I still think that coach Lavin is the right man for the job!

Coach Lavin is charismatic, well spoken, a great recruiter and generally a good guy.  He could have years of success with this program if he were to utilize his strengths and get help or his weaknesses.  I believe he should:

1.  Get a competent x and o man on board ASAP as he understands his limitations by his initial hiring of coach Dunlap.

2.  Bring in an assistant that is a good talent evaluator.  Perhaps he needs help in that department when it comes to bringing in all athletes and not ball players.

3.  Be a bit more transparent and honest in his dealing with the programs fans and the media.  The Sanchez/ Gift redshirt fiasco seems like it will eventually blow up and coach is going to look pretty bad.

4.  Stop over- hyping players until they have been through the Big East wars.  Such comments on his part that Marco is the next comming of Steve Kerr or his early public media ravings about Christian Jones is only going to make him look bad when these kids don't turn out to be as good as advertised and create unreal expectations on all our parts.

In short, I still say that coach Lavin is the right man for the job in the media frenzy city we dwell in but if he rests on certain bravado and does not make the changes he needs to make, he may as well buy a one way ticket on the Titanic II.

Bring in an assistant that is a good talent evaluator.  Perhaps he needs help in that department when it comes to bringing in all athletes and not ball players.

Its very difficult to pass on kids with the athleticism like Dom has, you can teach skills, although it may take a few years, you can't teach athleticism. The book isn't written yet, let these kids develop and lets see how they play as upper classsmen. Not every recruit is gonna be a 1-2 year player and hit the ground running from day one. 

not seeing the improvement from second year players that i thought should be.  not sure if thats a reflection on the coaching staff or the players.  to give the staff the benefit of the doubt, they did improve norm's players during their first year.  so, the jury is still out.  in any event, i have no reason to believe at this point that the improvement will be there next year.  hopefully i am wrong.

Obviously his health situation though no fault of his own set the program back. Then I think he was caught off guard by Harkless and Dunlap leaving and he misfired on Sanchez and Nuri. All of that would not worry me as much as the following three things:
1. How disorganized we look on offense and Defense and coach's lack of feel for substitution patterns. His sub patterns are almost Normesque
2. The unbalanced roster. One big man, one point guard , one shooter, fourteen swingman.
3. The Phil Greene love affair is starting to remind me of the Norm / Geno love story.

Obviously his health situation though no fault of his own set the program back. Then I think he was caught off guard by Harkless and Dunlap leaving and he misfired on Sanchez and Nuri. All of that would not worry me as much as the following three things:
1. How disorganized we look on offense and Defense and coach's lack of feel for substitution patterns. His sub patterns are almost Normesque
2. The unbalanced roster. One big man, one point guard , one shooter, fourteen swingman.
3. The Phil Greene love affair is starting to remind me of the Norm / Geno love story.

Agree with #1 & 2, will see on #3. Hopefully Branch gets lion share of time. Nice post!

Quote from: Linda Mirabella on January 14, 2013, 12:15:51 AM

Bring in an assistant that is a good talent evaluator.  Perhaps he needs help in that department when it comes to bringing in all athletes and not ball players.

Its very difficult to pass on kids with the athleticism like Dom has, you can teach skills, although it may take a few years, you can't teach athleticism. The book isn't written yet, let these kids develop and lets see how they play as upper classsmen. Not every recruit is gonna be a 1-2 year player and hit the ground running from day one.

Agree with you on that.  I also believe that these kids shooting stats are deceiving. If the kids are in a , as we used to say, prevent offense where every shot is contested, of course their stats will not be good,  that's where the competent x and o coach comes in. Coach Keady ( unless he was elevated to full time assisstant role which I doubt he would have the energy for)  is presently not the answer.

If you look at some of the great college programs.  The head coaches may not be doing ,it's of the coaching. They surround themselves with top flight assistants who do that. While they still run the show, their main job is in PR and closing down on recruits. Case in point, while I am certainly not a UConn fan, look at Calhoun's staff before he retired.  When Calhoun was I'll, the team didn't miss a beat.

It is easy to grin when you have Mickey D all americans coming in and you have the NCAA beat, but a fan worthwhile is a fan that can smile with Steve Lavin sitting in the head coach's seat.

Sorry, Caddyshack was on all weekend.

It is easy to grin when you have Mickey D all americans coming in and you have the NCAA beat, but a fan worthwhile is a fan that can smile with Steve Lavin sitting in the head coach's seat.

Sorry, Caddyshack was on all weekend.

What channel?  Missed it.

What channel?  Missed it.

HBO 4 or 5. The only way to watch it other than the DVD. I own the DVD but anytime it is on HBO I am in. HBO lets you appreciate the most underated character in movie Lacey Underall! I think she should have won an Oscar, or at least a Golden Globe.

Lacey Underall

There is so  much Spaulding Smails in We Are SJU

Lacey Underall

There is so Spaulding Smails is We Are SJU

Haha pmg, you'll have nothing and like it

What channel?  Missed it.

HBO 4 or 5. The only way to watch it other than the DVD. I own the DVD but anytime it is on HBO I am in. HBO lets you appreciate the most underated character in movie Lacey Underall! I think she should have won an Oscar, or at least a Golden Globe.

