Tale of the Tape Lavin vs Norm

the Norm comparisons are ridiculous.

I concur with my esteemed colleague

Are you trying to suggest that Norm is responsible for Lavin's successful season in 2010/2011? If that's the case, how can you explain such a dramatic improvement from the 09-10 season to 10-11 season?

That's a strange way to phrase the question. Norm was responsible for Lavin's success to the extent that Norm recruited the only players Lavin has had a winning season with in 10 years. Clearly it was not Lavin's Xs and Os that were responsible. He's as bad a coach as Norm as possibly worse, I haven't decided yet. OTOH Norm does not deserve credit for Lavin's success.

If Dunlap is responsible for Lavin's success it surprises me that he was unable to repeat that success the next year - with players the great recruiter Lavin hand picked for him - or in the NBA.

I absolutely think Norm would have managed a tournament appearance with his 10 seniors. Absolutely. Ten 22 year olds, the majority of whom went on to play pro BB within 6 months of graduating, with 4 years of system and weight training and getting their teeth kicked in playing against a bunch of teenagers. Louie got to the Hall of Fame playing upperclassmen. Shirley you remember that. The difference between juniors and seniors is enormous, as Bozo the Lavin's squad will demonstrate next year. I also think Norm's recruiting was better than he's given credit for. Yes, he failed to land name recruits -- because he was an inexperienced and overmatched coach at a crap school with a crap program in a hopeless competition against half a dozen hall of famers. So he was left left overs. But he had a good eye for second tier / mid major / under the radar talent. Cedric J, DJ, Horne, Hardy, Brownlee, Quincy Roberts. Even poor Tyshwan Edmundson had a respectable career at an appropriate level. I'd pick a mid major team of seniors to beat a freshman team of top 100 recruits any day.

Quote from: Poison on January 21, 2014, 11:35:00 AM

Are you trying to suggest that Norm is responsible for Lavin's successful season in 2010/2011? If that's the case, how can you explain such a dramatic improvement from the 09-10 season to 10-11 season?

That's a strange way to phrase the question. Norm was responsible for Lavin's success to the extent that Norm recruited the only players Lavin has had a winning season with in 10 years. Clearly it was not Lavin's Xs and Os that were responsible. He's as bad a coach as Norm as possibly worse, I haven't decided yet. OTOH Norm does not deserve credit for Lavin's success.

If Dunlap is responsible for Lavin's success it surprises me that he was unable to repeat that success the next year - with players the great recruiter Lavin hand picked for him - or in the NBA.

I absolutely think Norm would have managed a tournament appearance with his 10 seniors. Absolutely. Ten 22 year olds, the majority of whom went on to play pro BB within 6 months of graduating, with 4 years of system and weight training and getting their teeth kicked in playing against a bunch of teenagers. Louie got to the Hall of Fame playing upperclassmen. Shirley you remember that. The difference between juniors and seniors is enormous, as Bozo the Lavin's squad will demonstrate next year. I also think Norm's recruiting was better than he's given credit for. Yes, he failed to land name recruits -- because he was an inexperienced and overmatched coach at a crap school with a crap program in a hopeless competition against half a dozen hall of famers. So he was left left overs. But he had a good eye for second tier / mid major / under the radar talent. Cedric J, DJ, Horne, Hardy, Brownlee, Quincy Roberts. Even poor Tyshwan Edmundson had a respectable career at an appropriate level. I'd pick a mid major team of seniors to beat a freshman team of top 100 recruits any day.

I agree that Norm had a good eye for second tier under the radar talent. But his judgement during games was bad, and that's generous. One could argue that Lavin's success came from choosing the right guys to give the most minutes to. I sat and watched Horne, Boothe and DJ throw up bricks in the Holiday Festival against Cornell while Dwight Hardy sat on the bench and watched in the second half.

Yes, seniors are great, but how often did Norm have seniors? It seemed like he chased everyone away, and they almost always succeeded elsewhere with someone else teaching them.

