Chris Collins is not coaching this team well at all.

[Sec.112]

CC is not without blame. He's not perfect.

I'd love to talk about it, but it's pretty obvious the idiot train has rolled into town.

If your sole purpose is to shred Collins, you think you'd be better prepared than brilliant insight about his salary and cute little cliches to justify the argument. There's quite a few problems, and they go beyond this year of your sudden enlightenment. Hopefully someone can introduce them to you, and give you a speck of basketball knowledge.

Oh, and before we forget, Collins has that tournament season to remind us there's another side to his imperfection.

 

[willycat]

We didn’t have many easy shots in the lane. Part of that is coaching. We can’t win games relying on making 3 pointers, open or not.

Actually it's not all coaching. It's the desire and guts to do so. Driving into the lane has consequences , as does playing defense. An old coach told me years ago that playing defense is toughness. Some of the guys on this seasons team need to get more desire and toughness.

 

[NJCat]

The rest of the team should sit.

1 on 5 would be ugly.....

 

[EvanstonCat]

1 on 5 would be ugly.....

As we witnessed last night...

 

[willycat]

Amen. We caught all the breaks last year that BC never got when he was at rhe helm. Collins has 1 postseason in 5 years. We signed him for 10 years after one lightening in a bottle season. What a joke. His offense makes me sick. We dont have the athletes to play the style he wants to play or is used to playing.

Could you identify "all" of those breaks you note? Maybe if Carmody would have actually wanted to recruit, NU would have gotten better talent. Does the name Kaminsky ring a bell? How did Carmody's offense make you feel? OLD? Guys like Law, Mac and Pardon can't play an up tempo offense. If you think that, then you know nothing about basketball. Finally bitching about giving Collins a contract extension, after he took NU to their first ever NCAA is just dumb. Didn't Carmody get paid millions to coach at NU, for 12 years? Why?

 

[Styre]

NU would have been in the NiT two years ago at 20-12 with a 8-10 conference record but for a ton of losses by conference regular season champions of mid-major conferences in their conference tournaments.

NU was RPI #117 two years ago. The lowest RPI team to get an at-large NIT bid was Creighton at #94. There were three or four more automatic bids handed out that year than usual, but NU was nowhere close to the first 4 out.

 

[EvanstonCat]

Could you identify "all" of those breaks you note? Maybe if Carmody would have actually wanted to recruit, NU would have gotten better talent. Does the name Kaminsky ring a bell? How did Carmody's offense make you feel? OLD? Guys like Law, Mac and Pardon can't play an up tempo offense. If you think that, then you know nothing about basketball. Finally bitching about giving Collins a contract extension, after he took NU to their first ever NCAA is just dumb. Didn't Carmody get paid millions to coach at NU, for 12 years? Why?

The worst thing about losing is that all these Carmody hugging assholes come out of the woodwork. I wish they would just die.

 

[Max_Power]

The worst thing about losing is that all these Carmody hugging assholes come out of the woodwork. I wish they would just die.

Why anyone would even it bring up Carmody now, after what, 4 years and an NCAA tourney, is insane.

I apologize for bringing out the crazy but it appears since I'm not seeing their posts that I have blocked most of them over the years.

 

[Walker Fan]

There were a large of number of regular season champions from smaller conferences that took bids and limited the available openings for NIT bids at the conclusion of the 2015-2016 season. If you looked at our wonderful (NOT!) run of 4 NIT bids (which is meaningless for every other Big 10 team in our conference) which the Carmody huggers also focus on, NU's record in 2015-2016 was better at 20-12 than the records that the other NIT team's records were. Those teams were nothing special other than Crawford who had to send his CD to Tavares Hardy to get him to take a look at Drew and John Shurna who was not highly rated out of high school who grew three inches and made himself into NU's all-time leading scorer. BC was not able or did not try to recruit anyone to play with two of NU's greatest players of all-time to get into the tournament. That is why he was fired and soon he will be fired from Holy Cross and the Patriot League. Every other Big 10 school would not have allowed a coach for 13 seasons to stick around after never making the NCAA tournament.

 

[hdhntr1]

Yes.

But to have gone “year after year” you would need to either have gone the previous year, or the subsequent year.

Sorry but your statement indicated that CCC had not done the job year after year after year. Prior to this year team had improved year after year. Is this year a setback? Absolutely. But we won't know if it is a speedbump or something worse for at least a couple more years

 

[hdhntr1]

We didn’t have many easy shots in the lane. Part of that is coaching. We can’t win games relying on making 3 pointers, open or not.

Or having the right people to take advantage and get those easy shots in the lane. This year we have one player that can do that in Pardon. Only having one allows the other team to sag and double team and limit that. Falzone is getting healthier but is not really that guy yet. Skelly shows glimpses at times. Law hasn't been the same since he went down with the concussion. Basically, the team depends on Lindsey, Law, BMac making a couple open threes to open up passing lanes inside.

