2024-2025 B1G Basketball Thread

[ELA]

Honestly, you're spot on. all of it. Not even something I can find a reason to argue lol. Transfer portal at some point should be squashed or have limits or something. It's no longer collegiate athletics.. it's minor leagues

I think we are in the same place, I'd rather be good in a different way, but if this is how it is, I'd rather be good than bad.

I still think the arrogance of Indiana to think May would just linger at FAU until they were ready for him was staggering.  Like just winning at FAU was assured, and he would still be a hot commodity whenever they decided Mike Woodson was a bad college coach.  Michigan probably COULD have given their alum HC one more year, and it wouldn't be totally unwarranted, just like Indiana with Woodson, but they moved sooner rather than later, and now Michigan will benefit for a long time.

As to Beilein, I've always said he was the best hire in my lifetime.  And he built that program from dust.  Ellerbe and Amaker brought in talent, with absolutely zero vetting.  It's where MSU football was under BW, and was heading during Mel.  They literally had teammates fistfighting naked in Detroit during winter break.  That's part of what I'm sad about.  He leaned on guys like Zack Novak and Stu Douglass, and you saw year to year growth.  That's what I loved as a fan of the college game.  I saw it personally with MSU football.  It's fun that Indiana had a historic season in football.  But they just paid of bunch of dudes and immediately became great, it's not like you saw a program squeak into a bowl at 6-6, then get to a Citrus, then finally break through.

I think we agree on that.  You'd rather Michigan win than lose, but it's not like this is Beilein building a program from dust and getting the programs first tournament bid in a decade.  I felt that way when the Kenneth Walker team finished #8 and reached the NY6.  It was definitely better than winning, but MSU's first NYD bowl under Dantonio, a Citrus Bowl loss to Matthew Stafford's Georgia meant WAY more

[bayareabadger]

I don't remember David Robinson following his coach from Navy to Pitt after his junior season. 

Nothing against May, you play by the rules of the day, but I just hate what a year to year sport basketball has become.  It was that for Kentucky and Duke.  Now it's that for seemingly like 75% of the sport.  Just buy a whole new team every year, while gutting the fun mid-majors that made the tournament fun

I mean, were it not for COVID, he’d be out of eligibility this year. 

And I didn’t realize this, but he wasn’t even an FAU kid out of HS. He was a nice find by Chris Beard who was deep on the bench as a freshman and left in the midst of that coaching change. 

[ELA]

I mean, were it not for COVID, he’d be out of eligibility this year.

And I didn’t realize this, but he wasn’t even an FAU kid out of HS. He was a nice find by Chris Beard who was deep on the bench as a freshman and left in the midst of that coaching change.

So Chris Beard treated him BETTER than family?

[ELA]

Also to the hilariousness of all of this, was listening to an interview with Jamal Crawford, who I had kind of forgotten about.  He was declared ineligible for half his freshman year, and then went pro, because the NCAA might declare him permanently ineligible because a Washington booster took him in from drug addict parents, and then he went and played for Michigan.  But because the guy who saved him from the streets was technically an booster of a team, even though not at the school he went to, he was potentially going to be permanently ineligible by the NCAA.  Fortunately Crawford was good enough to have a long NBA career, but if he was slightly less of a player, the NCAA would have stripped this kid of a free NCAA degree for nothing.

This is why we are where we are, because the NCAA was this irrational for decades

[SuperMario]

I think we are in the same place, I'd rather be good in a different way, but if this is how it is, I'd rather be good than bad.

I still think the arrogance of Indiana to think May would just linger at FAU until they were ready for him was staggering.  Like just winning at FAU was assured, and he would still be a hot commodity whenever they decided Mike Woodson was a bad college coach.  Michigan probably COULD have given their alum HC one more year, and it wouldn't be totally unwarranted, just like Indiana with Woodson, but they moved sooner rather than later, and now Michigan will benefit for a long time.

As to Beilein, I've always said he was the best hire in my lifetime.  And he built that program from dust.  Ellerbe and Amaker brought in talent, with absolutely zero vetting.  It's where MSU football was under BW, and was heading during Mel.  They literally had teammates fistfighting naked in Detroit during winter break.  That's part of what I'm sad about.  He leaned on guys like Zack Novak and Stu Douglass, and you saw year to year growth.  That's what I loved as a fan of the college game.  I saw it personally with MSU football.  It's fun that Indiana had a historic season in football.  But they just paid of bunch of dudes and immediately became great, it's not like you saw a program squeak into a bowl at 6-6, then get to a Citrus, then finally break through.

