Steele not Mack!

[JTG]

[quote=skyhops

it just shows you how HARD it is to actually GET to a FF.

Butler went twice, end of story.

[madness31]

Hue Jackson is not a terrible coach because he won only 1 game in 2 years. He is a terrible coach because he lost several games he should have won because he made ignorant decisions and constantly tried to blame everyone else. Chris Mack is similar but at the opposite end. Winning games is great but isn't near as impressive when most wins are against teams you are supposed to beat. Looking at the number of upset wins vs. losses to teams you should beat and frequency of getting blown out you start to get a picture of reality.

Someone posted we don't know what in game adjustments Mack made because we were not in the huddle or the locker room. That is certainly true that we were not in position to hear the adjustments but we did see the results. It is possible that he made brilliant adjustments that the team didn't understand or couldn't execute but that is still on the coach because he should know what his team is capable of understanding and executing. Great coaches know how to maximize potential from their players. They know what strategies play to their players strengths. They understand how to motivate each player to play at his optimal level. They develop everyone from the star down to the end of the bench or reasonably close to the last player.

Mack improved as coach but he was still about average. Slightly better or slightly worse are both possible. I do think Louisville missed on their choice as far as coaching acumen but he is a great recruiter so not a bad gamble. He is still young and can continue to learn and grow. He also might be a much better coach with elite talent. Some coaches only understand optimal play and can't recognize the strategies that fit best with the players they have. If Mack is one of those coaches and he gets an abundance of talent, he may set records for most national championships.

I wish Mack luck though never against X. Ideally X is always better than any team Mack coaches but his success will reflect well on Xavier. It will only add to Xavier's reputation as a great place to coach which will certainly help us attract great coaches whenever there is a vacancy.

[Anti-Homer]

geez some of you guys are hopeless......

Bleed,

You're entitled to your opinion, and it is what guys like my Mentor 1B, Shadow, and I'm sure others on this board fought for. However, I won't sit idly by while you take unwarranted shots at one my good friends on this board, Muskienick. Shame on you.

[Anti-Homer]

Spot on again AH. Skyhops will be at the game today for reunion weekend if anyone wants to buy me a beer. My sources will not be present.

Hops,

I don't believe I've ever said this before to a poster, but this is one of the smartest takes to ever grace this board. Congratulations! Don't be surprised if you get a $5 Starbuck's gift card. I'll have to see what our Moderator petty cash fund looks like for this month.

[Anti-Homer]

[quote=skyhops

it just shows you how HARD it is to actually GET to a FF.

Butler went twice, end of story.

Drop......the......Mic.

I will do something rare for AH and straddle the fence. I do agree it is very difficult to go to the FF. Butler happened to do it with the best coach in cbb. I think Tony Bennet is one of the best coaches, and he has never gotten there. However, if he ever gets a team with top 30 talent, he will. He does more with less than anyone coach out there.

[Shadow]

Bleed,

You're entitled to your opinion, and it is what guys like my Mentor 1B, Shadow, and I'm sure others on this board fought for. However, I won't sit idly by while you take unwarranted shots at one my good friends on this board, Muskienick. Shame on you.

In support of Anti, I'd like to support him and all the posts he has put up on this site so I hereby nominate him for the coveted 2018-19 Uppayurs Award.

[longliveskip]

Spot on assessment. I think he was a good coach, and probably tied as the 3rd best with Gillen. His inability to win the big games as a prohibitive favorite in the tourney, and also lose to the best team in the league by an average margin of 25, when X was typically the 2nd best team in the conference, was a sign of his lack of ability to adjust, in my very humble opinion.

Anyone who quotes the tired "most wins in team history," argument, probably also thinks Cronin is the best coach in UC history, as he is the only UC coach to have back to back 30 win teams. He has also gone to the SW 16 only once. Once in 12 years! Thank you UC for employing that fraud of a coach.

when were we ever "PROHIBITIVE" favorite in tourney game and LOST? and i mean favored by at least double digits and lost? how many times did that happen?

we lost to the best team in the league by those margins - was that the same team that one the National Title 2 out of 3 years? you mean that one?

you guys have ZERO clue what in-game adjustments Coach Mack made because you're not in the huddle or on the sidelines.......EVER. i truly appreciate the basketball "internet geniuses" - ya know, the ones who can come on this site and MMQB everything that Coach Mack SHOULD HAVE done in the game the night before? you guys the smartest basketball minds on the planet - 24 hours after the fact.

it's so ridiculous.

i'm actually rooting for Mack to get to a FF at Louisville.

but then you guys will come on here and say it was just because he's able to recruit the best players and has nothing to do with his ability to coach.

these takes are so laughable.

when were we ever "PROHIBITIVE" favorite in tourney game and LOST? and i mean favored by at least double digits and lost? how many times did that happen?

