Damon Stoudamire

[Backstreetbuzz]

CDS jobs to do to make GT competitive in 2023-2024.

1. Remove assistants that were not producing. Done, although I thought we should have kept Wilkins.
2. Keep the players that were producing. So far, so good.
3. Remove players that were not producing. Done, although I don’t know if the 2 freshmen were keepers or not. IMO, one more non producing player to go.
4. Hire 3 assistants. One with national recruiting ties, one with local ties, one to coach. Still to do.
5. Keep Blue Cain. Looks doubtful.
6. Bring in a slasher, a big who can score and a big to defend from the portal. Bring in a shooter, if we lose Cain. We have one, lots of work to do.

Just saw we got our slasher, Kowancie Reeves.

 

[kg01]

CDS jobs to do to make GT competitive in 2023-2024.

1. Remove assistants that were not producing. Done, although I thought we should have kept Wilkins.
1a. Get the get-bak! coach on staff!
2. Blah, blah, blah...

I mean, I would put it lower on the list but appreciate the shout out.

 

[Techwood Relict]

Jesus, some of you guys call me a pessimist.

To all the beautiful GT pessimists, you guys are the best.

 

[ESPNjacket]

GT fans are the ultimate know it all folks! They are also First Class "see I told you" folks.

To the first point, yes, we excel at that, especially the less we know about the subject.

To the second, nah. We probably are low on that scale. Most fanbases have people who love the hire and then told you he would never work out. Most of ours just grumble from the start.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

Just saw we got our slasher, Kowancie Reeves.

Please, stop. Only negative news and complaints are allowed.

 

[tbglover]

Just saw we got our slasher, Kowancie Reeves.

Kind of impressive that so far he's gotten 2 transfer commitments, both from players from Georgia, without having an assistant coaching staff.

 

[MountainBuzzMan]

To the first point, yes, we excel at that, especially the less we know about the subject.

To the second, nah. We probably are low on that scale. Most fanbases have people who love the hire and then told you he would never work out. Most of ours just grumble from the start.

At least we are consistent

 

[CEB]

I’ll say this...
I don’t fault people who question the hire. I haven’t seen anyone say they don’t like the hire or point to actual failures (maybe I missed it), but I understand some apprehension about it. There are certainly people looking for signs... we all are... and we see what we want to see in the absence of real results.
This was an “out of the box” hire. No one saw it coming (at least no one was chatting and speculating about it) and by its very nature of being out of left field, it’s fair to be leery. Seems like it even came out of left field for Stoudamire himself... which I hope is embellished to a degree.
CDS certainly is respected, which is good, but a lot of respected coaches have come and gone from programs without setting the world on fire. CDS had what looks in retrospect to be a good run at Pacific. Was he building something enduring or did he have a good season? We don’t know. It could’ve been an upward trend or it could’ve been an outlier. We had to show the door to a recent COTY as well, right?
He has been an NBA guy and that looked like his career path. I hope his move back to college is a conscious decision to move back to the college game, not a “hadnt thought about it but I’ll give it a shot.” The NBA is a different animal... I agree with that notion and everyone who has said it. Historically, it’s true and there are limited examples of coaching success at both levels. That said, each year I watch the college game (on the court) become more and more like the NBA game in terms of pace, scheme/ approach and player type. With NIL being the key to recruiting these days, and the on the court game becoming more similar to the NBA, maybe the “gap” between the leagues is narrowing and this isn’t the worry it used to be.
J Batt went all in on this hard, and I don’t view it as a “safe” hire. For that reason, there is cause for optimism. It happened quickly, and there didn’t seem to be hesitation from either side. It would suggest a strong “fit” even if reasons arent / weren’t obvious. It looks like Batt went and got his first choice. You have to like that. Let’s hope we give him the tools he needs and let’s hope that what he was doing at pacific was a “trend” that he can replicate here.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

I’ll say this...
I don’t fault people who question the hire. I haven’t seen anyone say they don’t like the hire or point to actual failures (maybe I missed it), but I understand some apprehension about it. There are certainly people looking for signs... we all are... and we see what we want to see in the absence of real results.
This was an “out of the box” hire. No one saw it coming (at least no one was chatting and speculating about it) and by its very nature of being out of left field, it’s fair to be leery. Seems like it even came out of left field for Stoudamire himself... which I hope is embellished to a degree.
CDS certainly is respected, which is good, but a lot of respected coaches have come and gone from programs without setting the world on fire. CDS had what looks in retrospect to be a good run at Pacific. Was he building something enduring or did he have a good season? We don’t know. It could’ve been an upward trend or it could’ve been an outlier. We had to show the door to a recent COTY as well, right?
He has been an NBA guy and that looked like his career path. I hope his move back to college is a conscious decision to move back to the college game, not a “hadnt thought about it but I’ll give it a shot.” The NBA is a different animal... I agree with that notion and everyone who has said it. Historically, it’s true and there are limited examples of coaching success at both levels. That said, each year I watch the college game (on the court) become more and more like the NBA game in terms of pace, scheme/ approach and player type. With NIL being the key to recruiting these days, and the on the court game becoming more similar to the NBA, maybe the “gap” between the leagues is narrowing and this isn’t the worry it used to be.
J Batt went all in on this hard, and I don’t view it as a “safe” hire. For that reason, there is cause for optimism. It happened quickly, and there didn’t seem to be hesitation from either side. It would suggest a strong “fit” even if reasons arent / weren’t obvious. It looks like Batt went and got his first choice. You have to like that. Let’s hope we give him the tools he needs and let’s hope that what he was doing at pacific was a “trend” that he can replicate here.

