Steere out indefinitely

Nonsense. All of it. Admit you were wrong. Go ahead. The board knows it. You’ll feel better after doing so.

Okay. I was wrong in thinking you'd be swayed by facts and logic instead of stupefied by them and that when faced with incontrovertible evidence that you'd made a misstatement might admit that, as opposed to doubling down on stupid. Rest assured it's a error I won't make again. 

You have to realize Mullin was a first time head coach in arguably one of the most competitive conferences in the country. There was obviously going to be a learning curve when he was hired. I was apprehensive about this when he was hired however once  he was you had to know what you were getting into and the leash had to be there especially given Mullin's history with the school.

He had a level of comfort and confidence on the sidelines that obviously wasn't there his first year. Better understanding of flow of the game, interacting with refs, utilizing clock.

I think the lack of depth and lack of confidence in bench caused the team to become fatigued which caused some breakdowns. I also think Ponds playing for NBA instead of in the moment resulted in some hero ball that negatively impacted team at times.

Agreed.  I love Mullin and wanted nothing more than for him to succeed.  It would have been huge not only for our program but the BE generally.

Here's what I don't know:

Why was Mullin not out there nearly as much on the recruiting trail after year 1?  He made the now infamous comment during his initial press conference about knowing where all the local schools were and not needing to be told where to go.  What happened?

Did the admin suggest to Mullin that he get an experienced AC (or two)?  If so, did Mullin reject that to keep his buddy Mitch on staff?  If not, why didn't someone with Mullin's knowledge grasp this basic point?

Why didn't Mullin understand that running a college program is far different than dealing with professionals?  That you need to make sure kids are happy.  That you need to be around, even during the offseason.  That you need to stave off problems before they lead to internal drama or kids leaving, which then leaves you with short or unbalanced rosters year after year.  Tariq Owens leaving a team with talent was a major, major indictment on Mullin and the rest of the staff.

Why did Mullin seemingly defer all things recruiting to Matt once Matt successfully accomplished pushing Slice out the door?  When it became apparent pretty early that the recruiting strategy needed to change, why didn't he address that head on?

I'll never understand any of this, and it sucks because like I said I love Chris Mullin.




Kids transfer all the time in college hoops. Tariq Owens left because he was 23 yrs old and was trying to get some shine for the next level. The offense here was running through Ponds.They met with Mullin before entering the portal. Mullin like many coaches did not make any promises about seeing more shots. TO then wanted to commit to Maryland but they never offered him a scholly. He did well at TT. They highly overachieved. He would've looked great here last yr and the season might've been different.

The only difference last year is he had arguably the most talented starting 5 in the conference 

No he didn't.

"Was SJU's starting five > Howard, the Hauser twins and Theo John? Powell, Cale, McKnight, Nzei and Mamaluke? Booth, Pasquall, Gillespie, Bey?"

No he didn't.

"Was SJU's starting five > Howard, the Hauser twins and Theo John? Powell, Cale, McKnight, Nzei and Mamaluke? Booth, Pasquall, Gillespie, Bey?"

No he didn't.

"Was SJU's starting five > Howard, the Hauser twins and Theo John? Powell, Cale, McKnight, Nzei and Mamaluke? Booth, Pasquall, Gillespie, Bey?"

No he didn't.

"Was SJU's starting five > Howard, the Hauser twins and Theo John? Powell, Cale, McKnight, Nzei and Mamaluke? Booth, Pasquall, Gillespie, Bey?"

Ponds, Simon, Heron, LJ, Clark are better than every squad you mentioned. LOL. It's not even really close.

they were picked high but finished 7th. obviously those in the know thought they were capable. Mullin coached them down

So when earlier in this very thread you described Matt as the "gift that keeps on giving" in regards to Steere and accompanied that comment with a homophobic slur that was you pointing out that Matt was a keen judge of talent who recruited the best starting five in arguably the best league in the country? Interesting.

Agreed.  I love Mullin and wanted nothing more than for him to succeed.  It would have been huge not only for our program but the BE generally.

Here's what I don't know:

Why was Mullin not out there nearly as much on the recruiting trail after year 1?  He made the now infamous comment during his initial press conference about knowing where all the local schools were and not needing to be told where to go.  What happened?

Did the admin suggest to Mullin that he get an experienced AC (or two)?  If so, did Mullin reject that to keep his buddy Mitch on staff?  If not, why didn't someone with Mullin's knowledge grasp this basic point?

Why didn't Mullin understand that running a college program is far different than dealing with professionals?  That you need to make sure kids are happy.  That you need to be around, even during the offseason.  That you need to stave off problems before they lead to internal drama or kids leaving, which then leaves you with short or unbalanced rosters year after year.  Tariq Owens leaving a team with talent was a major, major indictment on Mullin and the rest of the staff.

Why did Mullin seemingly defer all things recruiting to Matt once Matt successfully accomplished pushing Slice out the door?  When it became apparent pretty early that the recruiting strategy needed to change, why didn't he address that head on?

I'll never understand any of this, and it sucks because like I said I love Chris Mullin.

So when earlier in this very thread you described Matt as the "gift that keeps on giving" in regards to Steere and accompanied that comment with a homophobic slur that was you pointing out that Matt was a keen judge of talent who recruited the best starting five in arguably the best league in the country? Interesting.

Mullin was on the road recruiting. I think a lot of this stuff gets overblown from media coverage and people who are not familiar with the landscape. Recruiting has changed and this isn't the 80's where you needed to hit local game after game to unearth a diamond. Things have become more organized and efficient. Last year for instance there was only 3 evaluation periods (this year it's back to 4) but that's it.

The thing that hurt more was Mitch Richmond was barely on the road. Over the years I barely saw him in the gym. St. Jean was in the gym more but he was disconnected to the recruiting scene and was more there in an evaluation capacity of existing targets. Funny story I didn't see Mitch Richmond all summer until I was in Vegas and saw him walking out of a club on casino floor at 3:00am when I was on craps table.

The admin was more clueless and that was in part the bigger problem. Jumping ahead to your comments on Slice, he pushed himself out the door. There was conflict with other staff members outside of Matt and ultimately Mullin. The fallout from this really made the administration pinch their pennies and their solution was lets avoid spending any money.

I do think Mullin's adjustment from Pro to College was evolving but slowly. I think this was hardest thing for him to understand the day to day babysitting needed. He didn't have to do it himself but needed someone on staff to be more dialed in than Mitch Richmond. In my opinion this was a fixable problem.

As for Tariq Owens I've stated before I would have done more and really anything I could to make it work for one more year but there were a lot of personal factors I don't feel comfortable sharing that influenced his decision to leave.

Dave you are dancing around the issue. You said mullin wasn’t involved in the day to day. You also said that st. Jean really tried and did his best. But the players didn’t fully respect him.
Forget novice coach. Forget he was improving. Bottom line, did Chris mullin do a good job? He was certainly paid like one. You can’t answer yes.
So many excuses. It’s very simple.

This is what confuses me.

Recruiting was terrible and we blame coaches for that. We should have won more because we had so much talent but bad coaching.

Player does well it's because he's good not because of coaching. Player does poor it's because coaching sucks.

It can't be both sides of these coins all the time.

Facts are we had some really good players, we needed more depth, problem wasn't taking transfers it was losing transfers, and coaching staff should have been more experienced and complementary.

Easily put - yes

Ponds, Simon, Heron, LJ, Clark are better than every squad you mentioned. LOL. It's not even really close. Did your really list Theo John - hahahahahahahhahahaha thanks for that one bro, i needed that after a long weekend. 5/5 Theo John just moving NEEDLES.