NU more patient than other programs
...and that is not necessarily a good thing. in no way am i suggesting that Northwestern's fans or administration take their expectations to Kentucky-like levels, but it would be helpful if they acknowledge failure and take measures to address it.
the two headlines that caught my eye this morning were the coaching changes announced at Elon and High Point. it is important to mention that both these schools share NU's distinction of having never made the NCAA tournament, although their misery has been much shorter, since both schools entered Division I just nine years ago. but even without that basketball heritage, the AD's at both places decided six seasons of losing was enough. at High Point, they guy they threw out even had a winning record.
how is it that Northwestern can sit idly through debacles like last season and not even think about making a change? granted, it would be illogicial and unreasonable to replace Carmody after this season. after all, this will be only the fourth-ever trip to the NIT in school history. but BC needs to be careful to avoid a regression next year. following the 1994 NIT berth, NU went 5-22 / 1-17 and lost 20 of its last 21 games. after the 1999 NIT season, the Wildcats went 5-25 / 0-16 and lost 20 of its last 21 games. Carmody will need to do something he hasn't before, and that is carry some wins over to the following season.
the two headlines that caught my eye this morning were the coaching changes announced at Elon and High Point. it is important to mention that both these schools share NU's distinction of having never made the NCAA tournament, although their misery has been much shorter, since both schools entered Division I just nine years ago. but even without that basketball heritage, the AD's at both places decided six seasons of losing was enough. at High Point, they guy they threw out even had a winning record.
how is it that Northwestern can sit idly through debacles like last season and not even think about making a change? granted, it would be illogicial and unreasonable to replace Carmody after this season. after all, this will be only the fourth-ever trip to the NIT in school history. but BC needs to be careful to avoid a regression next year. following the 1994 NIT berth, NU went 5-22 / 1-17 and lost 20 of its last 21 games. after the 1999 NIT season, the Wildcats went 5-25 / 0-16 and lost 20 of its last 21 games. Carmody will need to do something he hasn't before, and that is carry some wins over to the following season.
posted by Fire Bill Carmody at
1:43 PM
25 Comments:
Good post. I would add 3 things.
1. We haven't made the NIT yet so let's not get ahead of ourselves. If we drop our game vs. Minnesota, i would not be shocked if the NIT passed us by.
2. Craig Moore is graduating. I know i have mentioned it here before, but he is our only reliable 3 point shooter. We are fucked without one guy who can nail the 3 and based on carmody's 9 years of recruiting, i expect 0 from our freshmen next year. So who is going to bail us out when the shotclock is approaching 0? Who is going to be able to hit 3 pointers from 5 feet behind the line like moore does?
3. the big ten is going to be so much better next year. If we win 5 games with our returners i will be shocked. Unless of course we hire a coach who teaches basketball and not gimmick-ball. You know why very few teams use the vaunted princeton offense?? because it only fucking works at princeton against shitty ivy league teams and teams who only play against it once every 5 years. Newsflash, no one in the big ten is confused by it, except for john shurna.
fuck carmody
For God's sake, AC, stop with the We-Might-Get-Snubbed-By-The-NIT defeatism. I know you're frustrated (we all are), but be rational: this team is going to the NIT, and it's not even an issue.
In terms of this post, I wrote a comment in a previous thread that is probably more applicable here, so I'll paraphrase: Yes, NU has been VERY patient with Carmody, and yes, this is very unusual. The High Point/Elon examples are the norm. But this also means that we have very few examples of other schools where a coach has survived 7+ non-post-season years at the start of his tenure. But there are some examples, and you might be surprised what happened. Tom Brennan at Vermont comes to mind. His teams did nothing between 1986 and 2001. Then, they suddenly took off and made three straight NCAA tourneys, and he retired a hero.
Boston College with Jim O'Brien also jumps out at me. He made the NIT in his second year, but otherwise, put up one stinker after another between 1986 and 1994. Then, he posted a winning season, took the team to the Elite 8 and turned the Eagles into a consistent winner before leaving for OSU. I know there was a scandal at OSU, but his BC experience showed that patience can be rewarded.
