The flip side to Lkdog’s take is that after their worst season in ages, Kentucky is looking for answers, and is actually looking up at Illinois. They clearly DGAF how many years it’s been since IL made a round of 16 appearance. They do seem to GAF that those guys helped assemble one of the best teams in the country. And OA obviously had huge success there previously, having won a title.
After year one Brad and staff completely blew up the roster and managed to rebuild into a 1 seed that had the best record in B1G, won BTT, curb stomped Michigan in Crisler, etc. And many people forget this team looked pretty formidable going into the tourney in 2020.
Kentucky came after two of the architects of that success. And, being the objectively better job, were able to land them.
As noted, Chin wasn’t a big loss. He got us Ayo and helped with Miller which seemed to be all the stroke he had with MIF to begin with. And then he apparently lied to the Miller camp and completely napalmed that bridge to boot. How valuable is Coleman without the MIF juice? Frazier probably won’t be any worse and definitely could be better than post-Ayo Chin.
Gentry had an opportunity to return to his alma mater and coach with HOFer Mark Few. That aside, I’d also imagine it’s a much easier job considering about 70% of their annual schedule consists of cupcakes. He also apparently rubbed some people the wrong way here and his supposed forte—analytics and game planning—left a lot to be desired, so I’m not sure why it’s a bad look that he’s leaving. Moving Alexander into his role seems like a win-win to me.
Clearly the gaping hole here is what OA brought to the table and will be the most difficult (if not impossible) to fill. It looks like Josh and Brad are giving it their best shot and maybe that’s the best we can really ask for at this point.
Agree that from the outside looking in it doesn’t look good to lose three assistants in one offseason coming off our best team in well over a decade. But with a little digging it’s plainly evident why this has developed and not indicative that there’s something inherently wrong with Brad or the program or Josh, etc. And with the actual locker room problem headed to Spokane, there’s a real chance at a net improvement if they nail the final hire.
It will turn out OK and we will be a reasonably competitive second tier P5 program.
We had one decent year and one good year with a total collapse in the tourney.
We have a total of 4 NCAA wins in 16 years, no S16s, and nobody gives a fck in the end about our conference. Kentucky has 4 NCAA Final Fours in that same time.
We turned out to be a hot team for a month, but not one of best teams in country and the BT was clearly grossly over rated which most of us thought all year.
I can tell you that the AAU guys and coaches I talk with think it does not look good as it drags out that none of our top picks want to come, and they are not fans of the Irvin hire if that happens, or the Tony from the Neighborhood bullshit.
These are guys who have put multiple starters in BT on several teams not named Illinois, had a BTPOY, Top 50 recruits, and have guys in NBA. And they would love to see Illinois get back to a top tier program like in early 2000s.
We are trying to compete with UM and MSU and Wisconsin and the top P5 school programs right now and have a long way to go.
So far- we have an decent legacy hire in Chet, and a local legend gym rat guy in Alexander for an assistant staff.
I think they will do OK as long as we get somebody who can help get top 100-150 guys that we develop along with a few transfers.
Should make the tourney next year no matter what, and maybe more often than not after that.
A Huss might give us a chance to get to the first tier over time.
But, Kentucky is not looking up at Illinois.
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