Yeah, you missed it. Fonts are complaining about the roster and lack of staff and saying CDS is not doing well.

 

[CEB]

Yeah, you missed it. Fonts are complaining about the roster and lack of staff and saying CDS is not doing well.

i do think people are seeing what they want to see. Opinions being like ***holes and all...
It’s certainly too soon to declare it an abject failure, but roster and staffing are valid concerns, right? I’m seeing a lot of coaching and portal news but not really up to speed on where our “peers” are in terms of roster and staff at this point. Is there cause for concern? I think there can be valid concerns over signs of struggle now and it not be indicative of any future failure or success...

 

[slugboy]

i do think people are seeing what they want to see. Opinions being like ***holes and all...
It’s certainly too soon to declare it an abject failure, but roster and staffing are valid concerns, right? I’m seeing a lot of coaching and portal news but not really up to speed on where our “peers” are in terms of roster and staff at this point. Is there cause for concern? I think there can be valid concerns over signs of struggle now and it not be indicative of any future failure or success...

Most of the colleges with openings have now hired head coaches (here is one tracker). Some programs have hired assistants, many or most are still hiring assistants. I would have liked him to add some big names as assistants already, but musical coaching chairs are still going on.

As for “too soon to declare it an abject failure”, maybe that’s hyperbole, but it doesn’t even make sense as hyperbole. Stoudamire just added the only RSCI top 50 player we have to the roster through the transfer portal. He has a lot of work to do, but it looks like he’s doing it. Local coaches and our player alumni are excited. I suspect the players who didn’t enter the portal are excited. It’s a splash hire.

I would feel much more comfortable if he added a couple of highly-rated players to the roster, including a stud point guard and a center, but I think he can work with a lot of the players we have.

To answer some of the general worries that some have expressed—not you in particular—let’s look at the roster.

We’ve got two players on here who were highly rated as recruits, and we’re short of points, rebounds, and assists.

Player	#	Class	Pos	Height	Weight	Hometown	High School	RSCI Top 100	Summary
Miles Kelly	13	SO	G	6-4	171	Liburn GA	Hargrave Military Academy		14.4 Pts 3.4 Reb 1.3 Ast
Dallan Coleman	3	SO	G	6-6	215	Callahan FL	West Nassau HS	56 (2021)	9.5 Pts 2.9 Reb 1.3 Ast
Javon Franklin	4	SR	F	6-7	220	Little Rock AR	Parkview Magnet (AR)		9.7 Pts 8.1 Reb 2.2 Ast
Lance Terry	0	SR	G	6-2	180	Newnan GA	The Heritage School		10.1 Pts 2.8 Reb 1.2 Ast
Kyle Sturdivant	1	SR	G	6-2	198	Norcross GA	Norcross HS		8.6 Pts 2.3 Reb 3.3 Ast
Jalon Moore	14	SO	F	6-6	211	Gardendale AL	Gardendale HS		7.6 Pts 4.7 Reb 0.8 Ast
Deivon Smith	5	JR	G	6-1	165	Loganville GA	Grayson HS	56 (2020)	8.0 Pts 5.6 Reb 3.7 Ast
Rodney Howard	24	SR	C	6-10	241	Ypsilanti MI	Legacy Charter School		4.5 Pts 4.3 Reb 1.2 Ast
Tristan Maxwell	11	JR	G	6-2	209	Charlotte NC	North Mecklenburg HS		3.3 Pts 1.0 Reb 0.8 Ast
Freds Bagatskis	12	FR	F	6-8					0.9 Pts 0.0 Reb 0.0 Ast
Cyril Martynov	10	FR	C	7-0	229	Barrie Canada	Innisdale (ON) Lawrenceville School (NJ)		0.7 Pts 0.9 Reb 0.0 Ast
Jordan Meka	23	JR	F	6-8	224	Yaounde Cameroon	Mount Bethel Christian Academy		0.4 Pts 1.5 Reb 0.1 Ast
Coleman Boyd	30	SR	G	6-1	173	Smyrna GA	Mt. Bethel Christian Academy		0.4 Pts 0.0 Reb 0.1 Ast
Jermontae Hill	43	FR	F	6-6	198	Tucker GA	DME Academy		0.4 Pts 0.0 Reb 0.0 Ast
Brayden Daniels	33	SO	G	6-4	176	Louisville KY	Christian Academy of Louisville		0.0 Pts 0.7 Reb 0.2 Ast
Emmer Nichols	35	FR	F	6-6

Provided by CBB at Sports Reference: View Original Table
Generated 4/9/2023.