I'm not saying something similar will happen with Carmody. His record suggests it won't. But the same could have been said at Vermont in 2001 and BC in 1993.
the Jim O'Brien comparison is interesting. but i don't think Brennan applies here since he was in a small conference. in the America East, all it takes is one great player to dominate the league, and he got that with Taylor Coppenrath. that won't fly in the big ten. even in Eschmeyer's senior season, NU couldn't do better than one game over .500
1. Ohhh, Jim O'Brien, you had to bring up my kryptonite. If there is one coach in the history of the NCAA i may hate more than Bill Carmody it is Jim O'Brien. The only reason BC kept him through all of those losing years is that HE WENT TO BC. His record at BC was fucking atrocious and Al Skinner has consistently taken that program to the tourney. Al Skinner is 3x the coach O'Brien was. So yes, O'Brien did finally get BC to the tourney but look at what a marginally competent coach (al skinner) has done with the same program.
2. Yes, the vermont guy finally had something go right, but that is such a fucking outlier (which you readily admit). I am not a betting man (unless we are talking about the NBA, NCAA, NFL, tidlly winks, or the weather), but I would rather take the >99% chance that camrody is not the next vermont coach than the <1% chance that he is. It's just not happening with this guy, sorry, but it's not. Ricky fucking byrdsong got us to the NIT in ~1/2 the years, ricky fucking Byrdsong.
3. I am dead serious that the NIT is not guaranteed. if we lose to minnesota we are 8-11 in the big ten, mid 70ish to 80ish RPI and 17-13 overall. ESPN had us as the 25th team waiting to get into the tourney in their latest bracketology. So presumably, the NIT could pass us by since they take 32 teams i believe. As a pseudo big ten school with a BS sympathy vote going for us now, it is likely that we will make it, but it is not the slam dunk you seem to think. Especially because we don't draw.
fuck carmody
I want you to consider this possibility. Brennan and O'Brien always had a consistent amount of coaching ability (whatever amount that may be), through all of their years. Had they recruited the same way and coached the same way their entire careers, they would have eventually been fired in obscurity. So assuming their coaching level remained constant, what might've changed? Their ability to recruit! And how did that happen? Through hard work and fortitude that was fruitless the previous decade or so? I doubt it. What probably changed is . . . how shall we say . . . strict adherence to NCAA rules. The coaches might have adopted a certain morally casual attitude towards recruiting and bent a few rules. You want to make an omlet you gotta break some eggs, especially after almost 10 years of futility.
Do you think Carmody would bend, break, or shatter NCAA recruiting rules to build a winning program and go out a hero? Or do you think he's just going to grind it out and wallow in mediocrity until some day - mercifully - the ax finally falls?
FBC, time to liven up the site a little and let AC guest-post, a la LTP. Glad to see someone else as pissed off as we are (apparently maybe even a little more).
As far as I can tell, BC is only good at drawing up inbounds plays under the opposing basket (we seem to get layups every time). But last second 3's? Luka Mirkovic, anyone? It's amazing my TV has not had the remote thrown through it yet...
Juice Thompson 3FG%: .429
Craig Moore 3FG%: .419
Oh look, another reliable 3 point shooter. Try watching a game or two.
Princeton offense also seems to work pretty well in the Big East, what with Georgetown winning two conference titles in 5 seasons and making a Final Four with the same system NU uses. Herb Sendek used it to take NC State to 5 straight tournament appearances out of the ACC. I could go on.
Yeesh, AC, don't forget that Skinner didn't win at BC until Year 4 -- and this was after inheriting a Big East champion from O'Brien in '97. After those first eight years, O'Brien was 3-for-4 with getting to the NCAA tournament. The only miss came in '95, after losing 4 of 5 starters off the '94 team. He rebuilt fast and won the Big East tourney by '97. Skinner's been there for 12 years now (!) and he's not once advanced as far as O'Brien did in the NCAA tournament. I maintain: Patience was rewarded with Jim O'Brien, and I don't see how you can savage his post-'93 record in comparison to Skinner's mark.
