Paul Graham or Ernie Kent
- Thread starter 7ICoug
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Graham is the standard in my book and earned a place by himself. No talent, they didn't play hard, academic issues, son on scholarship etc. in a less competitive conference.
I don't know that I would put Bone above Kent. Kent's positive outlook on what looks like a disaster is wearing thin but Bone went on KJR and essentially said you can't win in Pullman to one of their guys (Mitch?). They should have fired him on the spot.
If fashion is your thing I'll take Kent over Bone there as well.
I don't know that I would put Bone above Kent. Kent's positive outlook on what looks like a disaster is wearing thin but Bone went on KJR and essentially said you can't win in Pullman to one of their guys (Mitch?). They should have fired him on the spot.
If fashion is your thing I'll take Kent over Bone there as well.
Graham was an absolutely terrible hire. The guy couldn't coach a lick. Might have been the farthest over his head of any D-1 coach I can think of.
This team is probably as ugly as Grahams last team, but I am still not ready to lay the blame at the foot of Ernie. No coach is going to consistently win in Pullman. As good as Tony is, his success was built to some degree by having his dad take the bullet while a rebuild was put in place. We were in a rebuild again when Tony left with only 1 senior and no juniors returning. Had any other team in the conference been willing to offer Klay out of high school we would have really been in bad shape. It takes a lot of skill and a little luck to have a good team in Pullman.
Can anyone win in Pullman? I think you can do a lot better than Graham, you can be a lot better than we are this year, or in Bones last 2 years. At the other end of the spectrum I don't ever expect to see back to back 26 win seasons again.
Time will tell whether Ernie can get us to some respectability. We are no worse than we were in Sampsons 3rd season, or in Ravelings 3 season for that matter.
This team is probably as ugly as Grahams last team, but I am still not ready to lay the blame at the foot of Ernie. No coach is going to consistently win in Pullman. As good as Tony is, his success was built to some degree by having his dad take the bullet while a rebuild was put in place. We were in a rebuild again when Tony left with only 1 senior and no juniors returning. Had any other team in the conference been willing to offer Klay out of high school we would have really been in bad shape. It takes a lot of skill and a little luck to have a good team in Pullman.
Can anyone win in Pullman? I think you can do a lot better than Graham, you can be a lot better than we are this year, or in Bones last 2 years. At the other end of the spectrum I don't ever expect to see back to back 26 win seasons again.
Time will tell whether Ernie can get us to some respectability. We are no worse than we were in Sampsons 3rd season, or in Ravelings 3 season for that matter.
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The October class will tell the tale. He has 7 to give so he has to find some quality talent. Even if he signs some players it's gonna be a long slog.
With 7 to give this wasn't the year to win 1 Pac 12 game. Staff changes potentially on the way? Does a new assistant or two have the time to make a difference over 1 summer and fall?
There was a lot of concern about the makeup of the staff when Ernie was hired. I understand him being comfortable with those guys but it wasn't going to help recruiting.
What concerns me is the complete silence on recruiting. Admittedly I don't follow it like I used to but I haven't heard anything regarding potential recruits. Even 7I doesn't seem to have any info.
I don't know enough about the staff to know whether they are good recruiters or not. However, I wouldn't mind seeing a couple of young chargers out there. I'm pretty sure Ernie can close a lot of deals if they can get them to him.
I don't know enough about the staff to know whether they are good recruiters or not. However, I wouldn't mind seeing a couple of young chargers out there. I'm pretty sure Ernie can close a lot of deals if they can get them to him.
The quiet tells me we will probably be scrambling unless we find an assistant that can bring recruits with him. Hearing about some past area recruits basically not giving us the time of day is a problem. When you don't hear much from 7I on the recruiting front that a bad signal to me as well. I don't follow recruiting much any longer either but the silence with half the roster to sign doesn't look good.
Why do some fans discredit that Tony got Klay? I don't care what the circumstances or rationalizations are, TONY GOT HIM. That is the bottom line. All rationalizations mean nothing.
Tony now has two ex-WSU basketball players who play regularly in the NBA at the same time! One is an all-star and one of the best players on the entire planet folks. Ponder that for a moment! Not even George Raveling can lay claim to that (nor can many (any?) current Pac-12 coaches).
Tony would have had Joe Harris at WSU too. He is in the NBA last time I checked. He was ACC player of the year too.
Let's also not lose sight of the fact that Tony was such a compelling coach that we were making the final lists of some great talent, including one of the best in the world, James Harden (http://espn.go.com/college-sports/basketball/recruiting/player/_/id/42887/james-harden). Can you imagine if we had Klay Thompson and James Harden on the same team? It wasn't completely out of the question, and that would have made it more likely WSU would get better players in the future had Tony stayed.
