Jon's new article

[theboat]

Fair enough, but have you seen Fran's "Building a championship defense" video?

Better question, has Fran seen it?

 

[homes]

Fran has boxed himself in with who he offered scholarships to and the distribution of scholarships by class. It's strange that he didn't see this coming, unless he did.

 

[PCHawk]

Off topic, but I had my pickup in the shop once a couple summers ago. The guy I rode to work with had to leave in an emergency. Could have waited a couple hours for my brother to get home and come get me, but I got a wild hair and decided to walk 8 miles home on gravel. I loved it.

I hope everything ended up ok for the guy you rode with.

 

[PCHawk]

Right. So why try anything in life, you’ll probably just fail. Good philosophy

He's talking about cheering for a team he has no control over. Not a team he actually plays on.

 

[theboat]

He's talking about cheering for a team he has no control over. Not a team he actually plays on.

That mindset transcends fandom.

 

[PCHawk]

Holy cow this thread moves fast. I normally read a whole thread before I respond to anything, but I can't keep up with this thing. I'm only on page 10 right now.

 

[PCHawk]

No one here’s asking for a national championship, dolt.

People are asking for consistent top 3~ish Big Ten finishes and NCAA berths in basketball, and leading the West Division and occasionally vying for a Big Ten title in football.

Stop trying to be dramatic.

Why do you think Iowa should have consistent top 3 finishes in a conference with MSU, Indiana, Purdue, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Michigan, and Maryland? We just tied for 3rd two years in a row and our fans were calling for Fran's head then too.

 

[PCHawk]

agree - NCAA or bust next season. Lick got 3 years and proved dick, Fran gets that too. It will be a miracle according to a lot of views on this board. But if he DOES it, we can go ahead and put it to rest whether he's a good coach or not.

Or just say he got lucky. Or say just making the tournament isn't enough. Or say 3 years out of 9 sucks.

 

[lightning1]

Wisconsin blocked Uthoff’s transfer to Iowa. So any schools that weren’t blocked could communicate with him while we couldn’t. He chose to attend Iowa and pay his own way for one year. It was a very unique situation.

Now I think Fran deserves some credit for turning our program around and his playing style helped to attract JU.

The problem with some of the really negative posters, and the troll56, is they won't ever give Fran credit for anything.

For instance if a guy doesn’t improve as much as they’d like they say Fran sucks at developing players. But then when someone brings up a Marble or Olaseni they say well he just got lucky.

Same thing for recruiting. They say he’s lucky White turned out as good as he was. Once you get into that place where you can’t give Fran credit for literally anything it’s hard to have a sane conversation.

I recognize that Fran has done some good here, but I’m ready to move on given everything I’ve seen.

This is not true.

 

[lightning1]

Yeah, Iowa should can the guy that just finished back to back third place in the B1G reg season and then 5th last year after they lost Uthoff, Woody, Gesell and Sapp...makes a lot of sense.

I tend to dismiss those results when the current team of 13 scholarship recruits, doesn't do anything fundamentally well. They don't move the ball or move without the ball well on offense. They don't value the ball. They don't play any kind of team defense. They don't communicate on defense. They don't box out. They don't hustle. They don't get back on defense. Fran has no clue how to make substitutions with this roster. Half of the roster is playing out of position. Fran still doesn't understand the hows/whys of using time outs.
I honestly can't think of anything this team does well. I'm sure there are some positives with individual players. That hardly translates to wins as a team.
When the problems are too many to list, how does Fran go about fixing them?
How long will it take?
Can he do it with the current roster?

 

[PCHawk]

Are you saying we have a coach where a single player determines our season? Wouldn't it be better to have a coach who can create depth . . . you know, in case a player gets hurt or graduates?

I'm waiting for the "we're Iowa, we shouldn't expect depth" bromide.

The best player on pretty much every team in the nation determines their season. Is there a single team this year that wouldn't be worse if you took away their best player?

 

[lightning1]

Did Wisconsin create a culture that demands success? Or did they hire the right coaches in Bo Ryan and Alvarez?
To address your question, Wisconsin does have the advantage of a state with 5.8M people compared to 3M in Iowa. And the Badgers are clearly the flagship program in the state. Marquette is in the ACC, but Wisconsin is much more clearly seen as the program of choice as compared to Iowa and Iowa State.

Of course the expectations are different for Gard than they are for Fran, given the last 15 years of what's gone on at Wisconsin. If they can him next year if he doesn't make tourney, and they bring in another coach who makes the tournament 3 times in 5 years, does that mean Wisconsin "demands success" any less than they did before? Or does it mean that they hired coaches who weren't as good as Ryan?

The bold portion above is not a new development. 30 years ago, the University of Wisconsin had the same advantages over Iowa, that they have today. And they had those "advantages" for decades of futility, before that.
The right leadership is everything in college sports. Wisconsin has it and we don't.

 

[HuckFinn]

If I were a victim type I'd tell you to go read the posts and see he called me a d-bag. But I find that stuff humorous and it rolls off. And again, quit crying. I never said anything about his family. Read the post and I said I hope he doesn't pass his quitter attitude down to his kids.

What am I missing? Are his kids not part of his family?

 

[PCHawk]

Meh, that might look cool on a coffee mug sitting on your desk next to your framed Blvd of Broken Dreams poster you are still lugging around from college that nobody thinks is cool any more, but over hneuh in the real world, I may not like that brick wall...but there ain't no amount of time available where ramming my head against it is going to knock it down.

Everybody doesn't always get a trophy....just because I want something, doesn't mean that I get something. There are real barriers to entry that exist in the high echelon of P5 athletics....and there are some programs that have decades of better success, better traditions, larger state population and recruiting bases, etc, that Iowa does not have and never will have.