You say it's a 1-in-100 chance that something similar happens with Carmody. I'm saying: Statistically, we can't say that. There are so few examples of coaches who've missed the post-season for 7+ years sticking around. I just remember the venom that was directed at O'Brien (and Brennan) and what people were saying by the time they actually left. The tone couldn't have been more different.
1. By trying to find outlier coaches who have sucked for a number of years and then all of a sudden won, all one is doing is trying to rationalize why carmody is still our coach. Well there is no rationalization other than carmody is bienen's butt buddy, seriously there is no other reason for him to be there. I am sure one could find other examples of coaches like the vermont guy or jim o'brien. Heck, I am sure you could find a coach who sucked for 20 years and then all of a sudden won games just like i bet you could find a guy who could suck his own dick, but guess what, carmody is neither of those. he's a shitty coach with a dy-no-mite gimmick system that does not work.
2. As for the dick bag who wants to compare michael thompson's shooting to craig moore's, i would add that moore has taken twice as many shots so let's see if thompson can shoot over 40% if he doubles his attempts. but that's fine, let's assume he can becasue he did last year. so let's take him OFF OF THE FUCKING BALL and let him run off screens or sit in the corner to get open so HE CAN TAKE TWICE AS MANY SHOTS to make up for the loss of moore. So now you don't need to replace moore, but you need to replace YOUR FUCKING PG. How do you propose we do that? Should we exhume Javon Johnson who played the pg position like he was a fucking abortion? You've seen NU point guards of the past right? They have all fucking sucked except for Juice is adequate. so great strategy dick bag. Seriously, let's let jeremy nash run the fucking point or maybe the next great freshman car-no-win-dy brings in next year. yawn. But way to point that out, seriously, you get points effort.
3. Look, I don't wish bad things on Carmody. i just want him not to coach our fucking team. It's not like Rick Pitino where i hope he gets anal herpes (and if you're reading this rick, you heard me right, i want you to get anal fucking herpes you slimeball), I just want him to take his stupid gimmick offense and defense back to the ivy leagues where it works and help dartmouth make an NCAA tourney. Go big green or what ever those douchebags are.
4. You know why "there are so few examples of coaches who've missed the post-season for 7+ years sticking around" because most ADs are not fucking idiot dickbags who don't value their jobs. If Jim Phillips has a fucking sac, carmody will gone.
fuck carmody
Three more quick points
1. I can't believe i just found this site. I want to give major props to whoever runs it. Just fucking brilliant. And you have been doing this for what looks like around 2 years, a fucking visionary. Whoever suggested i guest-post, that is not my intention. I am perfectly happy just venting on this board and letting the true genius (whoever runs this site) do what he or she pleases. i have enough fucking shit to deal with.
2. I don't have the time or energy to get into an Al Skinner vs. Jim O'Brien debate on a fire bill carmody board, i just don't have it in me anymore. I have had that argument so many times it make my dick hurt to even think about it and I am not entirely sure what that means. Anyway, mixing Al Skinner-Jim O'Brien with firebillcarmody is like crossing the streams in Ghostbusters for me, you just shouldn't do it, so I am just going to let it be. Just keep in mind that i can put up 10x the venom in that argument than i can in my desire to get rid of Car-no-win-dy, but that is not why i am here.
3. As for the buttdart who told me to try watching a game or two, i've tried watching this team but they are unwatchable. I sat through the fucking Iowa loss, the Michigan, loss, the OSU loss, the PSU loss. Watching NU basketball is worse than what i imagine it is like trying to watch Dustin Diamond fuck a porcupine. They regularly get outrebounded on the defensive glass because of their gimmick 1-3-1 tons of fun for the offense rebounders defense and they must lead the nation in shot clock violations on offense. if they have not set the ncaa record for shot clock violations this year than there was once some real fuck awful other team out there. My watching or not (and i have watched plenty) does not change the fact that we finished in 9th place in bill carmody's 9th year at the helm and people are calling this HIS BEST FUCKING YEAR. Congrats, you're only worse than 80% of your fucking peers but good job Bill, run along now.