Lavin hasn't been able to make up his mind regarding his starters, his rotation, his offense or his defense, but in 2010-2011, a light went on in Mid Dec and the team started playing well. Shortly after that, they started playing really well. That light has yet to go on, and despite having higher ranked players, this group is missing something that 2010-2011 had. Dunlap.

It's easy to say that those seniors would have gone from 6-12 to an NCAA team under Norm, but would Norm have given the ball to Hardy? Would he have started Brownlee? He certainly could have the year before, but he didn't see it. Norm went to the grocery store and bought all of the groceries. Lavin/Dunlap cooked a great dinner. Norm gets some of the credit. Fair is fair.

I agree that Norm had a good eye for second tier under the radar talent. But his judgement during games was bad, and that's generous. One could argue that Lavin's success came from choosing the right guys to give the most minutes to. I sat and watched Horne, Boothe and DJ throw up bricks in the Holiday Festival against Cornell while Dwight Hardy sat on the bench and watched in the second half.

Yes, seniors are great, but how often did Norm have seniors? It seemed like he chased everyone away, and they almost always succeeded elsewhere with someone else teaching them.

Lavin hasn't been able to make up his mind regarding his starters, his rotation, his offense or his defense, but in 2010-2011, a light went on in Mid Dec and the team started playing well. Shortly after that, they started playing really well. That light has yet to go on, and despite having higher ranked players, this group is missing something that 2010-2011 had. Dunlap.

It's easy to say that those seniors would have gone from 6-12 to an NCAA team under Norm, but would Norm have given the ball to Hardy? Would he have started Brownlee? He certainly could have the year before, but he didn't see it. Norm went to the grocery store and bought all of the groceries. Lavin/Dunlap cooked a great dinner. Norm gets some of the credit. Fair is fair.

I would not argue that Norm was a good coach at SJU. (Although I might argue that he could be an average coach if he took a job at which he had a chance of succeeding.) Neither is Lavin a good coach. They are both bad. Lavin might be worse, considering the latitude he is afforded and the handicaps under which Norm operated.

It is likely that inserting Hardy and Brownlee in the starting line up is what made the 2010 team a winner and possible that Norm might not have done that - he was loyal to his recruits - or stubborn - to a fault. Lavin's success in that case seems to imitate his strategy nowadays, which is to start whoever the stars tell him to and hope for the best. In Hardy's case his premonition worked. In Hooper's case, and Ndiaye's case, and Balamou's case, not so much. And so keeps trying to catch lightning in the bottle, which seems to me his fall back strategy. Lavin is stubborn too, playing Greene and Pointer despite their obvious handicaps and poor production.

The only point I was trying to make was to point out this dissonance: if Norm was a horrible recruiter how was it that Lavin - who anyone with eyes can see is an awful basketball coach - coached Norm's players up to success. It is to me not possible. Either they were good enough players who won despite Lavin - as Baron Davis suggests all Lavin's teams do - or some some intervening force deserves credit. They matured. Dunlap coached them up. Maybe the simple fact that the stench of losing that surrounded Norm dissipated when he was let go. But there is no way anyone can convince me that Lavin raised their level of play - the evidence is to me pretty clear that he makes his players worse.

Quote from: happyrappy on January 21, 2014, 10:58:51 AM

Lavin = Great Recruiter, Horrible X&O
Norm = Bad Recruiter, Bad X&O

Great > Good
Good > Bad
Bad > Horrible

There for Lavin wins Great & Horrible beats Bad & Bad.

If Norm was a bad recruiter and Lavin is a horrible coach how did horrible coach Lavin win with Norm's bad recruits?

Let me guess, it was genius coach Dunlap.

If Dunlap is such a genius that he could single-handedly overcome Norm's bad recruits and Lavin's horrible coaching, how come he failed so miserably in the NBA?

I'm pretty sure that Dunlap tripled the Bobcats wins from the previous season.