half of Cremins's term) were just ok. We weren't world-beaters, but we were competitive. When we started falling off that level is when Hewitt was brought in.

No, started falling off at the end of Cremins' time here.

I agree with Pea. We first need to get back to the level Hewitt had us, which was an NCAAT about 50% of the time and within a game of .500 in conference 8/11 times. If the next coach, whoever it is, can do that then they will have plenty of time to improve on that, but first things first. We need to undo the damage gregory did before we hope to be great again.

 

[forensicbuzz]

I see it differently. I see Gregory as having fixed what lazy-Hewitt screwed up. Now that the academic side is fixed, we need someone, with integrity, that can maintain what Gregory fixed and recruit back to the level that ambitious-Hewitt accomplished (before his ego got too big and he lost all the assistants that could coach).

You mis-interpreted my comment about falling off. I was saying that when Cremins teams started to fall off competitively, that's when Hewitt was brought in.

 

[LawTalkin Jacket]

I hear what you're saying, but GT IMO is a sleeping giant, with potential to be better than every team in ACC except UNC, dOOK and 'Ville. Location is perfect, arena is great and a lot of local talent. So the hire could be seen as someone who must take us to Final Fours, a la UCLA etc.

Although NCState is willing to spend, we are better situated as we are not in NC and the step child there, we have a better city, although they are the only game in town in Raleigh. We can attract GA talent and they have to fight UNC DOOK for NC talent. So if we can match $ with other programs, we can be as good as we want.

Also, FSU was on the move, but fans don't care and will always be a FB school. Miami was a sleeping giant and only lacks fan support, great city, local talent and with $ to pay coaches, should be great, only down side is its a FB school too and compete with Heat.

Anyway, coaching hire should be expected to take Tech to high level, as good as UVa and nipping at UNC and DOOK. Get it right, MBob!

 

[lv20gt]

Gregory fixing the academics is a myth.

GT had a single year APR score of the following.

07-08 - 840.
08-09 -953
09-10 -~ 960
10-11 - 1000 <--- Hewitt's last year.
11-12 - 1000
12-13 - 1000

The big improvement in APR didn't happen under gregory. It happened under Hewitt. The fix was already in when gregory was hired, and the administration made a big deal about it only because they knew it would be something to point to and claim the new coach improved, justifying the hire that they knew was bad. The truth is no matter who we hired, they were likely going to "fix" the issue.

And the APR is a joke anyways. In theory it's about graduating players. In reality that's not the case at all, else gregory wouldn't be seen as the academic savior. It's about having eligibility at the end of the spring semester. Because of that the mass amounts of transfers we had actually helped our APR despite not actually graduating from GT because they were forced to keep eligibility in order to play for their new school. The biggest threat to APR scores is players skipping out on their last semester in order to prepare for the NBA draft, because people who will be spending the next decade in the NBA preparing for the NBA is apparently a bad thing according to the NCAA. But when you don't bring in any talent that is NBA level, that isn't an issue.

gregory did nothing impressive academically. What would be impressive is if the new coach was able to have a high APR score while actually bringing in potential NBA players.

 

[Boaty1]

seeing a lot of "return to glory" and "tradition" posts in regards to our basketball program. You guys realize that our basketball programs greatness exists only in the Bobby Cremins era right? We are simply trying to re-establish competitiveness at this point. To think that we are UNC following Doherty is preposterous. We need a guy to simply make us competitive again. We aren't trying to revisit a UCLA championship run, a 90's Duke Dominance or a UNC steady hand. We are trying to get back to top level competitiveness. We have NEVER been a dominant program in terms of basketball but that doesn't mean we should strive towards it.

Bryce Drew is a good hire.
Jeff Capel would have been a good hire.

Either way I just wanna have people addres my fan hood without a giggle.

A realistic view would include the recruiting juggernaut we were from 85-2009. We had a 25 year stretch we we recruited on par with the likes of Kentucky. To discount the amount of talent we brought in from HS and the amount of talent we put into the NBA is counterproductive if you are a GT fan. You measure a program by the amount of talent that program can bring in and both Cremins and Hewitt showed there are literally only a handful of schools in the modern era that can attract recruits at the level of GT. How a GT fan can ignore the potential of our program is both mystifying and infuriating.

 

[jacketup]

Cremins' ACC career record was under .500.

Every good Cremins team had a superstar point guard or a coach's son point guard. In other words, a coach on the floor. Cremins was an outstanding recruiter, his kids liked him and wanted to win for him, but he was no X's and O's guy or student of the game.

There is no real basketball tradition at GT. But that doesn't mean GT can't have one going forward. GT has a lot to sell and is well situated. I have serious doubts that the administration cares, however.

Side Note:
It is possible to be a good basketball team with something less than a great PG if the coach knows what he is doing.

 

[Boaty1]

No basketball tradition? What about all the NBA players produced over the 25 year stretch from 85-10? At one point we had more players in the league than anybody in the nation.

From 85-05 we were a top 20 program. That is far from no tradition. We were competitive in the ACC with 3 championships when ACC hoops was what SEC football was from 05-13. We were good.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

Tech was known as the Kentucky killer under Hyder. For what that is worth.