Fuck Carmody
AC, you keep using "outlier" to describe the Brennan/O'Brien examples...as if there are dozens of other examples of coaches who posted 7+ non-postseason years, kept their jobs, and kept losing? This is precisely my point: There are almost no examples either way. In terms of a precedent, Carmody is in pretty much uncharted territory. All I'm saying is I heard all of the same comments -- "Fuck O'Brien," "Fuck Brennan -- and overzealous references to body parts and functions in their first 5+ years on the jobs. When they left, the same people were calling them geniuses.
And if you don't like the Skinner/O'Brien comparison, then don't bring it up. I wasn't the first here to sing Al Skinner's praises. You were.
Hey, AC -
First, you're not going to replace Moore's shooting, simply because he's one of the best long-range shooters in conference history. But you said there wasn't another reliable 3pt shooter on the team, and there is. Coble's not exactly a slouch from beyond the arc, either, and you've got a sophomore in Nick Fruendt and an incoming freshman in Alex Marcotullio who are, by all accounts, excellent long-range shooters.
Second, if this was only Carmody's best season, I'd agree that he should be fired. But for the 10th fucking time, it's pretty much indisputably the best season for this program in almost 80 years. Even the guy who runs this site says it would be "illogical and unreasonable" to fire Carmody after this season. You criticize people for celebrating mediocrity while forgetting that mediocrity IS a cause for celebration for a program as shitty as this one, and completely overlooking the fact that there are real, actual, honest-to-god NCAA tournament expectations for the team next season. If they don't improve even more in 2010, I'll be right there with you wanting Carmody out -- honest -- but you absolutely cannot fire the coach now that there's hope for a hopeless program.
Third, way to completely ignore the fact that the Princeton offense you hate so much has seen success in major conferences, the NCAA tournament, and is regularly incorporated into NBA offenses. Arizona State's a top 25 team.. guess what they run?
Bottom line - firing him before next year would be retarded. If the team regresses next year like the other times we made the NIT, it would be retarded to let him stay.
1. You brought up Jim O'Brien, but i did take it to the next level stating Al Skinner is the better coach thereby refuting your assertion that Jim O'Brien was successful. Either way, unless you start Jimo'briencan'tlickalskinner'snuts.com I am going to refrain from debating the two in this forum, even though i did make the first comparison.
2. I just want to understand your argument a bit better. You found two coaches who sucked for 7+ years and then finally won. Therefore since carmody has coached for 7+ years and completely sucked, he is due to also turn out a winner. What is your next argument going to be? Chewbacca was a wookie? You see he is from the planet Kashyyyk but he lives on the planet Endor. Now think about it; that does not make sense. Why would a Wookiee, an eight-foot tall Wookiee, want to live on Endor, with a bunch of two-foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense!
3. as for the person who said firing carmody after this year would be retarded, you should first apologize to the mentally challenged, then you should ask yourself why getting rid of a coach who in his 9th year finished 9th out of 11 teams and did not make a post season tournament in his first 8 years (fingers crossed for this year) even though the team he is coaching went to a tournament 2 times in the 7 years before him, each time with a different coach, is somehow unreasonable. We're not defending John Wooden here, gimmick-mody's 9 years have been an unmitigated disaster. Two full recruiting classes have come and gone without even one NIT game or one even marginal CBA prospect. Color me unimpressed (as long as unimpressed is a light blue because that supposedly matches my eyes).
Fuck Carmody
retard: to delay or hold back in terms of progress, development, or accomplishment
I'll stand by my comment.
AC: "I just want to understand your argument a bit better. You found two coaches who sucked for 7+ years and then finally won. Therefore since carmody has coached for 7+ years and completely sucked, he is due to also turn out a winner."
I specifically said that I did NOT think this constituted evidence that he would turn it around. I raised the examples beacuse they show that it's POSSIBLE. As I said, for all I know, you're right, and Carmody will never get it done here.
You call these examples "outliers," which is true enough, in the sense that they represent a tiny, insignificant fraction of all coaching experiences. But, as I keep saying, we have so few examples of ANY coaches who have ever been in Carmody's situation. These are the only two I can think of. There are probably others who just kept on losing, and maybe some more who started winning. All i'm saying is that I remember both O'Brien ad Brennan vividly, and I remember all of the four-letter taunts being thrown at them -- and I remember how it all suddenly stopped once day.
