Not feeling sorry for lil Mick at UCLA. (Of course, some might say I'm a bitter Bearcat having suffered through his tenure as HC on the Clifton Campus.) Sure, why not X? Would love to see a Final 4 for the boys from VICTORY PKWY! U.C. out of the NIT early: agree it was at least U.C.'s fault with that whole floor thing. OMG. But, I don't believe Lahkin, "such as he is" made a clutch basket all year, and definitely missed key "layups" at the end of the season and in Tourney Games. OMG. Zeke, a Bengal? Another, sure, why not from me on that. Time to say bye-bye to Mixon. Sadly, Perine is gone and won't be there to carry the load.
I guess I still am not a fan of letting Perine leave. I’m not sure we will end up with a better 2nd back then him. Maybe he wanted to leave, what do I know?
UC is not the Huggins, Cronin, or even the Brennen Bearcats. That’s sad. I heard someone say yesterday that Cronin wanted to stay at UC but they didn’t try to keep him. Shame. Is basketball still important to UC or are we a football school now? (I can say “we” because I pay my sons tuition to attend there). Where are the fiery timeouts and the adjusted game plans after a timeout. Do the kids just ignore the play calls and decide to jack up three’s on their own? Well...next season!
I'll start off by agreeing with you that it was a ridiculously shortsighted decision to force your program into back to back hornet nests because of a floor remodel. But I have a few counterpoints when it comes to the insinuation the UC program was anything less than a total sinking ship when Wes Miller took over:
1) The 2020-21 Bearcats went 12-11 in Brannen's final season at UC. Even if that entire team came back its not like Wes Miller started where Brannen started with a team coming off an NCAA Tournament and conference POY returning for his Sr season.
2) NINE players left the program to enter the transfer portal either during or after the 12-11 season. That is an absurd amount of a .500 team that quit on Brannen by the end of the 20-21 season. Maybe you prefer sinking ship over dumpster fire but whatever you call it Wes Miller didn't inherit a thriving program when he took over in mid April 2021. Well after most recruits had committed to schools for the 2022 season.
3) Lakhin was a medical redshirt and never played a minute of basketball for Brannen. He also wasn't very good his redshirt FR season which was played under Miller. All of his improvement from FR to SOPH season is due to Miller and his coaching staff (considering he's the only CBB coach he's played or -- most likely -- practiced for.)
4) Nothing to do with UC....but XU has 3 players that account for 17 YEARS worth of college basketball seasons. A ridiculous advantage that has never existed in college basketball before now. Yet I see no qualifying of success based on the random luck they've received by being able to play players who are 24 years old and in their 150+ career college basketball games.
Wow, so petty and jealous how you're handling Xavier's success. You left a couple obvious things out in your anger. X was smart. They hired an intelligent, solid, experienced coach. That's to their credit. Too bad UC did just the opposite. They hired a clown act in Miller. He is a push over of a coach. And he will bolt town the first chance he gets to go back to the Carolinas.
Lahkin was Brannen's recruit. NOT Miller's. That was the point. It's about Miller's horrible recruiting. Miller, in his 2 recruiting cycles, has brought in about a dozen guys, and almost all of them stink. That's a fact, Jack. Next time, try sticking to the point. As for Lahkin's development, I say he would be much farther along under Brannen's coaching than he is under Miller's. Brannen played inside. He had real experience. Miller was a undersized runt and crummy scrub at NC. He was a walk-on.
The 9 transfers line is a distortion. Of the six who left after the season, 2 returned. Most of the guys who left have done nothing elsewhere. As for DURING the Covid season, lots of kids sat out, then decided to quit their team, which you conveniently left out. They got all screwed up being trapped in the dorms and playing in front of no one. I was glad to see the Madsons, Sanders, and Harvey go. Brannen would have gone out and gotten better. Those guys were crybabies.
