GT / Louisville

orientalnc

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I'm not sure I agree with this at all. I don't think he came into the job ready to be an ACC coach. And I don't think he is a guy that can take a program on his shoulders and dominate the ACC. On the other hand, He does appear good enough that if he has good support from his AD (staff budget) and can get a good staff with a least one stud assistant (e.g., Charlton Young, Jonas Hayes), then I think he is fully able to succeed here. He is flexible, hard working and his schemes and approaches are sound.

He got knocked down pretty good in year two (Bell, LaBarrie, Lammers & Okogie) but the talent level of the program is not bad coming out of all that. My perception is that there is promise here and that too many Tech fans have an unreasonably negative outlook regarding this coach.
I wish we had better shooters and took better care of the ball, but we have some talent.
 

g0lftime

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To compete in the ACC you have to bring in some top 100 recruits every year. You can bring in a couple of high potentials to develop and will stay with the program more than one year but you better have a few of the really top players every year.
 
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I'm not sure I agree with this at all. I don't think he came into the job ready to be an ACC coach. And I don't think he is a guy that can take a program on his shoulders and dominate the ACC. On the other hand, He does appear good enough that if he has good support from his AD (staff budget) and can get a good staff with a least one stud assistant (e.g., Charlton Young, Jonas Hayes), then I think he is fully able to succeed here. He is flexible, hard working and his schemes and approaches are sound.

He got knocked down pretty good in year two (Bell, LaBarrie, Lammers & Okogie) but the talent level of the program is not bad coming out of all that. My perception is that there is promise here and that too many Tech fans have an unreasonably negative outlook regarding this coach.
What am I missing here? How do you include Lammers among those knocking him down?
 

Peacone36

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I'm not sure I agree with this at all. I don't think he came into the job ready to be an ACC coach. And I don't think he is a guy that can take a program on his shoulders and dominate the ACC. On the other hand, He does appear good enough that if he has good support from his AD (staff budget) and can get a good staff with a least one stud assistant (e.g., Charlton Young, Jonas Hayes), then I think he is fully able to succeed here. He is flexible, hard working and his schemes and approaches are sound.

He got knocked down pretty good in year two (Bell, LaBarrie, Lammers & Okogie) but the talent level of the program is not bad coming out of all that. My perception is that there is promise here and that too many Tech fans have an unreasonably negative outlook regarding this coach.

I think you confused my comments
 

orientalnc

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He got knocked down pretty good in year two (Bell, LaBarrie, Lammers & Okogie) but the talent level of the program is not bad coming out of all that.
If you mean Lammers playing injured hurt Pastner, then maybe I understand your point. But injuries are a part of almost every team's reality. We have been hurt by injuries more this year than any I can remember in a while.
 

alagold

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I'm not sure I agree with this at all. I don't think he came into the job ready to be an ACC coach. And I don't think he is a guy that can take a program on his shoulders and dominate the ACC. On the other hand, He does appear good enough that if he has good support from his AD (staff budget) and can get a good staff with a least one stud assistant (e.g., Charlton Young, Jonas Hayes), then I think he is fully able to succeed here. He is flexible, hard working and his schemes and approaches are sound.

He got knocked down pretty good in year two (Bell, LaBarrie, Lammers & Okogie) but the talent level of the program is not bad coming out of all that. My perception is that there is promise here and that too many Tech fans have an unreasonably negative outlook regarding this coach.

The man makes way too many bad decisions off the court (without even getting into on-ct). All the Bell .Labarrie, .etc problems are inexcusable.It is under his "watch"and partly killed recruiting which is a HUGE problem in the ACC.
 

okiemon

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I had no idea Spatola was that old. He went to West Point in the late 70s? I thought he played there in 2000 or 2001. He sure looks good for a 65 year old

Yeah, you’re probably right. I know he played at Army, but maybe the connection with K didn’t start until Duke. Memory fart.


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YlJacket

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FWIW I think his defensive schemes are sound and his players play hard on that end.
I am not sold on his offensive schemes so wouldn't agree with a blanket statement his schemes are sound.
 

Connell62

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FWIW I think his defensive schemes are sound and his players play hard on that end.
I am not sold on his offensive schemes so wouldn't agree with a blanket statement his schemes are sound.
His offensive schemes aren’t sound when we cannot make open shots or when we are committing turnovers. Throughout the season, we have generated open looks, but we have struggled mightily to make threes. Hit open shots and the offense will look a lot better.

Not to mention, I think our numbers are up from just about every year he has been here. It looked terrible when Jose was out, but I feel like it has improved immensely since his return (aside from some really poor shooting games and throwing the ball away)
 

YlJacket

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His offensive schemes aren’t sound when we cannot make open shots or when we are committing turnovers. Throughout the season, we have generated open looks, but we have struggled mightily to make threes. Hit open shots and the offense will look a lot better.