TWO Golden Globes 

Coach Lavin is charismatic, well spoken, a great recruiter and generally a good guy.  He could have years of success with this program if he were to utilize his strengths and get help or his weaknesses.  I believe he should:

1.  Get a competent x and o man on board ASAP as he understands his limitations by his initial hiring of coach Dunlap.

I agree that Lavin could still be the right coach for the job. But only if he has the wisdom to do what is mentioned above, ASAP. His #1 priority this offseason has got to be finding a very high caliber X&Os specialist. He should actually be thinking about who he might want to go after when the season ends NOW. 

Also, as someone else mentioned in another thread, he will need to always have an elite caliber point guard to help mask his game coaching weaknesses.

not seeing the improvement from second year players that i thought should be.  not sure if thats a reflection on the coaching staff or the players.  to give the staff the benefit of the doubt, they did improve norm's players during their first year.  so, the jury is still out.  in any event, i have no reason to believe at this point that the improvement will be there next year.  hopefully i am wrong.

interesting that Dom had his best two games in the last week when Dlo ran into trouble...he looked more confident shooting jumpers that at any point thus far. Maybe Dlo's struggles will pay some unexpected dividends by forcing others to step up

Why does everybody insist that Lavin needs and "X's and O's guy" on the sidelines with him now?  I don't see any glaring issues with what is being run out there.  It's not always being run to perfection, but that is pretty standard with a young team with lots of new pieces and a few missing pieces.

Too many people here think they know better how everything should be run.  I think it's pretty comical actually.  Sure we stunk a few games.  Then we out coach and outplay a very well-coached Notre Dame team and nobody notices.  Lavin is really only in is second year with his second recruiting class here.  Since being hired, he has always been "up front" about this team being built to reach our goals in year 4-5.  We are still just building this program. 

Certainly we had seem bad losses this year, but not because the team is incapable.  Lots of maddening issues that tend to plague young teams.  As much as people hate the oft-referred "young" excuse, it must be realized that it is the truth.  Lavin certainly needs to recruit a few more pieces for us to be a top tier team, but I think we are on the right track.

I just think it gets pretty obnoxious to put out s list saying Lavin is the right guy for the job but needs to hire: a X's and O's guy, a talent evaluator, different style of players etc..

Why does everybody insist that Lavin needs and "X's and O's guy" on the sidelines with him now?  I don't see any glaring issues with what is being run out there.  It's not always being run to perfection, but that is pretty standard with a young team with lots of new pieces and a few missing pieces.

Too many people here think they know better how everything should be run.  I think it's pretty comical actually.  Sure we stunk a few games.  Then we out coach and outplay a very well-coached Notre Dame team and nobody notices.  Lavin is really only in is second year with his second recruiting class here.  Since being hired, he has always been "up front" about this team being built to reach our goals in year 4-5.  We are still just building this program. 

Certainly we had seem bad losses this year, but not because the team is incapable.  Lots of maddening issues that tend to plague young teams.  As much as people hate the oft-referred "young" excuse, it must be realized that it is the truth.  Lavin certainly needs to recruit a few more pieces for us to be a top tier team, but I think we are on the right track.

I just think it gets pretty obnoxious to put out s list saying Lavin is the right guy for the job but needs to hire: a X's and O's guy, a talent evaluator, different style of players etc



Baron Davis and every UCLA fan not named Crgreen does not endorse this post!

we out coach

Lavin is fortunate that coaching is only over rated when the team loses, losses being on the players for their failure to perform adequately. Whereas when we win, Lavin out coached the other guy. By that criteria Mahoney was the right man for the job as well.

Quote from: MCNPA on January 17, 2013, 02:27:17 AM

we out coach

Lavin is fortunate that coaching is only over rated when the team loses, losses being on the players for their failure to perform adequately. Whereas when we win, Lavin out coached the other guy. By that criteria Mahoney was the right man for the job as well.

I was only making a point that good execution makes the gameplan look a lot better.  A gameplan that there was nothing wrong with from the start.  Guess this stuff is over your head though...

I was only making a point that good execution makes the gameplan look a lot better.  A gameplan that there was nothing wrong with from the start.  Guess this stuff is over your head though...

No, you are just reinforcing Fun's point with this post. So basically you are saying that if the players don't execute it is their fault becuasr in your expert opinion the game plan was solid. However when we win Lavin outcoached the other coach.

I was only making a point that good execution makes the gameplan look a lot better.  A gameplan that there was nothing wrong with from the start.  Guess this stuff is over your head though...

No, you are just reinforcing Fun's point with this post. So basically you are saying that if the players don't execute it is their fault becuasr in your expert opinion the game plan was solid. However when we win Lavin outcoached the other coach.

Huh?  No, I just said that people harp on Lavin not being able to coach every game, yet when we win with a solid gameplan, nobody even mentions it.   Btw, the players are the ones that always win or lose the games.  That's who is on the court.  Certainly coaching has its role.  Me saying that game coaching is overrated has nothing to do with our gameplan and preparation entering this game which was to stop their 3-point shooting.  A solid gameplan that worked. Our gameplan vs game coaching are two different things.  I think Lavin's plan entering the game worked and whatever Lavin did durn the game made little difference.  We followed the plan, executed and win,   Lavin has beaten Brey the last 4/5 times.  A coach that has won several big east coach if the year awards. 

It almost always comes down to execution by the players.  Like I said, game coaching has its role.  It's just that the expert analysis of most on these boards only comes out in losses yet nobody comments when we win.  I haven't read too many saying how good of a coaching job Lavin did after this win.  I'm only reading how he needs to hire more X's and O's experts which to me is perplexing.