 

[slugboy]

(continued)
We also have had a lot of transfers out.

Rk	Player	G	Games Started	Minutes Played	Transfer Status	FG	FGA	FG%	2P	2PA	2P%	3P	3PA	3P%	FT	FTA	FT%	ORB	DRB	TRB	AST	STL	BLK	TOV	PF	PTS
1	Miles Kelly	33	27	32.4		5.1	12.3	.410	2.4	5.2	.453	2.7	7.1	.379	1.6	1.8	.898	0.3	3.1	3.4	1.3	0.7	0.1	1.5	2.2	14.4
2	Dallan Coleman	33	31	31.3		3.1	8.3	.376	1.4	3.0	.465	1.7	5.3	.326	1.5	2.2	.689	0.4	2.5	2.9	1.3	0.8	0.3	1.2	2.2	9.5
3	Lance Terry	29	21	29.6	?? Not sure ??	3.7	8.7	.421	2.0	4.5	.450	1.6	4.2	.388	1.2	1.5	.814	0.5	2.3	2.8	1.2	0.6	0.2	0.9	2.0	10.1
4	Javon Franklin	32	19	27.3	Graduated / Used up eligibility	4.0	6.7	.591	4.0	6.6	.599	0.0	0.1	.000	1.8	2.7	.651	3.2	4.9	8.1	2.2	1.4	1.6	1.3	2.2	9.7
5	Deivon Smith	24	13	24.8		3.5	8.7	.399	3.0	6.8	.438	0.5	1.9	.261	0.5	1.2	.448	1.2	4.4	5.6	3.7	0.9	0.7	1.3	1.8	8.0
6	Kyle Sturdivant	33	21	23.9		3.1	7.9	.393	2.0	4.5	.447	1.1	3.4	.321	1.2	1.8	.695	0.2	2.1	2.3	3.3	0.7	0.1	1.6	1.8	8.6
7	Jalon Moore	32	15	20.6		2.8	6.4	.431	2.6	5.3	.497	0.1	1.1	.114	2.0	2.9	.688	1.8	2.8	4.7	0.8	0.7	0.9	1.3	1.9	7.6
8	Rodney Howard	24	16	17.8	Transfer	2.0	3.7	.545	2.0	3.7	.545	0.0	0.0		0.5	0.8	.579	2.0	2.3	4.3	1.2	0.3	0.5	1.3	1.9	4.5
9	Tristan Maxwell	18	2	11.6		1.2	4.4	.263	0.6	2.4	.227	0.6	2.0	.306	0.4	0.6	.636	0.2	0.8	1.0	0.8	0.3	0.1	0.5	1.2	3.3
10	Jordan Meka	10	0	5.3	Transfer	0.2	0.7	.286	0.2	0.7	.286	0.0	0.0		0.0	0.0		0.6	0.9	1.5	0.1	0.2	0.4	0.1	1.3	0.4
11	Freds Bagatskis	9	0	2.9	Transfer	0.3	0.9	.375	0.1	0.2	.500	0.2	0.7	.333	0.0	0.0		0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.3	0.9
12	Cyril Martynov	7	0	2.6	Transfer	0.3	1.0	.286	0.3	1.0	.286	0.0	0.0		0.1	0.3	.500	0.3	0.6	0.9	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.6	0.3	0.7
13	Brayden Daniels	6	0	1.2		0.0	0.3	.000	0.0	0.2	.000	0.0	0.2	.000	0.0	0.3	.000	0.2	0.5	0.7	0.2	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.2	0.0
14	Coleman Boyd	7	0	1.0		0.1	0.6	.250	0.0	0.1	.000	0.1	0.4	.333	0.0	0.0		0.0	0.0	0.0	0.1	0.0	0.0	0.1	0.3	0.4
15	Jermontae Hill	5	0	1.0	Transfer	0.2	0.2	1.000	0.2	0.2	1.000	0.0	0.0		0.0	0.0		0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.2	0.4	0.4

Provided by CBB at Sports Reference: View Original Table
Generated 4/9/2023.


As far as our official roster turnover, four of our outgoing transfers have 0 starts. They have 1, 2.6, 2.9, and 5.3 minutes per game. Even for underclassmen, they weren’t pushing for time. As for the player who did have points and playing time, Rodney Howard wasn’t playing towards the end of the season under Pastner, and wasn’t scoring a lot of points, making a lot of assists, or getting a lot of rebounds earlier in the season. He was struggling.

