Four years of Fran. Four years of improvement.

C

CarfinoFan

Well-Known Member
In four years Fran has turned this Iowa program from shambles to a NCAA birth. The team has played in multiple Nationally Televised games and the talking heads have had Iowa in the conversation, which never happened during the Lick days. CHA was sold out for the BT season. Recruits have Iowa on their list with TD and Hutton commiting despite the last ten games. Marble was all BT first team.

As fans we are disappointed in the total meltdown of the last ten games. Disappointed about the close calls with ISU, Nova, MSU, & Wisconsin.

At the beginning of the year fans were going to be happy being back in the Dance. Well it's going to happen! Be excited, anything can happen once you are in. Maybe a double digit seed is just what the Hawks need to regain that chip on their shoulder. What's the worst that can happen? We lose to a better team in the round of 64, but if we win, watch out the swagger may come back. The confidence and chemistry could get us to the sweet 16, which is where most fans thought would be our ceiling.

The season is not yet over, Hawkeye fans are the most loyal and supportive in college sports. This team deserves your respect and support. Let's Go Hawks!!!! This California Hawk fan can't wait to watch!
 
hawkforlife9 said:
What?
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HE SAID...

In four years Fran has turned this Iowa program from shambles to a NCAA birth. The team has played in multiple Nationally Televised games and the talking heads have had Iowa in the conversation, which never happened during the Lick days. CHA was sold out for the BT season. Recruits have Iowa on their list with TD and Hutton commiting despite the last ten games. Marble was all BT first team.

As fans we are disappointed in the total meltdown of the last ten games. Disappointed about the close calls with ISU, Nova, MSU, & Wisconsin.

At the beginning of the year fans were going to be happy being back in the Dance. Well it's going to happen! Be excited, anything can happen once you are in. Maybe a double digit seed is just what the Hawks need to regain that chip on their shoulder. What's the worst that can happen? We lose to a better team in the round of 64, but if we win, watch out the swagger may come back. The confidence and chemistry could get us to the sweet 16, which is where most fans thought would be our ceiling.

The season is not yet over, Hawkeye fans are the most loyal and supportive in college sports. This team deserves your respect and support. Let's Go Hawks!!!! This California Hawk fan can't wait to watch...

Whew...
 
I like where you're going with this, Carfinofan. I just hope this isn't as good as it gets with Fran. We are most likely in the NCAA tournament which is awesome, but limping (huge understatement) in as a possible double digit seed with this loaded team, hhhmmm.... Still, GO HAWKS, and I can't to see where we end up tomorrow!!!
 
linus19 said:
I like where you're going with this, Carfinofan. I just hope this isn't as good as it gets with Fran. We are most likely in the NCAA tournament which is awesome, but limping (huge understatement) in as a possible double digit seed with this loaded team, hhhmmm.... Still, GO HAWKS, and I can't to see where we end up tomorrow!!!
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Just my opinion here, but I think this is where the problem lies with fan expectations. Are we loaded or do we just have a lot of decent players? There are only 2 that I know of that get mentioned for having NBA potential.

Maybe, just maybe, we are only a top 40 team that rose too high too fast and then came crashing back to earth after teams figured some things out about us. Then we started doubting ourselves.

I think we are good enough to beat most top 100 teams on any given day, but can just as easily lose to those same teams.
 
dwh5er said:
Just my opinion here, but I think this is where the problem lies with fan expectations. Are we loaded or do we just have a lot of decent players? There are only 2 that I know of that get mentioned for having NBA potential.

Maybe, just maybe, we are only a top 40 team that rose too high too fast and then came crashing back to earth after teams figured some things out about us. Then we started doubting ourselves.

I think we are good enough to beat most top 100 teams on any given day, but can just as easily lose to those same teams.
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Mentioned this too in another post and I think you are dead right. Everyone says this team is talented, but who...maybe RDM? Other than that, who has real BIG talent on this roster. Failing to see it. To your point I think we have 1 very talented player and a bunch (7 or 8) of average BIG players. Nobody on this team is consistent from 3 and we don't have any of the bigs that can dominate in the low post.
 
Now let me temper this with...Fran has brought us a long ways. However, the collapse late in the year, the steps backward this team is taking is unacceptable. We have been outcoached in the last half of the season. As other teams accumulate their scouts on us...we seem to regress when we play teams. I am by no means going to step off the cliff and ask for Fran to go...but I hope this staff learns...I would love to see this staff bring in some real rah, rah, team chemistry type guy...maybe even a former Hawk. Just not sold Fran has all the coaching pieces put together yet.
 
HawksMN said:
Need a win in the dance to take some sour off. Bad.
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Good post.

If the Hawks make the Dance, the season is a success.

One or two wins in the tournament would take the sting away from the end of the regular season.

This team can do it....

This year's team would beat last year's team, no doubt in my mind. This year's schedule has been much tougher than last year's, and Iowa's current RPI indicates that fact.

People's memories are being skewed by last season's NIT run, which really meant nothing but was a "feel good" story for Iowa fans.
 
For the most part this is true but I'm calling this year and last year about even, even if we dance. It's better than getting worse I guess.
 
The comparison from last year to this year is a small improvement, but still an improvement. Last year we had several horrible losses and no signature wins. This year the Northwestern loss is bad but it is hard to beat a team three times in one year. Beating OSU at OSU and destroying Michigan at home are better than any wins last year. It might not be as big of a jump as Hawk fans had hoped, but an NCAA invitation is what we needed.....and will have tomorrow!!!!
 
The hawks had the toughest Big 10 league schedule as I read it. Fran took over a team that was unwatchable and had hardly any players, Cole and May played well under Fran.

We should be in the dance and if that happens that is a nice turn around in 4 years with the deep NIT run last year.

We all know at tourney time last year the hawks would have been better than many teams that made the dance.
 
In year 5 of doing it the right way... we lose the only player who has consistently played at the D1 level. If this is what we get for 5 years... please!
 
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