On basketball improvement...

[maroonmania]

If watching a team with unlimited potential crashing and burning and losing to legitimately bad teams is something you like, then go ahead.

Again, no one is saying that what we have currently is good enough. Literally no one. Not one single person.

Like I said, the crash and burn was only the last month and I certainly enjoyed that season up until that point. Hated the way it ended. And we didn't lose to any "legitimately bad teams" on the level of Ark. St., McNeese St., and USC Upstate. Now THOSE are bad teams.

[HancockCountyDog]

If watching a team with unlimited potential crashing and burning and losing to legitimately bad teams is something you like, then go ahead.

Sign me up for watching a team with unlimited potential. That sounds like fun.

I've watched a team with clearly a limited potential the last three years. If like to go into each game actually thinking we had a chance to win.

[smootness]

Like I said, the crash and burn was only the last month and I certainly enjoyed that season up until that point. Hated the way it ended. And we didn't lose to any "legitimately bad teams" on the level of Ark. St., McNeese St., and USC Upstate. Now THOSE are bad teams.

We lost to Akron, and several bad SEC teams.

[smootness]

Sign me up for watching a team with unlimited potential. That sounds like fun.

I've watched a team with clearly a limited potential the last three years. If like to go into each game actually thinking we had a chance to win.

The talent level had unlimited potential. The whole thing together did not...thus what we saw actually happen.

[Schultzy]

Serious question. What makes you think Ray is the guy to be successful here? The question isn't why it was / is hard to succeed from where we were, but what is it that Ray has shown that indicates he will win at the level we are all looking for?

I don't know if he will succeed or not but I think its too early to tell because of the roster situation he inherited. We play solid half court defense, we try to push it up the floor for easy baskets off of stops, and it looks like to me we get a good many open looks at the basket during the coarse of a game.

I just don't see how this short body of work with this group of very average players could tell anyone whether he is a coach who can win at the level we are all looking for. That's why I don't get why people are so adamant that he cant.

[Schultzy]

Well, we may have been a dumpster fire off the court but we were never a dumpster fire on the court other than at times we didn't play live up to maximum potential. Stans' last team was ranked in the Top 20 just 4 weeks prior to season's end and was a 1 seed in the NIT. Stans' teams never had losing records and were always competitive within the SEC. I was expecting to be pretty weak the first year Ray was here but anyone who says they knew or even thought we were going to have 3 straight overall losing records after changing coaches is likely not being honest either. Several things have contributed to it taking this long to try and pull ourselves up under Ray including 1. a ridiculous number of injuries, 2. extremely poor recruiting in the first couple of seasons, 3. very little emphasis on coaching up things offensively (ie., "the offense will take care of itself" attitude) and 4. lack of backing of Ray by the fanbase (many of the old Stans supporters have made it as difficult on Ray as Polk supporters did on Cohen). At this point I'm resigned to having Ray back again next year but I'm not seeing things ever really getting significantly better under him. Getting to middle of the pack in the SEC may be the ceiling with him. Hope he can prove me wrong. Now if we sign Malik that could be a game changer because it would bring back the fanbase, nearly assure us of having an NCAA tourney team next year and will help us with other top line recruits.

I was speaking to the roster situation Ray inherited, not how we played prior to that.

[codeDawg]

I don't know if he will succeed or not but I think its too early to tell because of the roster situation he inherited. We play solid half court defense, we try to push it up the floor for easy baskets off of stops, and it looks like to me we get a good many open looks at the basket during the coarse of a game.

I just don't see how this short body of work with this group of very average players could tell anyone whether he is a coach who can win at the level we are all looking for. That's why I don't get why people are so adamant that he cant.

Do you think we owe it to someone we're paying over a million dollars a year to wait for him to get above average players before he proves his team can play at an average level? Does this look like a guy that is overachieving with inferior talent, or a guy that is getting by blaming the situation and players? Keep in mind that in year 3, this is the 12th worst offensive SEC team in the past 14 years (I think that's out of 174 teams), and two of the 14 are his too.

[dawgs]

I don't know if he will succeed or not but I think its too early to tell because of the roster situation he inherited. We play solid half court defense, we try to push it up the floor for easy baskets off of stops, and it looks like to me we get a good many open looks at the basket during the coarse of a game.

I just don't see how this short body of work with this group of very average players could tell anyone whether he is a coach who can win at the level we are all looking for. That's why I don't get why people are so adamant that he cant.

Well part of the problem is if he can't win with an average roster, his recruiting just hasn't been good enough to give himself anything more than an average roster. Sword, fred, and ware were all high 3*/low 4* recruits if I remember correctly and they are in year 3 of playing 35+ min and haven't significantly improved since their freshman season (of course experience will lead to some improvement). Our recruiting since then hasn't been nearly as good, yet y'all expect ray to recruit himself a better roster?