Of course he didn't, so it doesn't matter. But my point is that those who say that we were on a downward spiral that was irreversible under Tony are being absurd.
Is WSU a difficult place to recruit to? No doubt. But I believe that Tony's late misses with recruits were due to the fact that he knew he wouldn't be staying at WSU much longer. It's difficult to sell kids on the future when you know you won't be there with them to live that out.
Kent doesn't have any good recruiters. That is obvious. I wasn't thrilled when he was hired, and I'm not optimistic about the future under Kent.
I am not sure Ava was discrediting Tony on Klay. While for whatever reason the Pac 10 wouldn't offer he did have offers from Michigan and Notre Dame. Howland received a lot of criticism for not offering Thompson and so should have every other program in the conference. I still don't understand what they were seeing to believe he wasn't worth 1 of 13 on the roster. NBA Dad, no academic or off-court issues, etc.
I do agree with you on what Tony would have put together in Pullman if he was committed to stay. We will never know (and have had the discussion multiple times on this board) but Thames, Thompson, Harris, Motum would have been a nice base to build out from if he stuck around. Tony made some recruiting mistakes when he took over but was learning quickly. I doubt it was a secret Tony wanted to leave for greener pastures on the recruiting trail. He was just biding his time in Pullman until some place opened up for him to bolt to. UVA was about as close as you can get to the perfect spot for him and his family. Two birds with one stone.
Wish we would have had the chance to see where he could have taken things but nothing we can do about it now. Thompson and Harden together! Wow!
Tony is a great coach. We were in a rebuild when he left however. Not the same as a downward spiral. When you aren't getting one and done type of talent, and you don't have any upper classmen returning, you are rebuilding.
Biggest problem Tony had was that he was still not able to get in to Seattle. Had he stayed that could have changed, but the WSU/Pullman albatross was still hanging over our head even after two good NCAA runs.
Because Tony couldn't get into a great recruiting area in our own back yard he had to take chances on a lot of guys in other time zones. That is always going to hurt your success rate in recruiting. Not a lot of blue chippers are going to travel to a non destination school.
Keeping Tony longer would have been great for WSU, but no sot great for his career path.
Biggest problem Tony had was that he was still not able to get in to Seattle. Had he stayed that could have changed, but the WSU/Pullman albatross was still hanging over our head even after two good NCAA runs.
Because Tony couldn't get into a great recruiting area in our own back yard he had to take chances on a lot of guys in other time zones. That is always going to hurt your success rate in recruiting. Not a lot of blue chippers are going to travel to a non destination school.
Keeping Tony longer would have been great for WSU, but no sot great for his career path.
Kent is a far better coach than either Graham or the Bonehead He had success as a basketball coach . Even better than the ugly ball coach who was a disaster until his son had success and then screwed WSU. It is amazing that people think that the Bennett years were all great years. People were doubting Leach after a 3-9 record. Let us see how Kent does next year as he will assuredly be here next year.
You are the first and only person I know who claims Dick Bennett was a disaster at WSU. I wish Ernie had a Derrick Low, Kyle Weaver, and Robbie Cowgill all playing significant minutes as underclassmen right now. It would bode well for our future. And you know what is ugly ball? Ugly ball is losing 16 games in a row. Ugly ball is playing horrible team defense and not having a half court offense that is remotely effective. Ugly ball is hoping to play uptempo without players talented enough to make it happen. This year, Kent ball was ugly ball.
Hey, I'm not trying to fault you for being optimistic this year even if I though it was unrealistic. But I think it's wrong for you to fault WSU fans who are skeptical about a program that just went 1-17 this year and whether Kent will get the job done. Yes, he will be here next year and probably the one after that. But if he doesn't bring in an outstanding recruiting class in 2017, this program will fall farther behind the rest of the conference.
By the way, I will agree with you about Kent being a far better coach than Graham. A fire hydrant would be a better coach than Graham...easily the worst college basketball coach I've ever witnessed. I will also agree that Kent has had a more distinguished career than Bone. But whether he will end up being a far better coach at WSU than Bone remains to be seen. (And for the record, in case you want to accuse me of being a Bone lover, I didn't not support Bone the last two years he was at WSU. I wanted him replaced and my posts reflected that opinion.)
Glad Cougar
Hey, I'm not trying to fault you for being optimistic this year even if I though it was unrealistic. But I think it's wrong for you to fault WSU fans who are skeptical about a program that just went 1-17 this year and whether Kent will get the job done. Yes, he will be here next year and probably the one after that. But if he doesn't bring in an outstanding recruiting class in 2017, this program will fall farther behind the rest of the conference.