I think the others here are right: BC is back next year, and that's that. I hope he turns into a Brennan or O'Brien. To me, it's at least possible. (And I also agree that if there's regression next year, the plug should be pulled.)
Anonymous (if that is your real name), I missed your comment before about the Princeton offense. I have no idea what ASU runs but they have this guy named James Harden who is going to be a top 5 NBA pick. Guess what? If a team has a top 5 NBA pick they could run the asslicker offense and still win. If NU had a top 5 NBA pick the gimmick offense would work too because we could give the ball to that guy with 5 seconds left on the shot clock after all of our back door cuts failed like usual and tell him to go get it.
The fact is that our offense sucks, it has sucked since carmody got here, and if I have to watch another 4+ shot clock violation game where there were another 5-6 shots which had to be forced up at the buzzer I am going to fly to Evanston, stand behind the fucking bench, and yell out the shot clock to fucking carmody starting at 30.
And who gives a shit if we fire carmody after his first almost mediocre season (and it is almost mediocre because 9th FUCKING PLACE OUT OF 11 TEAMS is not mediocre, it is still on the shit side of average) and what you think is NU’s best season ever. That is the wrong fucking bar to use. Seriously, I’ve said it before, we need to raise our fucking standards. Finishing better than only 2 big ten teams, one of whom is on fucking no scholarship probation is not a reason to suck anybody’s dick. Do you honestly believe car-no-win-dy will win with this team next year when the Big Ten will be better and we won’t have our one volume shooter to bail us out (and I will eat Hecky’s ribs until I throw up if Nick Freundt who can’t even get off the bench on a 9th place big ten team as a sophomore can take craig moore’s place next year (just remember, it’s the sauce))? If you’re fine wasting another year with Carmody then kudos to you. I prefer to try to compete and if I’ve learned anything over the past 9 years other than what ATM means in the porn world, it’s that Carmody is not going to take NU to an NCAA tournament.
Fuck Carmody
Yeah, but that's the point: it's not the offense that doesn't work, it's the fact that NU is forced to run it with marginal talent. The offense works at all levels of organized basketball. And yes, the talent is Carmody's fault, but only inasmuch as no coach has ever been able to recruit top talent to NU.
And you say we need to raise our standards; well, my standard for next year is the NCAA tournament. Yes, I think the team will get better, and be even more competitive. Tied for the most wins in program history (1983's 18th win came via forfeit, and this season isn't even over yet), heading to the postseason, only losing one player of significance, a very promising freshman class entering its second year, and one of the most highly-regarded recruits in program history (Drew Crawford) coming in. This does not sound like a program trending down.
You know what? I was watching ESPN the other night (the WCC tourney, I think), and during the game, Steve Lavin and Stephen Bardo started an unprompted discussion of Northwestern's tournament chances. During the pregame show of the fucking Duke-North Carolina game on CBS last weekend, the CBS studio crew talked some Northwestern hoops. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that we've never had this kind of attention before -- and it would be fucking embarrassing to turn around and fire our coach after a season that actually earned us positive national attention.
If we fail next year, then get rid of him. But you want to fire him on principle -- and we're nowhere near good enough to fire people based on that.
I bet Steve Lavin and Stephen Bardo are still having unprompted discussions of Northwestern's tournament chances only they are cackling like 3 year olds on a fucking sugar high about what dingbats they were to even entertain the thought.
And during the next pregame show of the fucking Duke-North Carolina game on CBS (as you so eloquently put it), do you think the CBS studio crew will talk some more NU hoops unless Bill Carmody runs up into the stands and takes his own walk on the wild side?
So our hoops team got 2 fleeting mentions by some national announcers for one day of bill car-no-win-dys 9 fucking years and all of a sudden we are supposed to be content and think we have turned the corner and carmody has figured it out? Yeah, i am soooooooo excited to see carmody's recruits for next year. He's done such a fucking bang up job already i am sure the next rex walters is anxiously already preparing his transfer application before he even arrives.