I think we agree on that.  You'd rather Michigan win than lose, but it's not like this is Beilein building a program from dust and getting the programs first tournament bid in a decade.  I felt that way when the Kenneth Walker team finished #8 and reached the NY6.  It was definitely better than winning, but MSU's first NYD bowl under Dantonio, a Citrus Bowl loss to Matthew Stafford's Georgia meant WAY more

Yes, well articulated and all of this we are on the same page.  I couldn't agree more and I'm in the place I'm at because it is how it is but isn't how I want it to be. And we fully agree that Beilein was the best hire of a lifetime. I loved everything about him. I absolutely hated that he took the Cavs job and that's coming from a Cavs fan. I knew it was an epic disaster waiting to happen and would do absolutely no favors for him. 

It's all a tough pill to swallow because the element I grew up watching and falling in love with seems to be gone and now we just have to accept it and deal with it.

[LetsGoPeay]

I still think the arrogance of Indiana to think May would just linger at FAU until they were ready for him was staggering.  Like just winning at FAU was assured, and he would still be a hot commodity whenever they decided Mike Woodson was a bad college coach.  Michigan probably COULD have given their alum HC one more year, and it wouldn't be totally unwarranted, just like Indiana with Woodson, but they moved sooner rather than later, and now Michigan will benefit for a long time.

Actually, there was a strong movement to ditch Woodson last year. The University president and AD were ready to fire him. Woodson has some very strong support on the Board of Trustees, in particular Quinn Buckner, who vetoed that. Now we're probably stuck with him barring a massive implosion to end this season, which is always possible with him. He's already blown recruiting the best class of Indiana high school seniors in quite some time but Woodson doesn't really care about that. He's the laziest recruiter in major college hoops. He'll just throw cash around and bring in another poorly assembled group of portal transfers to run his antiquated Ewing & Oakley offense.  There are no legit coaching prospects out there for IU so we are stuck with arrogant, lazy Mike Woodson.

[ELA]

Yes, well articulated and all of this we are on the same page.  I couldn't agree more and I'm in the place I'm at because it is how it is but isn't how I want it to be. And we fully agree that Beilein was the best hire of a lifetime. I loved everything about him. I absolutely hated that he took the Cavs job and that's coming from a Cavs fan. I knew it was an epic disaster waiting to happen and would do absolutely no favors for him.

A Michigan writer I trust said Beilein was the most interesting dude he ever met.  He said he was a basketball savant, but imagine the smartest math savant you know also trying to convince a bunch of 18 year old athletes to buy in.  He said if you forced an offensive and defensive system on him as a challenge, he'd figure it out.  He was a scientist in a lab.  But he was also amazingly talented at simplifying it or complicating it to the level of his players.  If a kid had a basketball question, he could spend his whole day working with him.  But the other stuff wore on him.  Particularly the fact that he had an eye for underrated talent, then coached them up, and they still went pro after a year.  Then that final year, apparently the locker room was a mess because of Jordan Poole.  Everyone hated him, and Bryzdilkis (sp?) punched him in the face at halftime of the BTT.  Beilein was done with all of the non-basketball distractions.  He figured the NBA was that escape.  Yes, no more 17 year olds, but he figured NBA players were as obsessed with the game as he was.  Instead he faced a bunch of prima donnas, who made more money than him.  He actually got ridiculed on NBA podcasts for trying to teach schemes to his roster.  My god, imagine a coach coaching.  But such is the NBA

[medinabuckeye1]

Ohio State is hosting Oregon tonight and the wise guys have the Buckeyes favored by 3.5. I'm a little surprised that a team that needed OT to beat the Gophers is favored over the Ducks but the apparent reality of modern college basketball. 

[847badgerfan]

SEC SEC SEC

[ELA]

The Izzone alumni game is always so much louder than when the actual students are there.

MSU has now won the Izzone alumni game in 10 straight years, covering in 9 of them, with only one win by single digits.  This was the second consecutive year they won it by 30+.  A 13-4 run to end the game against the scrubs was all that prevented it from being the 2nd largest MOV in a Big Ten game in Izzo's career, behind only the 51 point win over Michigan in 2000

[ELA]

Fine, AJ Hoggard was the problem.  I'm willing to admit it now


https://twitter.com/Loomin_Knotty/status/1877728888421314824

[bayareabadger]

Fine, AJ Hoggard was the problem.  I'm willing to admit it now


https://twitter.com/Loomin_Knotty/status/1877728888421314824

Although Michigan state is decidedly improved, I feel like that little four-game snippet is maybe overstating things a little bit.

[ELA]

#3 for all games.  #8 offense, #2 defense

[ELA]

Mick Cronins week has not improved