Yet....but I WANT IT!

By all means, knock yourself out with that waste of time. But please pardon me when I call it for what it is, and instead choose to stay grounded on the reality of things. that doesnt mean wave the white flag..it doesn't make the losses taste like garbage...sports, when you are not a blueblood, is about hope. But hope in something just for the sake of the outcome without a reality based assessment of how the sausage is made is idolatry.

The problem is, some fans think being mad on a message board helps make us better.

 

[tksirius]

The problem is, some fans think being mad on a message board helps make us better.

 

[PCHawk]

I think that at times I can get a little negative but that is usually spurred by someone making defeatist remarks and it just rubs me the wrong way. Also as you stated none of us likes it when we are having a tough year especially when we all high expectations.

Just a point of reference here;

Defeatism:

1. the attitude, policy, or conduct of a person who admits, expects, or no longer resists defeat, as because of a conviction that further struggle or effort is futile; pessimistic resignation.

*To be fair there are people on this forum who seem to reflect this description.

It’s not unrealistic for us to at least be able to match up with Wisconsin in any sport. In that respect we have to do better. Match up against Alabama? Now that would be unrealistic to have that level of expectations. We should be winning our division in equal amounts with Wisconsin. It’s going on three years we are due. If we get to 2020 and haven’t won the division at least once then KF should be fired. I give Fran one more year even if he doesn’t win another Big Ten game this year but he has to make a substantial improvement next season. I give him that because of the dumpster we were in when he got here. I think I am being totally fair and reasonable with both coaches.

That definition has nothing to do with accepting being average. If it does, where does being a defeatist stop? If you get second in the conference, you're a defeatist for being happy? If you win the conference, you're a defeatist for not winning a national championship? Being happy for being promoted to vice president of your company is a defeatist because you're not CEO? Being happy you're wife is a 9 is a defeatist because you didn't get a 10? I'm sorry, but how much joy I get out of watching a sport of a team I have absolutely no connection to and no impact on how they do, has zero reflection on whether I'm a defeatist or not. How can you possibly be called a defeatist over something that has nothing to do with you? You live in Utah right? You can rest assure that no matter how much or little you care about the hawks results, it will have nothing to do with whether you're a defeatist or not. You have pretty much the same affiliation with the hawks as you do my 4 year old's soccer team.

 

[JonDMiller]

Here is the problem. This roster ain’t changing much next year. This is the roster we are stuck with. The next time we will really see a new roster or a “mulligan” if you will won’t be until the 2019-2020 season. Are we willing to wait that long? If your stance (some posters on here not necessarily you) is if he doesn’t make the tournament next year than we let him go and we don’t make the tournament next year, not only are we setting ourselves back an entire year, but we are also likely blowing up the 2019 recruiting class.

Let's revisit this in June when we know exactly what the roster will look like

 

[JonDMiller]

My concern is neither Cook nor Jordan are good enough right now to carry a team that lacks experience and I don't think they have the role players in place that Marble, White, and Uthoff had. If we can't right the ship this year, which we most likely won't and next year is no better than Fran may not have the opportunity to see if it pans out because he may be out of a job before their senior years. I guess my biggest concern though is that we're bringing in what seems like the exact same players every year. Why does it seem like we're bringing in a PG every 3-4 years when we should have one coming in atleast every other.

I dont think it's so much that they are not good enough to carry a team that lacks experience. I think the lack of a few additional guards and wings with breakdown ball skills and quickness are killing this team...because you just need to overplay JoBo, or any of the guards for that matter, which makes entry passes come from farther away and awkward angles. Shonn Morris nailed that last night, and it's a key, key thing. Iowa's lack of guards that scare anyone hinders their ability to space the floor correctly and run a competent half court offense.

 

[PCHawk]

Can we at least agree that bluebloods aren't ordained. There's nothing in the constitution which declares who will be a blueblood. Bluebloods are simply schools which demand a lot from their coaches. There's nothing magical about bluebloods, they just set high goals. And I'm willing to say bluebloods aren't permanent in their station. Sports imo is like society, we don't have a class system. Almost any P5 program can work their way to the top. Look at NW in football. They have serious handicaps but have changed their culture. That's where it starts, hiring someone like a Fitz or Fry who isn't always looking for an excuse after a loss.

Well that's wrong. Blue bloods are schools who either have huge built in advantages, or schools who had hall of fame coaches for a long period of time. Most schools who are blue bloods because of the latter will have a hard time maintaining that status once the coach retires.

 

[PCHawk]

I'm not saying fire them because settling for average is a losers mentality. I'm saying why do we hold on to mediocre with the hopes that they right the ship. I don't see how Iowa becomes a "coaches graveyard" if we decide to get rid of Fran after 8 years. We're not talking about hiring and firing year in and year out. Give them a few years to prove themselves and if it doesn't work then move on. Why go long term for a coach with mediocre results? If we land a coach with similar success to Bo Ryan or Tom Izzo then by all means lock them up long term, but I simply don't understand the Fran needs more time to right the ship mentality.

If you give a coach 3 years then move on, give another coach 3 years then move on ,then give another coach 3 years then move on, you will be considered a coaching graveyard. You have a small chance of finding a great coach that takes you temporarily to the next level. If you do, that's awesome and we're all happy it worked out. But there is a far greater chance you will end up with another average coach (which isn't good enough) or a bad coach. Then you fire and move on. Just my guess but I would say there is about a 10% chance you would find your guy (about half of the time he leaves anyway) and about a 90% chance you end up labeled a coaching graveyard.