Why Barbee?

zuksnj · Post by **zuksnj** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 12:02 pm

Chapel Hill Minuteman wrote:The fact that some people want to be held hostage to Lappas because of one unranked recruit who may or may not leave is a joke. A new coach will bring in his own players anyways.

Keep Lappas and the fact that it will be more of the same losing culture is a given.

A new coach is a roll of the dice but at least there is the possibility of a winning program if not next year but in years after. Lappas is a tired, worn out coach who is still dining out on the fact that he had a head coaching job in the Big East years ago which means dick today.

And for all the people who make the argument that it's not Lappas' fault that the A10 is so weak that it hurts the RPI (which is true), just imagine how much worse the record would be right now if the A10 were having even an average year. For the A10 to be down in lappas' big year should have been a blessing in disguide for him.

I don't see Lappas' leaving as making that much of a difference as our a-10 play has been mediocre (losing twice to Fordham and Temple and squezzing by the likes of St. Bon) and better or worse would continue to be mediocre. The future of the program is obviously the key, I want to run the a-10 and be competitive nationally, which is better than mediocre.

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 12:13 pm

I can see why people would want to keep Lappas. The trend lines are all there.

I call this my Rebuilding Graph. It shows two A10 men's basketball programs, UMass and George Washington, from 1996-97 into 2003-2004. Somehow, though I'm not sure how, the George Washington program, which suffered a bit like UMass in the early 2000's has rebounded, as shown by the trend line. On the other hand, UMass has not, also shown by the trend line.

But have no fear! Prosperity is just around the corner! All we have to do is hang in there for another year or two! And if we don't, I shudder to think of the direction that trend line might move in.

VoxPop · Post by **VoxPop** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:40 pm

recheck your trendline. this will be the first UMass team to finish over .500 in 5 years.

UmassFanatic · Post by **UmassFanatic** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:44 pm

VoxPop wrote:recheck your trendline. this will be the first UMass team to finish over .500 in 5 years.

Very true

fbiman · Post by **fbiman** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:57 pm

VoxPop wrote:recheck your trendline. this will be the first UMass team to finish over .500 in 5 years.

What was the UMass S.O.S. over the last 5 seasons?

UMass87 · Post by **UMass87** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 2:34 pm

VoxPop wrote:recheck your trendline. this will be the first UMass team to finish over .500 in 5 years.

I don't get why you think the fact that Lappas has sucked for three years makes his marginally less sucky fourth year so good?

You are rewarding him for sucking for the first three years. This is not suprising because three and one half years ago you did, in fact, agree that Lappas had to "visit miserable on the way to good". Most of us don't consider that "rebuilding".

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 3:25 pm

VoxPop wrote:recheck your trendline. this will be the first UMass team to finish over .500 in 5 years.

And it will be the first time that GW finishes over .500 in, let's see, why, since last year! Am I mistaken, or did it take GW about 3 years to get back over .500, and it took UMass under Lap, how long did you say, this is the first time in 5 years? Cut us a little slack. I think we were at .500 in 00-01, only four years ago.

But you have a point Vox. Let's include this year's records, as nearly as we can tell. I'll give us the Duquesne game. Now, for the 2000's, let's keep it simple. How are the two teams trending?

Man. Look at that. UMass is STILL trending down, while GW is taking off. I just don't get it Vox. What do you think the difference is?

zuksnj · Post by **zuksnj** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 3:28 pm

Have a look Villanova Wildcats in the Big East!

zuksnj · Post by **zuksnj** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 5:28 pm

I might get slammed for this but am I the only one who thought that at times Bruiser's bench coaches, including Barbee looked absolutely clueless. Bruiser would look at them during a bad game and they would have a dumbfounded look on their faced and would just shrug their shoulders. I don't want to see that again.

I know that what he looked like as an asst has little to do with what his role would be as head coach so I would welcome him and hope he would do a great job, it's just that I remember those late 90's years which werent all peaches and cream either.

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 6:03 pm

zuksnj wrote:Have a look Villanova Wildcats in the Big East!

An interesting idea, zuks. What made you think of them? Well, let's look.

They are going up. And surprisingly we're still going down! I think it's slightly different though. Notice that Villanova isn't rocketing into the stratosphere, trendwise. However, they're way up there in terms of winning pct. this season. And they never had the same dolldrums we had here. Looks like, let's see, just one sub-.500 season out of the six. It would appear that the reason they are improving at a slower rate than GW is that they never hit the pit of despair that the Colonials did- three sub-.500 seasons! Of course, Villanova gets to play most of its games in the Big East, a relatively soft conference.

Didn't Nova replace their coach sometime around 2001? You'd think they'd have had several years under .500 after something like that.

Hyperbole Defender · Post by **Hyperbole Defender** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 6:41 pm

UMass is 16-11 heading into the A-10 tournament.

Last year we were 10-18 heading into the A-10 tournament.

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 10:39 pm

Did you get that from the graphs, or on your own?

LS71 · Post by **LS71** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 10:52 pm

Hyperbole Defender wrote:UMass is 16-11 heading into the A-10 tournament.

Last year we were 10-18 heading into the A-10 tournament.

Last year the A-10 was a helluva lot stronger than it is this year. Yeah their record is better, but the given the weakness of the league, 9-7 and third place in the weaker of the two divisions is nothing to write home about.

Tell the whole story will you? I've got one word for you...context!

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 11:20 am

Is there any way to get SOS information for previous seasons? Wig?

chuff · Post by **chuff** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 2:23 pm

Glad to oblige. Here are the Lap years, in terms of winning pct., strength of schedule and RPI. Using linear trends, Lap has improved things enough this year that the overall winning pct. is up. But if you look at strength of schedule, as fbiman suggests, you see that it has trended down. However, if you use the old RPI to be fair (as DS suggests) there's enough of improvement in wins this year that the overall trend in the Lap years is up. However, it's close enough that if you used the revised RPI this year, it's down (I didn't bother to show that).

So yeah, wins are up. And I do think we have a better team this year than last. However, a significant reason behind the improved record is a much easier schedule.