By the way, I will agree with you about Kent being a far better coach than Graham. A fire hydrant would be a better coach than Graham...easily the worst college basketball coach I've ever witnessed. I will also agree that Kent has had a more distinguished career than Bone. But whether he will end up being a far better coach at WSU than Bone remains to be seen. (And for the record, in case you want to accuse me of being a Bone lover, I didn't not support Bone the last two years he was at WSU. I wanted him replaced and my posts reflected that opinion.)
Glad Cougar
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You go where you need to go to get players and that's rarely been Seattle for us over the years. Seattle has a lot of talent but if they aren't going to the UW then they mostly go outside of the NW. Gonzaga still hasn't really cracked Seattle since their '99 run. Oregon doesn't have a single player on their roster from the NW. The key for WSU has always been California more than Washington/Oregon. Foreign players would and should be a possibility for us as well.
Yes the season was ugly Even when Bennett was playing ugly ball and losing some games by 20-30 pts he still had the fans support. i could not understand that then and now still.Yes the season was ugly but there were glimpses of what may be under Kent As i sad,lets see what he does next year in righting this ship.
Things went according to the plan Dick laid out from day 1. Not everyone supported him but it turned out about as close as you can get to what he said in his initial press conference. How many times can you say that for a program like WSU?
I read somewhere that Dick Bennett's team in year 3, the year critics like to point to as regression, lost 5 conference games by 2 points. They went 4-14 in conference play. That's with the core underclassmen unit that ended up taking the Cougars to back-to-back NCAA tournaments. Maybe some of us saw the makings of a pretty good team by the time Dick turned things over to Tony. That's why I supported him back then. Kent still can turn things around but the program is nowhere close to having that core of good young players. Do you realize that we likely will start 5 seniors next year with 2 more seniors in the rotation?
Glad Cougar
Glad Cougar
They had a solid OOC in Dick's 3rd year but toward the end of it Low went down for the season and Weaver went to the point. He struggled at times but I still think it made him a better player. Harmeling was already taking a medical redshirt they wanted to use on Cowgill.
I hope I am not getting years mixed up.
From what I've seen Kent and Bone are very similar coaches. They seem have similar problems at WSU, both wanted to run, both were or in Kents case to this point been unable to recruit players with the skill set to accomplish this. When their plan A failed, both showed no real sign of effectively going to plan B and scratching out some level of success. Kent has an accomplished pedigree but so does coach Bone. The knock on Kent was never that he couldn't recruit it was always he couldn't coach the talent he had effectively. If Kent can't recruit to WSU he will be in the exact same spot as Bone found himself in...On the outside looking in... Only difference will be Bones legacy will be better at WSU due to his first years stacked on Tony's success.
Yep that's a fact jack....its always all about recruiting and its not being done very well at all ... Rich nothing at all happening with 2017...No new offers...more JC's that are third tier in the cards?
Well hopefully he will be more in line with your 8-8 prediction next year. You and I weren't close this year.
But as he still has no PG I see not much of a change.
The injury to Low was probably the killer in Dicks 3rd year. The kid who, transferred to Fullerton, was a bit of a gunner, and didn't like to play defense, went in to the starting lineup. Although he ended up being the leading scorer, a person close to the program described him to me as a cancer who didn't respect Bennett and detracted from team chemistry.
As for the current Cougs, it isn't about run and gun players it is about getting shooters. The college game is going the way of the 3 point shot. Most top 25 teams have a couple of guys who are threats to knock down 6 or 7 threes on a given night. Even Dick Bennetts defensive scheme, which I thought was tremendous, was vulnerable to teams with multiple outside shooters.
As for the current Cougs, it isn't about run and gun players it is about getting shooters. The college game is going the way of the 3 point shot. Most top 25 teams have a couple of guys who are threats to knock down 6 or 7 threes on a given night. Even Dick Bennetts defensive scheme, which I thought was tremendous, was vulnerable to teams with multiple outside shooters.
Yep. If Kent were to recruit a 3* to 4* PG for next year out of high school, then I'll have hope. Otherwise, he's just placing band-aids on the roster than will not address the hemorrhaging.
Akognon "a bit of a gunner"? Ha! Akognon actually called himself out his senior year. In an interview he said looking back he should have listened to Dick and tried harder on defense and been a more complete player. That all Dick was trying to do was to help him be a better player but essentially he was too young to get it. Even though he was the leading scorer it didn't feel like a huge loss at the time and obviously it played out that way. Rotchestie was a much better player as was Koprivca before his acl injury.
Last year Kernich-Drew bailed us out mid-way through league and complimented Lacy. This year Callison, Suggs, and Johnson couldn't make shots consistently like we needed them to. Even wide open looks. Frustrating watch.
The more I think it through the more Bone to Kent feels like a replay of Eastman to Graham. That's the only comparison I would ever make back to Graham. Kent is still a far better coach but things look headed in a scary direction.
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