Not to mention, I think our numbers are up from just about every year he has been here. It looked terrible when Jose was out, but I feel like it has improved immensely since his return (aside from some really poor shooting games and throwing the ball away)

We started the year with Banks as the primary distributor in the same Princeton type system we used with Lammers. Took half the year to get out of that to make Banks a pick and rim runner guy. We also started the year with Moses primarily in the corner or otherwise outside the 3 point line. Not his strength. We are better at getting Moses in the mid range to paint area but still have him try to drive from the parking lot more than he is capable.

Even the offense we run now doesn't consistently have much ball movement in it. We degrade into just seeing if Jose or DeVoe can penetrate into the paint against a set defense and then are surprised when we lead the ACC in TOs by a wide margin.

Making shots would obviously help - as it does all teams - but it goes a lot deeper than just that.
 

lv20gt

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We started the year with Banks as the primary distributor in the same Princeton type system we used with Lammers. Took half the year to get out of that to make Banks a pick and rim runner guy. We also started the year with Moses primarily in the corner or otherwise outside the 3 point line. Not his strength. We are better at getting Moses in the mid range to paint area but still have him try to drive from the parking lot more than he is capable.

Huh, we've been getting the ball to Moses midrange in the entire year since game 1. Unless you think he should just never be outside the 3 point line for any reason which doesn't make any sense, because we want space inside both for Banks at times but also for driving lanes.


Banks went to the high post early in the year for the same reason we tried having Bubba and Moore try to be primary facilitators at times, because we lost Jose and were trying to find anything that would help.
 

MtnWasp

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The idea behind our offense under Pastner has been to create spacing to attack the rim off the drive because of the lack of natural shooters/scorers.

The Princeton offense was a good choice because of Lammers. He was an effective trigger man because of his face-up ability, his passing ability and his court awareness. It worked surprisingly well in year one because we had Q Stephens and Okogie at the wings and defenses had to at least respect their shooting range. Those three (Lammers, Okogie and Stephens) were enough to give defenses something to think about despite the horrific lack of outside shooting ability of our guards.

After year one things got dicey. Q was gone and replaced by Gueye. Gueye didn't fit the Princeton offense. He wasn't robust enough to be a Center on defense, didn't have the playmaking ability to be the high post trigger and he lacked the face-up ability to play one of the "Four-out" spots. He couldn't do what Q did. That left us with two post scorers and that messed-up the spacing of the Princeton offense.

By year three we lost both Lammers and Okogie and neither Banks nor Gueye could replace Lammers. The perimeter guys suffered an epic shooting slump and nothing was working well. Banks did start to show some capacity to catch and distribute the ball late in the season but that might have been a net negative because it gave the staff hope that he could fill the Lammers role in the offense.

But this season, Banks demonstrated the bad hands and bad court awareness again. He is no Lammers. And Moses right was out of place in the corner. Wright was no Q. But Wright is very productive when he gets the ball at the elbow. So finally, the staff scrapped the Princeton offense because the personnel did not match the scheme. We now move the defense via the guards breaking down the perimeter defense off the dribble via pick and rolls. This is pretty standard stuff, it looks less dynamic because the players off the ball wait to cut until the guard has achieved daylight. But our version is way more dynamic than similar sets seen under Gregory or Hewitt's teams after Jarret Jack.

The Princeton offense has gone kaput at Gt for three reasons:

1. After Lammers, we didn't have a Center who could be a high post trigger/face-up threat.
2. Our Power forwards since Q have not had the skill set to be a perimeter threat but have been post scoring threats.
3. Persistent lack of three point shooting to spread the floor.

Gigberia and Kai Sotto could definitely solve problem #1. But Wright is back next year and he doesn't fit the "One-in, Four-out" prototype for a PF. Neither does Meka. I dont know if we go back to recruiting for the Princeton set again or not. Probably not?
 

MtnWasp

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The man makes way too many bad decisions off the court (without even getting into on-ct). All the Bell .Labarrie, .etc problems are inexcusable.It is under his "watch"and partly killed recruiting which is a HUGE problem in the ACC.

Pastner was clearly immature and naive (from a management perspective) to take on an ACC program and it showed in all the year two off the court stuff. But people have to let that stuff go. If we had had a better budget, we could have hired a more savvy manager instead of taking a risk on a younger guy. But that is water under the bridge.

Managers can mature over time, learn and become more aware after the bad stuff that happens around them. If the stuff keeps happening, that is a different story. But why fail to support the guy after we have endured his maturation phase?

But the team's talent level is higher than it has been for years. Recruiting seems to have picked-up some juice.
There is enough positive indicators for fans to focus on so that they don't need to be fixated on the rear-view mirror and gnashing their teeth about the past.

Failing to support players like Alvarado and Moses Wright because fans are nurturing their butt-hurt from Ron Bell, Darryl LaBarrie/Jarret Jack and the pathetic NCAA is bad form, IMO.

The X's and O's are okay. If recruiting continues to trend up and Stansbury can get the program and new locker room and a budget for at least one stud assistant, then I think Pastner could be perfectly fine here.
 