 

[orientalnc]

The biggest threat to APR scores is players skipping out on their last semester in order to prepare for the NBA draft, because people who will be spending the next decade in the NBA preparing for the NBA is apparently a bad thing according to the NCAA. But when you don't bring in any talent that is NBA level, that isn't an issue.

I am not sure this is correct. If a basketball player left school at the end of the season to prepare for the NBA draft and did not officially withdraw, or was failing his Spring semester classes, that would bring our APR down. But as long as he was academically eligible when he withdrew, I don't think his leaving would hurt our APR.

That said, one player each semester being academically ineligible is enough to destroy a basketball team's APR.

 

[natureboy]

So...pecone36, who do think will be our new head coach?

 

[Peacone36]

I have no reason to doubt those in the know saying its Drew.

I'm no insider.

 

[GTRX7]

No basketball tradition? What about all the NBA players produced over the 25 year stretch from 85-10? At one point we had more players in the league than anybody in the nation.

From 85-05 we were a top 20 program. That is far from no tradition. We were competitive in the ACC with 3 championships when ACC hoops was what SEC football was from 05-13. We were good.

I don't think anybody is arguing that Tech has no basketball tradition. We have a very nice tradition and the potential to be a very strong program. As you note, we are among maybe the top 10 programs in history at putting talent in the NBA. That said, during the time period you are talking about (85-05), we only finished in the top 3 in the ACC 3 times, and have only won more than 8 games in the ACC once since 1986.

We definitely have the potential to be great, but we are not in a place right now where we are going to pull Xavier's coach or one of the "top" mid major coaches.

Drew seems like a great get. I hope he gets us back to our potential. To me, that is, at a minimum, something like in the tourney two of every four years, and on the bubble (maybe in) a third, with at least one sweet sixteen appearance during that time.

 

[ESPNjacket]

I don't think anybody is arguing that Tech has no basketball tradition. We have a very nice tradition and the potential to be a very strong program. As you note, we are among maybe the top 10 programs in history at putting talent in the NBA. That said, during the time period you are talking about (85-05), we only finished in the top 3 in the ACC 3 times, and have only won more than 8 games in the ACC once since 1986.

We definitely have the potential to be great, but we are not in a place right now where we are going to pull Xavier's coach or one of the "top" mid major coaches.

Drew seems like a great get. I hope he gets us back to our potential. To me, that is, at a minimum, something like in the tourney two of every four years, and on the bubble (maybe in) a third, with at least one sweet sixteen appearance during that time.

That isn't the minimum. That's very close to Hewitt's record (NCAAT 5 out of 11 years).

GT went to the NCAAT 10 out of 12 during the Cremins glory years, including 9 in a row. I'm not sure what a minimum potential is but unless Cremins is an unattainable level of coach I would set it there.

The malaise across the fan base is driven by two things IMO:

1. A re-writing of all of the Hewitt years into some disastrous atrocity instead of the roller coaster it was.
2. The ugly brand of basketball under Gregory in his first 4 years that was not only unsuccessful but also painful to watch.

 

[DaBiz]

To me with the landscape of the ACC now and how brutal it is GT can be a consistent 4th-9th in the conference with the right hire.

That's nothing to fuss about either, that means you're consistently in the hunt for the tourney, if we made the tourney every other year I'd be ecstatic...hell I'd take 1/3

College basketball has become guard oriented, the teams that do well have great guard play and do so with a veteran team...unless you're the Duke, UNC, Kansas, Kentucky then you probably won't reload enough to make the tourney each year from the ACC but being consistent is the key...I want a consistent program who is always in the hunt and peaks every few years for a run but never hits the lows we've experienced lately.

I'd look at Miami's run since Larranaga took over...that's what I'd like to see, consistency in competing, making a run...he's done it there and it can happen here.

BTW, I totally forgot about the board, my bad...good to see some familiar names here I haven't seen in a while and some good discussions going on.

 

[Boaty1]

To me with the landscape of the ACC now and how brutal it is GT can be a consistent 4th-9th in the conference with the right hire.

That's nothing to fuss about either, that means you're consistently in the hunt for the tourney, if we made the tourney every other year I'd be ecstatic...hell I'd take 1/3

College basketball has become guard oriented, the teams that do well have great guard play and do so with a veteran team...unless you're the Duke, UNC, Kansas, Kentucky then you probably won't reload enough to make the tourney each year from the ACC but being consistent is the key...I want a consistent program who is always in the hunt and peaks every few years for a run but never hits the lows we've experienced lately.

I'd look at Miami's run since Larranaga took over...that's what I'd like to see, consistency in competing, making a run...he's done it there and it can happen here.

BTW, I totally forgot about the board, my bad...good to see some familiar names here I haven't seen in a while and some good discussions going on.

I agree we could be like Miami with the right hire, but we have more potential than Miami. We could be like Virginia with the right hire as well. Our programs ceiling is no lower than UVA's.

 

[dtm1997]

I agree we could be like Miami with the right hire, but we have more potential than Miami. We could be like Virginia with the right hire as well. Our programs ceiling is no lower than UVA's.

This is the realistic view. Where we are today is not a good place relative to our ingredients and we need to recognize that, but those ingredients pack very potent possibilities with the right coach & resources.