What we need is a real coach and staff. Guys who will put the time in in the offseason and know what the hell they are doing during the season. Over the past 7 years, because of lack of coaching, kids are not getting better as a team but to some degree individually. Every program needs some studs, but sju is not making the right moves on who should lead this program, so it won’t matter who comes.
No.
The team needs a full roster, and then coaching can be evaluated. Yes, team construction can be validly criticized, but the team got some really bad breaks on personnel.
Yes, there is some awful basketball being watched, but it's hard to evaluate with such a short-handed team. On the other hand, sometimes i see really pretty basketball being played. There is just such great volatility to the play on the floor. Sometimes really nice; sometimes god awful. The team has to learn to be consistent.
Another point: If a key player is not using his head, Coach K at Duke, will just bench that player to let that knucklehead 'think' about why he was making poor decisions. This year, who are the St. J's coaches going to substitute in for player not playing smart? There are no great options. The coaches are forced to give players way too much leash. It is what it is.
A gazillion times Ahmed and Ponds and others should have been benched for taking overly stupid shots, but the coaches can't bench them in game.
Coaches can only try to drill it them during practice to player smarter. I will argue, and I think rightly, that Ahmed is taking way better shots lately as com pared to the beginning of this season, and for certain way better than last year. Is it good enough? Not yet, but he's definitely better than last year. Ponds has completely regressed with shot selection.
Yes, it is easily arguable that free-flowing NBA type offense should be reigned in, b/c these are not NBA players. Sometimes it drives me nuts the shots that Ponds takes.... However, for me, personally, I don't throw a fit about that just yet - I'll just patiently wait for a full roster next year - and then start evaluating.
I probably have an overly simplistic view of the coaching - but I think I have a reasonable argument to not overly react to the play on the court because of the short-handed team.