 

[hdhntr1]

Last year was a smoke and mirrors outlier: they couldn’t leave us out even though they knew the BIG sucked, because of the history of the BIG (and the Duke/ never made it feel good story.). 5 BC teams would have thrashed last years team.

Now the big just flat out sucks with no disguise.

I have no idea how good our incoming class next year is, but if it’s not really, really good, we have a long 4 years ahead.

We might want to go the football route: water down the schedule to nothing (like how we know fb could go undefeated any year and not make the playoff because of sos), and just try to act like we’re trying.

Have you looked at BIG recruiting over the last couple years? The BIG is getting stronger top to bottom. NU has the best class maybe ever coming in. But so do a lot of BIG teams. And this year, MSU is touted as a potential Final Four team but just got beat by an up and coming OSU and got taken to the wire by Rutgers. BIG is getting better and NU will have its work cut out for it but it looks like it will be improving as well. Yes this year is a disappointment. Just step back and take a big breath and give CCC a chance to get us back on track

 

[hdhntr1]

Absolutely embarrassing. he can’t even get us to the NIT with all his recruits in place. No wonder Baldwin decided to split. I think behind the scenes there is more going on than we will ever know. Collins is not coach K and never will be. He will not take us to the tournament with his current offensive and defensives strategies. The talent level he puts on the court reminds me of Penn St talent over the the last 10 years. What have they done? NOTHING

He got a HC gig.

 

[hdhntr1]

Yeah, I do think CC took a step back this year, but it's reasonable to expect that there'll be periods like this given that this is his first time as a headliner. I'd much rather this happen in a transition year like this than later on in his career if there's to be a learning curve.

There were a couple big changes. Loss of a couple players that had been here from the beginning and a top assistant (also here since the beginning) leaving. Maybe bigger transition than anyone thought.

 

[hdhntr1]

Amen. We caught all the breaks last year that BC never got when he was at rhe helm. Collins has 1 postseason in 5 years. We signed him for 10 years after one lightening in a bottle season. What a joke. His offense makes me sick. We dont have the athletes to play the style he wants to play or is used to playing.

We won 24 games. We had a 10-8 BIG record, upper division and actually got to the semi finals of the BTT for the first time ever. All things that BC coached teams never did. And it isn't like we avoided the injury bug with Falzone and Rap going down for the season as well as Lindsey getting Mono. And we won the first game in the NCAA, etc. How is that getting all the breaks that BC didn't get? Oh and the year before, a 8-10 BIG season and winning 20 games and not getting into NIT? When did that happen to BC?

Yes this year has been a disappointment and we all want to see better. But do you remember some of those BC years in the middle of his run (all his own recruits) before he brought in TH? Far worse than anything seen with CCC

 

[xxjfgxx]

Don't come on here with absurd, gushing preseason praise for a single-season coaching performance (with all that good shooting) and make all sorts of outlandish predictions, wallpapered with hyperbolic recruiting effusiveness and then refuse to assign any blame to the coaches for dreadful performances like that. This may be beyond you, but shooting performances are partially attributable to things like spacing and movement, which is directly related to coaching.

I only wish CC was playing guard. He could actually shoot the ball consistently and was a leader. This is s soft gutless group of upperclassmen!

 

[hdhntr1]

Its clear that CCC doesnt know how to get this years team motivated. And he's being stubborn at times sticking with the man to man defense when its not working. But aside from that he's the best thing to ever happen to NU basketball so people need to relax. If next year is more of the same from an effort stand point then its time to voice concern.
But imo this senior class is going through something that we're probably never gonna find out. Likely between Lindsey and McIntosh. Naming 4 captains probably has something to do with it. But when your first recruiting class that has already proven so much is showing up to their senior seasons with this effort, its clear something behind the scenes is going on. And I think CCC is already waiting for this season to be over. Not giving up but understanding this is just a spoiled bunch. And trying his best to make sure it wont transfer to next year.
And I think Law and Pardon taking over leadership next year along with hard working Ash, will make for a more consistent team, and hopefully one that can compete for a tourney spot.

Ash still makes lots of mistakes. So far I like what I see from Gaines other than his outside shot which needs to improve a lot

 

[hdhntr1]

This basketball season reminds me too much of our 2013 football season.

After the 2012 season with the 10 win season, our first bowl win in a half-century, and all that hype and a pre-season ranking for the 2013 campaign... we ended up with a pair of 5 win seasons and no bowls for two years.

CC is still learning as a coach, but I'm willing to flush a season or two as long as there's improvement over time.

Hard to forget all the hype going into the OSU game and the team falling apart after the loss

 

[EagerFan]

I've never been a coach and have no idea what goes into making a team believe and succeed.

The games I've watched them win, I see fire and hustle coming from several players. The games I've watched them lose, I've seen it from maybe two of them.

There are obviously more causes than one for what's gone wrong so far this season. I believe Baldwin was a very important cog in the machine that hasn't been replaced, and that is costing us.

I believe Sanjay's passion and defense haven't been replaced, but I like what I see from Gaines.

