This sucks

theboat

Well-Known Member
This season has soiled my love of Iowa basketball and I don't like it. The Lick years did that a little too, but this feels way worse because of Barta and the fact that he is so lost on actual results driven goals. Iowa basketball was the first sport that I got into as a kid and has always been such a big part of my fandom, and I found myself worse than apathetic this year. I actually found myself laughing or even hoping they would lose, just to drive change.

Its like my best friend is dating a horrible person, and I told him how horrible she is, and then he decided to marry her. Yeah, he had bad girlfriends before, but it never felt permanent like this does. I want her to cheat and break his heart, so I can get my friend back.

It is a weird dichotomy of emotion to wish ill upon something you care about in the hopes to make it better. Iowa needs to suck to drive change. I don't know, maybe Barta can get sued a couple more times and this bad dream can be over.
 
It's really so bad that it's time to hope for worse results instead of just hoping he gets back to top 3 conference finishes? I hope Fran falls into one really good grad transfer guard, or the Weiskamp is already really good as a freshmen. Then we would have a good guard, a really good guard, a really good power forward, and a pretty damn good center. That's a good start to a really good team. We need one more really good guard. That's it. Why not hope for that instead of hoping to tank? Especially when we signed a top 50 guard already.
 
It's really so bad that it's time to hope for worse results instead of just hoping he gets back to top 3 conference finishes? I hope Fran falls into one really good grad transfer guard, or the Weiskamp is already really good as a freshmen. Then we would have a good guard, a really good guard, a really good power forward, and a pretty damn good center. That's a good start to a really good team. We need one more really good guard. That's it. Why not hope for that instead of hoping to tank? Especially when we signed a top 50 guard already.
Sure, the girl may stop being an ugly b****, but the reality is she was never that great in the first place. It’s just that his previous girlfriend cheated on him and pissed the bed so he thinks the new one is good.
 
Sure, the girl may stop being an ugly b****, but the reality is she was never that great in the first place. It’s just that his previous girlfriend cheated on him and pissed the bed so he thinks the new one is good.

I can understand this year being so bad that you want to move on. But it's already so bad that you want to do terrible, just to get Fran out? That's just pathetic in my opinion. If a new coach guaranteed success, it would be one thing. But what do you think the odds are that a new coach will have better results than Fran has the last 5 or 6 years? Good enough odds to wish for another season like this? Let me ask you this. Would you rather finish 3rd in the conference next year, or last?
 
Once the season is a couple of months behind us, we will calm down, accept the reality that Fran will be the coach next year, that we will have a lot of returning players who have shown some potential; and, we have a couple of new guys with Weiskamp and young McCaffrey coming in next fall. I am the eternal optimist, I suppose, but I think Iowa will be much improved next season. I still maintain that our offensive play, which was really, really good this year most of the time, shows that our players have enough athleticism to be good defensive players. It just does not compute that we are not talented enough within our roster to be a good team. I know many posters here seem to actually enjoy bashing the talent on this team, but I frankly think they have an agenda that they will not let go of for whatever reasons they have. I have my season football tickets purchased for next Fall, and will renew my season basketball tickets as well. So, hang in there and GO HAWKS!
 
Look Fran put this team in position to beat Michigan. JBo took his worst shot of the season in overtime and that was that. They were so close. If that happened, winning the tourney would have been on everyone's mind. They were not a good team early due to inexperience, chemistry, or whatever, but they seemed to be figuring it out the last couple of weeks. I'm not gonna judge Fran until next season and after whatever shakes out in the offseason. He led us out of the cellar, and for that, we owe him at least one more season to figure this out.
 
I can understand this year being so bad that you want to move on. But it's already so bad that you want to do terrible, just to get Fran out? That's just pathetic in my opinion. If a new coach guaranteed success, it would be one thing. But what do you think the odds are that a new coach will have better results than Fran has the last 5 or 6 years? Good enough odds to wish for another season like this? Let me ask you this. Would you rather finish 3rd in the conference next year, or last?
I get it Fran, “body of work.”
The best parts of the body are slightly above average.
 