But hey, let's give carmody a tenth a year. What's the old saying? fool me once shame on you. fool me twice shame on me. fool me 10 times and i am a fucking idiot dickbag who doesn't care one shit about winning.
Fuck carmody (and his stupid Princeton offense which now only works according to you when you have the right players. Hmmm, if we don’t have the right players to run it, THEN WHY THE FUCK ARE WE RUNNING IT???????????????????????).
We get it, AC, you like to say "fuck" and drop the occasional pop culture/pornography reference. You're like the x-rated Sports Guy! The act's getting old. Enjoy Carmody for another fucking season.
Of course we have the talent to run the Princeton, we just don't have as much talent as the teams who run it better. What, you think if we install the triple post that we'll suddenly score 85 points a night? (Hint: we tried it. We didn't.)
But you're obviously not interested in being sensible. You keep banging that drum, and dreaming of that coach who'll come in, wave his magic wand, and win 25 games in his third year, or whatever the fuck it is you expect.
Anonymous,
Flattery will get you nowhere with me. If you’re going to turn this into personal attacks, at least get a few things right.
1. I don’t just like to say fuck, I also like to say shit and apparently dickbag.
2. I prefer to think of myself as an angrier, less likeable jay mariotti than a dirtier bill simmons (and you see that is funny because no one is angrier or less likeable than mariotti).
3. I really haven’t used that many pop culture references. Sure I compared NU’s offense to watching Dustin Diamond fuck a porcupine but I swear to D’wyane Master Bates that is not only true but fucking funny. If you don’t like pop references, I am perfectly willing to compare carmody to mentally challenged Lizaveta from the Brothers Karamazov but that’s just not as funny. Nor would it be funny if I only wrote in iambic pentameter (well, actually that would be funny, but who has the time?).
4. If anything, I have made a ton of NU references. When was the last time someone dropped a Dewey Williams on you (I can’t believe I have never used the term “dropping a dewey “until now, wow) or Javon Johnson? How about a Hecky’s comment even leaving in their tag line?? Come on, that is fucking high quality shit even a dickbag like yourself can appreciate. And I still have the Chicken Shack, Foster Walker, and Dan Kreft up my sleeve for when I need them.
5. I may have called a few people douchenozzles or shitbags in my posts but to me those are terms of endearment. Every post I have written has contained some reference to basketball and I have tried to shed light on what I believe are carmody and NU’s shortcomings (the fallacy of the Princeton offense, the idea that a coach can get it after 7 years of losing, the idea that finishing 9th in the big ten is fucking good when the team that finished 11th basically had no scholarships, the fact that we have no replacement for craig moore who bails us out 10 times a game). So when you put out a post solely attacking me, that is bit douchey. It’s fine to call me a numbnut in debating a fact, but to throw your hands up and call me tired without any substance basically means you agree with my points and you have to take this down to a baser level because you have nothing else to say. I expect more from you anonymous, I really do. But hey, if you now want carmody to stay just to spite me, I say brilliant, really, that makes a ton sense.
Look, I graduated from NU in 1997 and root for our teams. I even went to Franklin Field last year to see our females fucking win the NCAA lacrosse title and I don’t even know the rules of lacrosse. As a fan and an alumnus, I have a right to point out how shitty I think carmody is. So lighten up, after all this is a FIRE BILL CARMODY blog. Seriously, the whole thing is a fucking joke premise to begin with. If you want joke free exchanges, maybe you should go to williamcarmodyisonlyanokkindofcoachbutireallydon’twanttohurthisfeelings.com.
Now if you’re the same anonymous who followed up the dopey post with one about the Princeton offense not working because we don’t have the players, all I can say to you is this. I have no fucking idea what offense bill carmody should be running. I don’t know if he should try the dribble-drive motion offense which is more in vogue these days than the French guy who worked at EV1 in the mid 1990s (though I doubt we have the personnel for it), but I do know that the Princeton offense that we run is a fucking abomination. Seriously, have you ever seen a team with more shot clock violations and more forced shots as the shot clock is running out than us? I have seen Dance marathons that have not sucked so bad (notice 2 NU references and no pop references, I’m just saying I am more than a 1 trick pony, like my use of fuck and shit). How well is Georgetown doing with the Princeton offense this year with a team full of mcdonald’s all Americans and stud recruits?