Losing to a 7 seed as a 2, and 8 seed as a 1 in 2 of 3 years, is the definition of being a prohibitive favorite. I just double checked it in Websters. CM’s pic is actually cited as an example. If you want, I’ll change it from prohibitive to decidedly. Wow , that really takes the sting off!

these takes are so laughable.

If by laughable, you intended to say insightful I agree; and thank you.
[/quote]

in the NCAA tourney, after the first round, you can throw seeds out the window. if you can find where we were double digit favorites vs those teams then fine, but i don't believe we were. plenty of 1's have lost to 8's and plenty of 2's have lost to 7's. it happens every almost every year. we were not "decidedly" or even "prohibitively" favored vs those teams just because of our seed so nice try on that.

no, it doesn't take the sting away but as i said - you don't want to call Mack a great coach because of those two games but you NEVER use the other side of the coin for your argument at all - when he took "inferior" teams who were PROHIBITIVELY and DECIDEDLY NOT FAVORED and beat the better teams - he did that just as much as losing to a worse seed. isn't that the sign of great coaching? when you take a lesser talented team and beat a MORE talented team?

i guess in your eyes, it's not.

you have your opinion of Mack for whatever reasons, but it seems, and i'm just speculating based on the massive amounts of negative posts you've had towards Mack, to have more to do with what kind of a person he was at Xavier and maybe how he treated you when you were there than it does his coaching ability. for whatever reason, you can't put aside your personal distaste for Mack when trying to assess his coaching talent. i don't know why. i don't know what happened, but something clearly did.

i'm willing to bet that he will prove you wrong with his tenure at U of L.

i hope he does. not to prove me right, but because i wish nothing but the best for EVERY coach that has been at X and moved on, especially one that took this program to a level we haven't been to before. a #1 and a #2 seed 2 out of last 3 years. a regular season BE championship. etc, etc, etc.

Best of luck, Coach Mack.

[skyhops]

Best of Luck Mack? He was talking to Louisville during the year and verbally agreed to the job before the big east. He had no loyalty so why should we be loyal to him.

[madness31]

The 1 and 2 seeds were more the result of an improved SOS due to league affiliation. I'm not overly impressed with the BE other than obviously Nova but what is great about the league is that there are no terrible teams or at least not several. Generally the conference has done well against non conference opponents until the tournament at which time the conference folds other than Nova the last few years. X has also made some runs but should have made several more.

Some of you call attention to the years X has overachieved with a focus on seed but ignore the years the team underachieved. I'd also suggest seed alone is not an appropriate measure. X should have been a top 5 team Tu's senior year but bad coaching had them limping into the tournament. A confident Frease suddenly emerged and the team was saved from complete embarrassment. Lyons was a talent but his shot selection and decision making was destructive to the team. That is exceptionally bad coaching. Even Tu, who obviously had a great career, was slow to grasp the concept of shot selection. Had that team won games it should have during the season they would have been a 2 seed and expectations would have been much higher. The team overachieved twice in the tournament under Mack and underachieved 4 times. That is not a resume that screams great coach. It is well within the range of average.

This still puts too much focus on wins and losses which only partially speaks to a coaches ability. To properly judge a coach you have to look at player development, in game adjustments, defensive and offensive strategies, out of bounds plays, etc. Mack showed improvement over the years in some of those categories. His zone was unique but overall defense has been a huge liability. Rarely did X make halftime adjustments that got them back into a game. Occasionally a player was able to heat up and put the team on their back but I don't credit the coach with those heroics. Riding the hot hand is 1 thing but demanding 1 to win a game is very different. That is desperation coaching.

If I didn't watch most of the games and simply looked at the record and the tournament results I would assume Mack was a great coach. But since I did watch most of the games and experienced the frustration with much of the coaching I can safely conclude he was about average. There was a lot of undeveloped and underutilized talent during the Mack years. There was also a huge dependency on a star to emerge each year and carry the team. Most coaches live and die by their star player, which is exactly what makes someone average - when they do the same thing everyone else does.

[longliveskip]

Best of Luck Mack? He was talking to Louisville during the year and verbally agreed to the job before the big east. He had no loyalty so why should we be loyal to him.

these are the things that we would love to know how you know, but we are all just supposed to take your word for it? whatever.

i have ZERO problem with him talking to U of L before the season was done. Pitino had been fired. their guy was an interim. do you REALLY believe he didn't give everything he had to try and get Xavier as far as they possibly could? do you think he was thinking "it doesn't matter what we do because i'm leaving?" total BS.

it was the only job he was leaving for, they wanted him, and he was offered it. if you were in the middle of a contract with the company you work for and your dream job called you and wanted you, would you not at least llsten? would you not jump at the chance? c'mon, man. that's not being disloyal. anyone in his shoes would at least listen. and any one of us would jump at the chance for a job like that.