2021-2022 B1G Basketball thread

[MaximumSam]

I personally came to the conclusion a long time ago that hiring a coach is basically a crap-shoot but there us a thumb on the scale for a school like tOSU. The thumb on the scale is that we are unlikely to lose a guy to a bigger fish because we're a pretty big fish. Ohio State can pay top dollar so if we ever get a great coach we can make him one of if not the highest paid nationally. Thus, if we get a worse one we'll fire him in 3-5 years and try again. Rinse/repeat until you get it right then pay him a LOT of cash and keep him for a LONG time.

Oh I disagree with that. For one, we have already lost a good coach in Gary Williams leaving for Maryland. My biggest fear with Holtmann is his teams start rolling and we lose him to Kentucky. OSU is not a first tier basketball school by any definition and likely never will be. They do have strong resources, but they have a crappy arena and tepid fan support. It's not a destination job, which doesn't mean someone wouldn't stay there, but I'd say there's a lot of guys who would jump to the top tiers of the world if they had a chance.

Edit to add: Also hard to say the NIL effect here. Programs with strong NIL efforts will almost certainly be better at getting and retaining players. OSU basketball being very much a second fiddle would have an effect there, but to what extent I have no idea relative to other programs.

[bayareabadger]

Holtman hasn't had a successful Basketball season according to my personal definition. (Make NCAA tournament and then not get upset in the tournament ie. play to your seeding.)

He has been upset every year they have gone.

As was said by others, only upset once, which led to my confusion and the question.

It’s interesting because at a point, I personally started moving away from the upset worry, simply because if you have positive seeds and tend to feel the good teams, it becomes harder and harder not to get upset unless you make the final four. Basically, almost all of the upset-ability is contained within being a bad seed.

But that was a journey I had to go on because UW kept getting good seeds and made it every damn year

[betarhoalphadelta]

As was said by others, only upset once, which led to my confusion and the question.

It’s interesting because at a point, I personally started moving away from the upset worry, simply because if you have positive seeds and tend to feel the good teams, it becomes harder and harder not to get upset unless you make the final four. Basically, almost all of the upset-ability is contained within being a bad seed.

But that was a journey I had to go on because UW kept getting good seeds and made it every damn year

Yeah, same for me... I understand that upsets occur, but upsets in the first round when you're a 5 or better are embarrassing, and get progressively more embarrassing the better your own seed. Those are the ones that I hate. Purdue lost as a 4 to North Texas last year, and as a 5 to UALR back in 2016. Those are the ones that sting. But it happens.

The question is whether Holtmann had built enough goodwill to survive a few of those? For Painter, his teams have been to the NCAAT 12 times, he's been bounced in the first round 3 of those times, and only two were upsets; the other Purdue was the #9 and lost to the #8. 

Purdue has played to seed in 2008, 2010, 2015, and 2017. 

Purdue has technically played above seed in 2007 (#9 beat #8 in R64 before losing to #1 in R32), 2009 (#5 beat #4 in R32 before losing to #1 in S16), 2012 (#10 beat #7 in R64 before losing to #2 in R32), and 2019 (#3 beat #2 in S16 before losing to #1 in E8).

Purdue played well below seed in 2011 (#3 losing to #11 in R32), 2016 (#5 losing to #12 in R64) and 2021 (#4 losing to #13 in R64). Technically they played below seed in 2018 (#2 lost to #3 in S16), but that was the year that Isaac Haas was injured in the R64, so I believe we were no longer really a #2 after that injury. 

I'd say playing to seed 1/3 of the time, above seed 1/3 of the time, and below seed 1/3 of the time, is certainly not terrible. And that's what Holtmann has done, albeit in very limited sample size.

I certainly wouldn't look at Holtmann's NCAAT history as justify firing him. Now, if you believe that he's got the trajectory of the program headed the wrong direction, as evidenced by falling further and further back in B1G regular season standings, it's a different story. In that case, his NCAAT certainly hasn't been enough to justify keeping him either. 

[Brutus Buckeye]

As the kids would say, wut?

Should be in the NIT. 

[bayareabadger]

Yeah, same for me... I understand that upsets occur, but upsets in the first round when you're a 5 or better are embarrassing, and get progressively more embarrassing the better your own seed. Those are the ones that I hate. Purdue lost as a 4 to North Texas last year, and as a 5 to UALR back in 2016. Those are the ones that sting. But it happens.

I feel that. The weird ones are the later ones, when you catch an 8 in the Elite 8 or 11 in the Sweet 16. And then you played seed, but it still feels like a highly missed chance. 