The facts are that I am sick and tired of losing the carmody way. His two predecessors had more success in shorter time frames running more traditional offenses. Based on his 9 years of results I am 100% convinced that carmody is never going to take this program anywhere, so it’s about time to cut fucking bait and bring someone else in and let the next assclown have a go at it. Maybe no one will be ever win at NU, just don’t tell that to Gary Fucking Barnett. I truly believe someone will eventually figure shit out, and if I didn’t I would just give up on the program and enjoy the extra few hours a week I would be gaining. The problem is we’ll never know if we continue with car-no-win-dy and his gimmicks. I’m just fucking sick of it already.
Fuck Carmody
Thanks for the 28,000-word self-deconstruction of your own comic/analytic method. Gripping.
I see this site as more than a joke. The editor actually does write-ups and recaps for every game. I've been reading it in spite of the title. There's some very good content here, completely unrelated to Carmody.
To be fair, if you're going to talk about Carmody's predecessors having more success in a shorter time period, you have to consider that Carmody won 7 Big Ten games in his second year -- more than the three previous coaches ever won -- that he won 16 total games that year -- also more than the three previous coaches ever won -- and that the 2002 team was the first-ever major conference team to be left out of the NIT with a winning record.
Or look at their records in their first three years:
Foster: 23-61 (6-48)
Byrdsong: 27-56 (8-46)
O'Neill: 30-56 (9-39)
Carmody: 39-49 (13-35)
Now I'm not saying Carmody's record was GOOD, but he clearly had more success than the others. Unless it was somehow his fault that his team was snubbed for the NIT.
But that was years ago, so let's move on:
I think there are a couple of indisputable facts:
1) Carmody is the most successful coach we've had since at least the 1960s, if not earlier.
2) Carmody's overall record, when compared to other high-major programs over the same time period, is still awful.
So no, there's nothing wrong with wanting him fired, based on #2. And there's nothing wrong with wanting to keep him around, based on #1. All I'm saying is that to fire him after this year, no matter what he did in the 8 seasons beforehand, would be stupid, since EVERYONE (except a few angry NU alums) thinks the arrow for the program is pointing straight up.
As for the Princeton offense, I agree that it looks ugly at times. I also think it's at something of a disadvantage in the Big Ten, since the conference is famous for allowing a lot of banging in the paint without calling fouls, and it's hard to make cuts when you're getting knocked out of position. But I also think it's the best chance we've had in years to succeed on offense -- and really, O'Neill's offense looked even worse. I'm still not sure he even had a scheme.
Anyway, a few quick points:
1. I still think you are MISSING THE CONTEXT. Indiana was an anomaly this year. They used non-scholarship walk-ons and freshmen for the most part due to a ONCE IN A PROGRAM event. Those wins shouldn’t really count. If you take out the 2 indiana wins, NU was 6-10 in the big ten in what I think is a down year for the conference. That is a .375 big ten win % in year #9. I don’t call that improvement or something to be giddy about. We suck just as badly now as we did when carmody took over,
2. You say Kevin o’neill’s offense sucked but he got us to the nit tournament in two years. I would love to have that shitty offense now.
3. If you want to keep carmody, you obviously think we are going to miraculously improve next year. So which Big ten teams are going to get worse???? And who is going to replace craig moore’s ~4 3-pointes a game???? Jon Shurna? I would argue, actually I am arguing, that craig moore is our most important player because he bails us out of so many fucking god awful offensive sets. The guy is a lights out fucking shooter and that function is not easily replaced.
In 9 years I see no improvement. He has averaged a 30% winning % in the big ten including the 2 indiana games this year. Winning 30% of your games is not reason for a 10th year, fuck it wasn’t even reason for a 9th. And being the best coach in NU history is like being the smartest kid on the short bus, big fucking deal (though I will take ricky birdsong over carmody any day just for pure entertainment value).
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