LibertyTurns

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Pastner was clearly immature and naive (from a management perspective) to take on an ACC program and it showed in all the year two off the court stuff. But people have to let that stuff go. If we had had a better budget, we could have hired a more savvy manager instead of taking a risk on a younger guy. But that is water under the bridge.

Managers can mature over time, learn and become more aware after the bad stuff that happens around them. If the stuff keeps happening, that is a different story. But why fail to support the guy after we have endured his maturation phase?

But the team's talent level is higher than it has been for years. Recruiting seems to have picked-up some juice.
There is enough positive indicators for fans to focus on so that they don't need to be fixated on the rear-view mirror and gnashing their teeth about the past.

Failing to support players like Alvarado and Moses Wright because fans are nurturing their butt-hurt from Ron Bell, Darryl LaBarrie/Jarret Jack and the pathetic NCAA is bad form, IMO.

The X's and O's are okay. If recruiting continues to trend up and Stansbury can get the program and new locker room and a budget for at least one stud assistant, then I think Pastner could be perfectly fine here.
I agree with your manager development philosophy but not every manager failure is created equal. Failing to identify a weakness in a kid’s game or having a suboptimal game plan is different from allowing a scumbag into your inner circle. I’m not sure you ever learn your way thru having bad judgment like that. We passed on the latest chance to give him the eject button so the AD either believes the nonsense is permanently ended or he had no choice, we were unprepared again, etc.
 

Wrecked

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[QUOTE="
The X's and O's are okay. If recruiting continues to trend up and Stansbury can get the program and new locker room and a budget for at least one stud assistant, then I think Pastner could be perfectly fine here.[/QUOTE]
Facilities are not the reason Pastner can't recruit, especially local talent. I agree on hiring a stud recruiting assistant to keep the Atlanta kids here. I say bring LaBarrie back.
 

MtnWasp

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I agree with your manager development philosophy but not every manager failure is created equal. Failing to identify a weakness in a kid’s game or having a suboptimal game plan is different from allowing a scumbag into your inner circle. I’m not sure you ever learn your way thru having bad judgment like that. We passed on the latest chance to give him the eject button so the AD either believes the nonsense is permanently ended or he had no choice, we were unprepared again, etc.
A couple of points about the Ron Bell situation:

First of all, despite the sensational nature of the episode, it really didn't do a lot of harm to the program in the practical sense. Yes, it was embarrassing, but the GTAA hired out an independent investigation on Bell's allegations, the NCAA investigated the matter and pretty much the conclusions are all the same, it mostly was an embarrassment intentionally created by a sycophant and blackmailer. Enticing Okogie and Tadric to swim in a pool in Arizona was a minor deal and the NCAA seemed pretty satisfied with the suspensions we handed out. Not a shining moment, but hardly the catastrophe that some GT people are making it out to be (especially relative to some of the malfeasance being discussed by the Feds or UNC's academic fraud deal).

Second, I hope that most people here have not had run-ins with duplicitous people. For those who have never been the target of cunning people with no ethics, then I can see where you might find scenarios like this inexcusable. But the truth is that there are people out there who can fool you. While it is human nature to want to blame the victim, sometimes they are really innocent. You assume that you would be able to spot the scumbag, and may the grace of God protect you in such an assumption.

Third, Pastner's innocence regarding Ron Bell is substantiated not only by the finding of two independent investigations but by the extensive history of Ron Bell's freakiness. That guy is not worth roasting one of our own over. Hes a bad actor, pure and simple. If you will turn on our coach because of Ron Bell, then you seriously need to question your sense of loyalty.

(Same for the NCAA. if we roast one of our own based on the pathetically unjust NCAA then we have to seriously question our own judgment.)
 

slugboy

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The NCAA initially exonerated Pastner for the access he granted Bell, but in their report it was a major justification for the sanctions they leveed against our program. While I think that it isn’t fair for them to hold that against us two years after saying he didn’t do anything wrong, they are holding that against us and Pastner.

Until the NCAA removes those sections from the report and reduces the sanctions significantly, I don’t see how we can say that they really cleared GT or Pastner over the Bell fiasco.


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MtnWasp

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The NCAA initially exonerated Pastner for the access he granted Bell, but in their report it was a major justification for the sanctions they leveed against our program. While I think that it isn’t fair for them to hold that against us two years after saying he didn’t do anything wrong, they are holding that against us and Pastner.

Until the NCAA removes those sections from the report and reduces the sanctions significantly, I don’t see how we can say that they really cleared GT or Pastner over the Bell fiasco.


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I read the NCAA report and while they did give a mild tongue lashing for allowing Bell the acess he had, they pretty much explicitly said that it was not cause for major sanctions. What I read that was the major sanctions were entirely because of the LaBarrie/Jack Cheetah fiasco and specially because LaBarrie initially lied about the incident when first approached by the NCAA.
 
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