Adjustments...what can Lon do?

thebigabd said:
All of these problems kind of solve themselves when you put a different kind of team on the floor.... You start competing for the Big 12 championship, going into the tournament with a bang and not on crutches, etc and it will steadily grow.

I think think they should be a real basketball arena regardless, and that will only help, but right now team performance is the problem.
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Exactly, and there's really only one recourse to solve that problem...
 
thebigabd said:
Imagine football attendance if OU was barely sneaking into bowl games every year with a 7-5 or 6-6 record.
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We only have to look back at the John Blake years to see what that would look like.
 
thebigabd said:
Imagine football attendance if OU was barely sneaking into bowl games every year with a 7-5 or 6-6 record.
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Are you saying that Lon (at the end of his career) is the basketball equivalent to Gary Gibbs?:D;)
 
stormspencer said:
Are you saying that Lon (at the end of his career) is the basketball equivalent to Gary Gibbs?:D;)
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I'm gonna hafta agree with this.

Now, that said, I understand a lot of Lon's appeal also came from the fact he's squeaky clean and I truly, truly appreciate that also.

I don't believe in playing loose with recruiting stuff. I'd actually prefer to be more like Stanford and have the best academic reputation with moderate sports success. But we do have a monster of sorts to feed given football expectations and football pays the bills. I just put more import in standing for something than relying merely on athletic success for ones' reputation.

So I reluctantly agree that it's probably time we look for a different direction.
 
thebigabd said:
Doesn't matter.... the comparison is valid.
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How is the difference between 25% & 50% not valid? Top 25% in football is a top 30 team. A 10 seed is top 12% so you’re talking top 15 team.

Now it’s not so black & white bc basketball has more smaller schools playing & I’m not saying people should be thrilled about the state of the program.

However, still making the tournament almost every year, good culture, running a clean program is good for me until LK hangs it up in 2-3 years.
 
BCSooners said:
How is the difference between 25% & 50% not valid? Top 25% in football is a top 30 team. A 10 seed is top 12% so you’re talking top 15 team.

Now it’s not so black & white bc basketball has more smaller schools playing & I’m not saying people should be thrilled about the state of the program.

However, still making the tournament almost every year, good culture, running a clean program is good for me until LK hangs it up in 2-3 years.
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and this is the down side ..


this coach has also taken this program to the final 4
 
BoulderSooner said:
and this is the down side ..


this coach has also taken this program to the final 4
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John Phillips took TU to the second round of the NCAA Tournament two years in a row. His first two years. Then he went 9-20 the next year, and resigned after a 2-5 start to the next season.

The reasons?

"A two-season slump, combined with a significant decline in attendance, led to the resignation on Saturday night of University of Tulsa fourth-year basketball coach John Phillips."

"During its first five seasons in the 8,355-seat Reynolds Center, TU's attendance average was 7,991. Through six home dates this season, the average is 5,955."
 
Could you elaborate? I'm not at all sure I understand the point of your comparison of a TU coach from 15 years ago and Coach Kruger.
 
skyvue said:
Could you elaborate? I'm not at all sure I understand the point of your comparison of a TU coach from 15 years ago and Coach Kruger.
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He had accomplishments and good seasons... but when the program started to decline they got rid of the coach. People stopped showing up to the games, they were losing or barely winning games they normally wouldn't, etc.

And before you say, "yea, well, they went 9-20!"... Kruger went 11-20 not long ago.

In fact, in the last 3 years OU is 49-48.

Now, because of the new(er) NCAA Selection System they avoided missing the tournament the last 2 years. The 2018 team went 4-8 down the stretch. The 2019 team lost 11 of their last 15 games.

It used to be a selection criteria to evaluate how a team is playing down the stretch, which apparently is no longer considered anymore. Traditionally the last couple OU teams wouldn't have made it in.

But the overall point is this... when the wins stop coming, the crowd stops showing up, etc it is typically a harbinger. TU cut the cord early when writing was on the wall. We will see what OU and OSU do this time around.

OU has 1 recruit next year, who might not even play that much. So the team loses the best player and will structurally be different, but is the talent there to avoid a 5th "mediocre at best" season in a row?
 
coolm said:
I just put more import in standing for something than relying merely on athletic success for ones' reputation.
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But coolm......We have more National Merit Scholars per capita than any other university in the country.
 
CMSOONER said:
But coolm......We have more National Merit Scholars per capita than any other university in the country.
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I useta get so tired of hearing that. To me the art collection with the Monets is much more significant. That rates right up there with "Brady Manek resembles Larry Bird ..." comments.
 
WichitaSooner said:
Half the teams in the country (give or take) make bowl games. Less than 25%of teams make the NCAA tourney.
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My comment was more tongue-in-cheek. Lon has been very good over his career, but the last several years have been Gibbs-esque.
 
thebigabd said:
He had accomplishments and good seasons... but when the program started to decline they got rid of the coach.
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Phillips followed Bill Self and Buzz Peterson, who went a combined 100-37. In other words, he took over a (relatively) thriving program. For two seasons, he succeeded with players brought in by the previous two coaches. The next two seasons (he left during the second one, but I think we can safely postulate that he wouldn’t have done better than Pooh Richardson did with the team), TU went a combined 18-42 (.300).

Nothing about that scenario remotely compares with Kruger at OU.

Kruger took over a dumpster fire, improved a bit on the team’s performance his first season and notched 20 or more wins five out of the next seven seasons, going to the NCAA tourney in six of those seasons with just one sub-.500 campaign over that span. It’s not guaranteed, but OU is in position to once again reach 20 (or more) wins and make it to the tourney. OU is currently tied for fourth in one of the toughest conferences in the country, higher than we were projected.
 
skyvue said:
Phillips followed Bill Self and Buzz Peterson, who went a combined 100-37. In other words, he took over a (relatively) thriving program. For two seasons, he succeeded with players brought in by the previous two coaches. The next two seasons (he left during the second one, but I think we can safely postulate that he wouldn’t have done better than Pooh Richardson did with the team), TU went a combined 18-42 (.300).

Nothing about that scenario remotely compares with Kruger at OU.

Kruger took over a dumpster fire, improved a bit on the team’s performance his first season and notched 20 or more wins five out of the next seven seasons, going to the NCAA tourney in six of those seasons with just one sub-.500 campaign over that span. It’s not guaranteed, but OU is in position to once again reach 20 (or more) wins and make it to the tourney. OU is currently tied for fourth in one of the toughest conferences in the country, higher than we were projected.
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Don’t let the facts of where our program ACTUALLY is and it’s success distort the narrative. Lol.

You also forgot to mention we still have around 8500 tickets sold each game. That goes against the narrative that people have stopped caring. Yeah I know it’s not butts in the seats and it’s a problem they don’t show up, yet they still support the program.

LK runs a clean program without embarrassment, has won 20 like 5 of 7 and made the tourney last 6 of 7. We could very possibly finish 3rd in the league behind the #1 and #2 team in the country.

Bottom line is yes, we need to improve. BTW, if we simply played better on the road, our record and standing would be fine. We need to recruit more consistently and don’t waste schollies. We’ve got to figure out a way to get more students and fans in the games. And yes, we need to start thinking of life after Lon and plan for when that begins. But, for now, things aren’t as dire as people project.
 
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