I’d have like to have kept a 7-footer, but it looks like we’re looking for people who can play now.

 

[CEB]

As for “too soon to declare it an abject failure”, maybe that’s hyperbole, but it doesn’t even make sense as hyperbole. Stoudamire just added the only RSCI top 50 player we have to the roster through the transfer portal. He has a lot of work to do, but it looks like he’s doing it. Local coaches and our player alumni are excited. I suspect the players who didn’t enter the portal are excited. It’s a splash hire.

Good info- thank you.
As for the bolded part above, that was in reply to the assertion that posters were declaring failure due to staff and roster issues they’re seeing. My point was that I hadn’t seen those declarations but if it is happening, I agree it’s way premature. However, concerns may still be valid. Just stop short of declaring that they are a harbinger of what is to come.
For what it’s worth, I’m less worried about the roster at this point. I fully expect departures and a lot of movement. I am interested in how we stack up staff wise to other schools in this situation and I may be a little more concerned about it in our case because we dont have a guy who has been plugged into the college coaching ranks. Then again, it might be a good thing... maybe the right time to take a critical look at “conventional wisdom.”

 

[slugboy]

Good info- thank you.
As for the bolded part above, that was in reply to the assertion that posters were declaring failure due to staff and roster issues they’re seeing. My point was that I hadn’t seen those declarations but if it is happening, I agree it’s way premature. However, concerns may still be valid. Just stop short of declaring that they are a harbinger of what is to come.
For what it’s worth, I’m less worried about the roster at this point. I fully expect departures and a lot of movement. I am interested in how we stack up staff wise to other schools in this situation and I may be a little more concerned about it in our case because we dont have a guy who has been plugged into the college coaching ranks. Then again, it might be a good thing... maybe the right time to take a critical look at “conventional wisdom.”

Panic may be the new normal. I just read an article concerned because Rick Pitino has only three remaining players at St John’s (a bunch of players from Iona seem to want to follow him to St John’s, though).

 

[CEB]

Panic may be the new normal. I just read an article concerned because Rick Pitino has only three remaining players at St John’s (a bunch of players from Iona seem to want to follow him to St John’s, though).

We’ve all become drama queens...

 

[Novajacket]

I look at the assistant hires taking some time as a good thing, as the good assistants likely have a lot of options and are thinking things over. To me another good sign, is that not much information is coming out, so Batt and coaches are running a tighter ship, this was true with football hires as well. The other part of this is our background check process usually takes some time, and under Batt we seem to not be in a rush on assistant hire announcements. As far as progress, the 2 transfers are both ATL based and I feel it shows CDS is either already has or is making quick connections locally.

 

[iceeater1969]

It is refreshing to see fonts skipping the potion of coaching dealing with hiring of assistants, recruiting, developing players, scouting and game planning opponents, and managing the in-game strategy and tactics and go right to complaining how bad a coach DS is. Why waste time and effort on the other unimportant stuff, amirit?

You are right - there is no need for me to recruit mem mbers for the i hate the bb coach club.

The I hate the football coach club has been going for a couple of months and i am the only member.

 

[Techwood Relict]

We’ve all become drama queens...

Whatever do you mean?

in all the news about the assistant hires......

 

[78pike]

I think posters on here just fear the unknown and project that as some sort of possible or potential failure. People need to remind themselves that just because we don't know something doesn't necessarily mean it is cause for concern. For all we know he has already gotten commitments for his entire staff and they just haven't been announced yet for any number of reasons. Maybe they are contacting potential recruits/transfers as individuals not currently associated with Georgia Tech for some advantageous reason that we are not aware of. I prefer to think CDS knows what he is doing and just doesn't care that much if WE know what he is doing which is fine by me as along as we get results.

 

[GTNavyNuke]

I think posters on here just fear the unknown and project that as some sort of possible or potential failure. People need to remind themselves that just because we don't know something doesn't necessarily mean it is cause for concern. For all we know he has already gotten commitments for his entire staff and they just haven't been announced yet for any number of reasons. Maybe they are contacting potential recruits/transfers as individuals not currently associated with Georgia Tech for some advantageous reason that we are not aware of. I prefer to think CDS knows what he is doing and just doesn't care that much if WE know what he is doing which is fine by me as along as we get results.

I wish we had this problem in baseball with coaching replacements.

I still would have been happy for Pastner to stay since I liked him so much even though he didn't win enough. But if it were baseball, I would have wanted the change since I care about winning more there.

Talking with non-GT ACC basketball people, they think we made a good move with Stoudamire. I think so too and for those worried about assistants, just increase the Buspar / THC / CBD and all will be fine.