Year 1 was a throw away. I think ray did about as good as anyone in tr country could've done with that roster. Maybe coach K squeezes out 1-2 more Ws, but that's about it. Year 2 was a disaster. And year 3 has been a disaster. 3 years ago everyone said that the NIT in year 3 would be a reasonable expectation. Instead we are most likely gonna finish under .500. And there's not any reasonable expectation to expect dramatic improvement anytime soon. So spare me the "it's too soon to pass judgment" bullshit. The job just ain't getting done and we are better off moving along sooner rather than later. There's not a coach in the world that would be hesitant to take a job because the predecessor was fired after not being able to break .500 in any of his 3 seasons.

[maroonmania]

I was speaking to the roster situation Ray inherited, not how we played prior to that.

Well just to remind folks, per Rivals both Ware and Sword were 4 star recruits coming out of HS and were handed to Ray in the "dumpster fire roster" along with 5 star Rodney Hood who he couldn't convince to stay. Ray has now gotten his first 4 star recruit with Simonds who will not even be on the roster until year after next. Bottom line is Ray had plenty to build around when arriving that his 3rd year should have been quite good, he has just failed to bring in the additional pieces (like a perimeter shooter and a better ball handler) that would have made this team an upper half SEC team. I don't know of any coach that takes over a program where the prior coach was relieved of his duties where everything is ideal. Its the new coach's job to get things back on track and it shouldn't take 4 or 5 years to do in basketball.

[msugolf]

Well just to remind folks, per Rivals both Ware and Sword were 4 star recruits coming out of HS and were handed to Ray in the "dumpster fire roster" along with 5 star Rodney Hood who he couldn't convince to stay. Ray has now gotten his first 4 star recruit with Simonds who will not even be on the roster until year after next. Bottom line is Ray had plenty to build around when arriving that his 3rd year should have been quite good, he has just failed to bring in the additional pieces (like a perimeter shooter and a better ball handler) that would have made this team an upper half SEC team. I don't know of any coach that takes over a program where the prior coach was relieved of his duties where everything is ideal. Its the new coach's job to get things back on track and it shouldn't take 4 or 5 years to do in basketball.

Not to mention in 3 years of being here, the only one of his recruits we are getting positive production from is Ready. 3 years and only 1 contributor.... That's ridiculous.

[maroonmania]

Not to mention in 3 years of being here, the only one of his recruits we are getting positive production from is Ready. 3 years and only 1 contributor.... That's ridiculous.

Another issue that bugs me is Ray was unwilling to let Steele sit out last year when he wanted to in order to get healthy. Instead he told him to play last year or leave. Can you imagine how much better this team could be with an outside shooting guard like Steele as a 5th yr SR? Its EXACTLY what we don't have. But no, Ray had to get other guys onto the roster, most of whom aren't really contributing at all on offense, and here we sit.

[Goat from MSU]

Spot on. I thought the same thing Steele could have brought 5 more wins this year . Truth is Ray has been trying to run off all the leftover Stansbury players since he got here.

Another issue that bugs me is Ray was unwilling to let Steele sit out last year when he wanted to in order to get healthy. Instead he told him to play last year or leave. Can you imagine how much better this team could be with an outside shooting guard like Steele as a 5th yr SR? Its EXACTLY what we don't have. But no, Ray had to get other guys onto the roster, most of whom aren't really contributing at all on offense, and here we sit.

[Goat from MSU]

Before you Ray Guys get your panties in a wad ,the most of the leftovers did shoot themselves in the ass ,but Ray should have been prepared for this which he was not .

[Political Hack]

All I know is that being a loser is better than having players that wear wife beaters.

[maroonmania]

Spot on. I thought the same thing Steele could have brought 5 more wins this year . Truth is Ray has been trying to run off all the leftover Stansbury players since he got here.

Yep, these are the things that immediately remind you of Croom where yes, the program had hit bottom, but does the new coach really have to come in and dig you 5 feet deeper before trying to start turning things around including trying to excise players simply because they played for the previous coach? And doing so even though they could help you in getting things turned around faster?

[Schultzy]

All I know is that being a loser is better than having players that wear wife beaters.

The wife beater wearers were big time losers. Nice try though.

[Schultzy]

All I know is that being a loser is better than having players that wear wife beaters.

The wife beater wearers were big time losers. Nice try though.

[Schultzy]

Yep, these are the things that immediately remind you of Croom where yes, the program had hit bottom, but does the new coach really have to come in and dig you 5 feet deeper before trying to start turning things around including trying to excise players simply because they played for the previous coach? And doing so even though they could help you in getting things turned around faster?

The whole Croom/Ray meme is total bullshit and mentally lazy.

[Dawg61]

The whole Croom/Ray meme is total bullshit and mentally lazy.

Disagree. Ray is Croom 2.0. Even has the historically shitty offense.

[maroonmania]

The whole Croom/Ray meme is total bullshit and mentally lazy.

Gracious, don't be so sensitive, I was only comparing them in the methods used to "clean up the program" and not wanting players leftover from the old coach. In that, the comparison definitely has merit. People who like Ray get so touchy about the whole Croom/Ray thing.