Interestingly, UW had a very odd 5-12 loss a few years back. They had closed relatively well, even as the offense fell off a cliff. Their best offensive player (Happ) was scuffling, and their decent to good shooters kept missing 3s. And then they catch this 12 in Oregon, which was by most measures not so good, but had come together at the right time and rolled out four top-50 quality recruits who were all playing like it (the worst of their top five guys was the No. 129 recruit in the country). In the moment, that sucked, but sucks less so as time passes. 

[bayareabadger]

Should be in the NIT.

I mean, in terms of how they feel or make folks feel, sure, I guess?

But they put teams in based on some level of accomplishments, and on that front, OSU is decidedly good enough. They're basically high end middle class, which gets in out of the Power 5, unless the conference does the Pac-12 thing or what it did in 2018. 

[TyphonInc]

Don't think that is true. His first year they were a five seed and got bounced by a four seed. His second season they were an 11 seed and got clubbed by Houston, a three seed. The only upset was last year.

Also, you have a pretty fair starting five with just the guys that were out last night for them.

Sorry, I was wrong. I got those reversed in my head. (Thinking OSU was the 4, and 3 seeds and lost to a 5 and 11.)
So, according to how I define success; in 4 years he has had 2 successful, one canceled, and horrible flub years.
Heres to hoping to not get upset in the tourney.

[ELA]

3/11 Update

Not doing a true bracket at this point, but a daily update with the seeds.  You can read this as a true snake, so, if you go straight down a line, that would be a region, if they didn't adjust to avoid rematches, and regional considerations, with auto-bids in bold

(number in parenthesis indicates moving up or down a seed line, or new)

NCAA

• Auburn, Baylor, Arizona, Kentucky
• Duke, Tennessee, Gonzaga, Kansas
• Texas Tech, PURDUE, Villanova, UCLA (+1)
• ILLINOIS, Arkansas, WISCONSIN, Houston (-1)
• Providence, North Carolina (+1), Connecticut (+2), Saint Mary's
• Murray State (-1), IOWA, Texas (-1), LSU
• USC, Colorado State, Alabama (-2), MICHIGAN STATE (+1)
• OHIO STATE (-1), Seton Hall, San Diego State (+1), TCU (+1)
• Boise State, Iowa State (-1), Davidson, Loyola(Chi) (+1)
• Notre Dame, MICHIGAN (-2), San Francisco, Oklahoma (+2)
• Miami, Marquette (-1), Memphis, Wake Forest
• VCU/SMU (-1), Creighton/Virginia Tech (N), South Dakota State, North Texas
• Chattanooga, Vermont, Toledo, NM State
• Saint Peter's (+1), Montana State, Longwood, Princeton
• Norfolk State, Delaware, Georgia State, Colgate (+1)
• Jacksonville State, UC Santa Barbara (N), Bryant/Texas Southern, Nicholls State/Wright State

NCAA Bid Changes

• Virginia Tech replaces Florida
• UC Santa Barbara replaces UC Irvine as Big West AQ

NIT

• INDIANA, Texas A&M (+1), Wyoming, Florida (N)
• Xavier, RUTGERS, Dayton, BYU (-1)
• Mississippi State (+1), Colorado (+2), Virginia, UAB, St. Bonaventure
• South Carolina (-1), West Virginia, Saint Louis, Belmont
• Vanderbilt, Virginia (-2), Kansas State, St. John's
• MARYLAND (+1), Santa Clara, Drake, Oregon (-1), Iona
• Richmond (N), Oregon (-1), Towson, Northern Iowa
• Alcorn State, Cleveland State, Long Beach State, Texas State

NIT Bid Changes

• Richmond replaces NORTHWESTERN

[ELA]

Celebrating drawing a charge call should be an automatic technical

[bayareabadger]

Good for IU. A little less good for Purdue if it’s trying to bump its seed

[ELA]

Indiana should be in now, and Texas A&M maybe as well.

Bubble teams could really use a Virginia Tech loss tonight

[847badgerfan]

Today's winners:

Rutgers
Indiana
Penn State
Michigan State.

One down.

[ELA]

CUSA possibly just became a two bid league now in one of the ugliest games you'll ever see.

We'll see if North Texas still gets an at large bid

Bad afternoon for bubble teams whose season was already over

[ELA]

Houston was able to erase an 8 point deficit to beat Cincinnati, or the AAC would be a bid stealer if anyone except Memphis won