Once the season is a couple of months behind us, we will calm down, accept the reality that Fran will be the coach next year, that we will have a lot of returning players who have shown some potential; and, we have a couple of new guys with Weiskamp and young McCaffrey coming in next fall. I am the eternal optimist, I suppose, but I think Iowa will be much improved next season. I still maintain that our offensive play, which was really, really good this year most of the time, shows that our players have enough athleticism to be good defensive players. It just does not compute that we are not talented enough within our roster to be a good team. I know many posters here seem to actually enjoy bashing the talent on this team, but I frankly think they have an agenda that they will not let go of for whatever reasons they have. I have my season football tickets purchased for next Fall, and will renew my season basketball tickets as well. So, hang in there and GO HAWKS!
Patrick McCaffery is only a junior in high school
 
I get it Fran, “body of work.”
The best parts of the body are slightly above average.
Watching here at MSG, our body needs work.

Iowa needs to upgrade its slasher/defender spots 1-2 and 3. Quickness, handles, leaping, defending with quality.

EVERY other B1G team has the above. We do not, hence our record the last two years.

Fran also should hire a defensive assistant ala Michigan, let go of his ego and give up the ropes.

Coaching improvement needed on d, taking charges, defending the ball, blocking out, winning 50-50 balls.

On O, discipline to stop turning the f-ing ball over. Many teams at the Tourney getting to half with 3-4 or 5 turns...makes it much easier to win when you’re getting shots. This also helps our D numbers since we then won’t run to the other end giving up dunks and transition 3’s.
 
I get it Fran, “body of work.”
The best parts of the body are slightly above average.

And I get it too. One shitty season and it's time to pray for as many shitty seasons as it takes to move onto the next guy (who will more than likely eventually have a shitty season and make you start wishing he would lose too)
 
Watching here at MSG, our body needs work.

Iowa needs to upgrade its slasher/defender spots 1-2 and 3. Quickness, handles, leaping, defending with quality.

EVERY other B1G team has the above. We do not, hence our record the last two years.

Fran also should hire a defensive assistant ala Michigan, let go of his ego and give up the ropes.

Coaching improvement needed on d, taking charges, defending the ball, blocking out, winning 50-50 balls.

On O, discipline to stop turning the f-ing ball over. Many teams at the Tourney getting to half with 3-4 or 5 turns...makes it much easier to win when you’re getting shots. This also helps our D numbers since we then won’t run to the other end giving up dunks and transition 3’s.

Who even knows at this point if he needs a new assistant, or just needs to focus more time on it.
 
And I get it too. One shitty season and it's time to pray for as many shitty seasons as it takes to move onto the next guy (who will more than likely eventually have a shitty season and make you start wishing he would lose too)
It's a shitty season mixed in with a bunch of mediocre seasons. It's time to move on. We've seen the ceiling with Fran and it's a 2nd round NCAA beat down.
 
It's a shitty season mixed in with a bunch of mediocre seasons. It's time to move on. We've seen the ceiling with Fran and it's a 2nd round NCAA beat down.

I don't disagree with that. It's just crazy that one terrible season can be enough to make someone root against the hawks. Especially since the coach has shown he can win here at a pretty good level.
 
Who even knows at this point if he needs a new assistant, or just needs to focus more time on it.

Are you f'ing serious?!! He has been here 8 years. Don't you think he should have figured out by now "he just needs to focus more time on it" ??

He either doesn't know how to coach defense or doesn't care. Which is it? Because he has a history. What is the common denominator because the last time I checked no player has 8 years of eligibility?
 
I don't disagree with that. It's just crazy that one terrible season can be enough to make someone root against the hawks. Especially since the coach has shown he can win here at a pretty good level.
He hasn't shown that. He's shown that he can win enough to get to the 2nd round of the NCAA tournament. That's it and that's all, after 8 seasons. 2 NCAA wins in 8 seasons does not = "win here pretty good".
Seriously? You think that 2 NCAA tourney wins in 8 seasons is pretty good? He's 68-76 against Big Ten conference opponents. Wanting to find a coach that can do better than that, is not crazy.
 
I don't disagree with that. It's just crazy that one terrible season can be enough to make someone root against the hawks. Especially since the coach has shown he can win here at a pretty good level.