I believe Falzone, even slowed as he seems to be from nagging recovery issues, more than replaces Tap.

There has to be more going on than what I'm seeing, because way too often the team doesn't seem ready to compete and last year's fire and passion are mostly missing. And I believe that stuff creates confidence and motivated action and is a large part of what wins games regardless of X/O adjustments or the lack thereof.

In conclusion, I'm kind of sad atm.

 

[Styre]

There were a large of number of regular season champions from smaller conferences that took bids and limited the available openings for NIT bids at the conclusion of the 2015-2016 season.

There were 15 auto bids handed out that year. Most years there are anywhere from 10-13, so it was not a massive increase. Furthermore, by RPI, the metric used at the time, NU was nowhere near the next 4-5 teams out of the NIT. You can keep repeating this fiction that the auto bids kept NU out, but it won’t become true. We were not good enough that year and we were correctly left out, 20 wins or not.

 

[willycat]

There were 15 auto bids handed out that year. Most years there are anywhere from 10-13, so it was not a massive increase. Furthermore, by RPI, the metric used at the time, NU was nowhere near the next 4-5 teams out of the NIT. You can keep repeating this fiction that the auto bids kept NU out, but it won’t become true. We were not good enough that year and we were correctly left out, 20 wins or not.

Enlighten me. How many Big Ten teams with 20 wins have been left out of the NIT in recent times? The NU teams that did make the NIT in the last 20 or so years had how many wins? I'm not doubting you but just wonder what the answers are to those questions.

 

[hdhntr1]

Could you identify "all" of those breaks you note? Maybe if Carmody would have actually wanted to recruit, NU would have gotten better talent. Does the name Kaminsky ring a bell? How did Carmody's offense make you feel? OLD? Guys like Law, Mac and Pardon can't play an up tempo offense. If you think that, then you know nothing about basketball. Finally bitching about giving Collins a contract extension, after he took NU to their first ever NCAA is just dumb. Didn't Carmody get paid millions to coach at NU, for 12 years? Why?

Wasn't it 13?

 

[hdhntr1]

Enlighten me. How many Big Ten teams with 20 wins have been left out of the NIT in recent times? The NU teams that did make the NIT in the last 20 or so years had how many wins? I'm not doubting you but just wonder what the answers are to those questions.

Don't forget 8-10 in conference games.

 

[ColumbusCatFan1]

...but it's pretty obvious the idiot train has rolled into town.

Was about to comment on how another thread got off the rails, but after reading this there's no need.

Posting perfection, Sec.

 

[ColumbusCatFan1]

There were a large of number of regular season champions from smaller conferences that took bids and limited the available openings for NIT bids at the conclusion of the 2015-2016 season. If you looked at our wonderful (NOT!) run of 4 NIT bids (which is meaningless for every other Big 10 team in our conference) which the Carmody huggers also focus on, NU's record in 2015-2016 was better at 20-12 than the records that the other NIT team's records were. Those teams were nothing special other than Crawford who had to send his CD to Tavares Hardy to get him to take a look at Drew and John Shurna who was not highly rated out of high school who grew three inches and made himself into NU's all-time leading scorer. BC was not able or did not try to recruit anyone to play with two of NU's greatest players of all-time to get into the tournament. That is why he was fired and soon he will be fired from Holy Cross and the Patriot League. Every other Big 10 school would not have allowed a coach for 13 seasons to stick around after never making the NCAA tournament.

I suggest you avoid debating Styre on topics like NIT selection (same goes for Willy). You'll only look foolish.

Paragraphs can helpful as well.

 

[Styre]

Enlighten me. How many Big Ten teams with 20 wins have been left out of the NIT in recent times? The NU teams that did make the NIT in the last 20 or so years had how many wins? I'm not doubting you but just wonder what the answers are to those questions.

I can’t think of another example of a Big Ten team with 20 wins being left out of the NIT. It’s certainly unusual, but NU had an unusual season - we won 20 games, but I believe only one was over an NCAA qualifier, and only one more was even over an NIT qualifier. We looked better in the computer rankings, and if something like Kenpom had been used for selection we probably would have made it, but our RPI was garbage and that was the metric used at the time.

As for the win totals in the NIT seasons:
2009: 17
2010: 20
2011: 18
2012: 18

Win totals in 83, 94, 99 aren’t relevant because the selection criteria were very different in those years.

 

[willycat]

Wasn't it 13?

Yes, guess it was. My how time flies.

 

[TheC]

Ash still makes lots of mistakes. So far I like what I see from Gaines other than his outside shot which needs to improve a lot

Ash can't dribble the ball with his left hand it seems. When he plays the point, he seems to always have to use his right hand and keep his back to the defender because he lacks the confidence to dribble it out in front of his body. He dribbles too high and can't switch hands quickly. This really limits his ability to set up the offense because he can't see much of the time with his back to everyone. Couple that with his lack of shooting ability and its clear why we struggle so much with him on the floor.