I guess it depends on your definition of "pretty good". If the NCAA appearances were more regular, I'd be more inclined to agree with you. But two 2nd round beat downs in 8 years, and a First Four loss.. Things have also trended downwards the last couple seasons in a big way. A few years ago, I was satisfied, but at this point, Fran's body of work Leaves me cold. Lukewarm at best.

Fran's gotta make the dance next year or he'll lose me completely.

As for rooting against the Hawks.. I'd rather see them win of course (to answer your question about a hypothetical 3rd place finish next year) but from a certain perspective, I kind of can see where some people are coming from with that.

With Barta at the helm, it's not hard for a coach to do just enough to keep his job and get a fat extension/buyout, keeping us mired in overall mediocrity for several more years. I guess some people would rather a fresh start than continued stagnation, right or wrong.
 
This season has soiled my love of Iowa basketball and I don't like it. The Lick years did that a little too, but this feels way worse because of Barta and the fact that he is so lost on actual results driven goals. Iowa basketball was the first sport that I got into as a kid and has always been such a big part of my fandom, and I found myself worse than apathetic this year. I actually found myself laughing or even hoping they would lose, just to drive change.

Its like my best friend is dating a horrible person, and I told him how horrible she is, and then he decided to marry her. Yeah, he had bad girlfriends before, but it never felt permanent like this does. I want her to cheat and break his heart, so I can get my friend back.

It is a weird dichotomy of emotion to wish ill upon something you care about in the hopes to make it better. Iowa needs to suck to drive change. I don't know, maybe Barta can get sued a couple more times and this bad dream can be over.

Iowa has just 1 issue (it's a big one, but it's the only one); lack of speed and quickness with our guards. PC and others are right, we really need to land a juco guard that is fast, laterally quick and has handles. Our offense was one of the best in the B1G and we didn't even have a pg. Now, Conner will help, not that he's super fast or laterally quick, but he showed he is excellent at moving the ball side to side and finding the open man; mean, the ball doesn't stagnate with Conner. If you don't have guards that can beat their man off the dribble, then the next best thing is the move the ball (passes are faster than humans). However, that doesn't solve the issue on the defensive end, thus the need for a speed and quick juco guard.
 
Once the season is a couple of months behind us, we will calm down, accept the reality that Fran will be the coach next year, that we will have a lot of returning players who have shown some potential; and, we have a couple of new guys with Weiskamp and young McCaffrey coming in next fall. I am the eternal optimist, I suppose, but I think Iowa will be much improved next season. I still maintain that our offensive play, which was really, really good this year most of the time, shows that our players have enough athleticism to be good defensive players. It just does not compute that we are not talented enough within our roster to be a good team. I know many posters here seem to actually enjoy bashing the talent on this team, but I frankly think they have an agenda that they will not let go of for whatever reasons they have. I have my season football tickets purchased for next Fall, and will renew my season basketball tickets as well. So, hang in there and GO HAWKS!
Good points in the middle of this post. I still can't wrap my head around the fact that they played some of their best 2017 ball without Jok. They went into Rutgers and turned the RAC into the WRECK. They whipped tOSU. There was a Brady Ellingson sighting in the Nebraska win (my annual Carver appearance). I saw Rutgers leave their hearts on the floor last night; nearly pull off the impossible. Damn! You got to lace 'em up at this level. Hope they learned some valuable lessons this year.
 
Iowa has just 1 issue (it's a big one, but it's the only one); lack of speed and quickness with our guards. PC and others are right, we really need to land a juco guard that is fast, laterally quick and has handles. Our offense was one of the best in the B1G and we didn't even have a pg. Now, Conner will help, not that he's super fast or laterally quick, but he showed he is excellent at moving the ball side to side and finding the open man; mean, the ball doesn't stagnate with Conner. If you don't have guards that can beat their man off the dribble, then the next best thing is the move the ball (passes are faster than humans). However, that doesn't solve the issue on the defensive end, thus the need for a speed and quick juco guard.
We don't have a point guard in the traditional sense but JBo knows how to feed the post at the right angle which many jet quick points don't know how to do. Getting the ball inside, even at the high school level, doesn't do any good if said post player is tied up when he receives it. JBo isn't racking all those assists up by accident. But all comments about his defense are well founded. And as has often been pointed out the rest of the defense crumbles like a house of cards.
 
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