Brannen was well loved by most of his guys at NKU. He was very successful there. He was a very successful college player, just like Huggs. Also like Huggs, he's a tough coach who doesn't put up with crap. Miller coddles his guys. He's Travis Steele, 2.0. Steele got all walked over. So does Miller. Nolley got more and more careless and selfish as the season went on, jacking 3s whenever he wanted to, throwing passes behind the back, playing hard only when the mood struck him. Miller ignored it. Miller belongs at a mid major. This is not the right place for him. He's been pretty lost here. He tries hard; UC is not a good fit.
Good to see you read what you wanted to read instead of what I actually said. I made no issue of XU success. I simply stated there has been no qualifying of that success like their is any time UC was mentioned this year.
You keep making up whatever you want to make up though. Enjoy the offseason.
Moreover.....it was actually 11 that potentially left at the end of the season....but I don't remember Davenport or Adams-Woods officially having entered the portal so I didn't include them. But 9 players quit the team or entered the transfer portal at the end of the season. When Miller was hired in mid April he was able to re-recruit Saunders and Mason Madsen back to UC.
Wanna count with me?
1) Rapolas Ivanauskas (left 7 games into the season)
2) Tari Eason (transferred to LSU)
3) Mason Madsen (entered transfer portal at end of season, Miller re-recruited him back)
4) Zach Harvey (entered transfer portal at end of season, transferred to UCSB)
5) Chris Vogt (entered portal after season, transferred to UW)
6) Gabe Madson (left team 2 games into the season, transferred to Utah after the season)
7) Mike Saunders (entered transfer portal at end of season, Miller re-recruited him back to UC)
8) Mamoudou Diarra (transferred to Tennessee Tech)
One final thing because its a ridiculous take that can't be ignored RE: Lakhin. I get you're just a hater (of Miller...or perhaps just an XU fan and a hater of UC in general?) but what an asinine comment in regards to Lakhins development on the college level.
Brannen inherited a conference championship roster and turned it into a .500 team within 2 years. But he would have been better for Lahkin's development than the man that has actually been developing him (successfully).....because Brannen is also tall?
Georgetown must be leading the NCAA's in the development and draft picks of big men since Patrick Ewing had been HC for several years....right? He's tall so his big men must be the best...because tall. Excuse me...my eyes have rolled out their sockets and I must retrieve them.
Wasn't planning on commenting since this is one of the worst efforts on your part ever, by your own admission, but then I decided a comment of the same quality is in order. Here goes;
I've finally figured out what is wrong with UC and Miller in particular. It goes like this; *crickets*.
David Bell has to do the following to get the Reds playing better; *crickets*
So and so is definitely going to be the Bengals new running back next year. You heard it here first. *crickets*
I can do even worse next time. Have an indeterminate weekend.🤐
What a wimp out. As the 'adult' to us youngsters, you have a mature duty to bring the heat to the comments under this scenario, rather than just tanking like this ... for shame
Certainly not a "dumpster fire", but Wes Miller did come into a mess of a situation, with much of the team in the portal following all of the issues with Brannen. So he first had to talk some of the players who ultimately stayed into staying. I still feel like Wes is the right guy, and I am resigned to reminding myself that "progress" next year may look flat, or maybe even like a small regression, with UC entering the Big12. He deserves 5 years to show what he can do, especially with what sounds like a good group of new players coming in next year.
X was only given a 30% chance tonight...but then, who listens to ESPN anyway? I say let's go X. Just need some hot 3 pointers and they are on their way. And, I'm thinking Creighton will beat Princeton. Too bad they are on at the same time, but that's what recorders are for. Another long night with the hoops. Nice way to spend a rainy evening.
ESPN owns 538 .com, so that's where that projection comes from. They are quite down on the chances of the Xmen, with only my darkhorse impossible dreamers/channelers of global consciousness-wielding Princeton pocket protectors less of an overall chance
The 'sages of the ages' are raining down their 3s shooting random data probability-altering mojo from the burgeoning planetary noosphere onto the squared up, open PU 3ball practitioners ?
UK lost an OT game to that same MSU outfit early in the season that kicked off their subsequent sugar in the gas tank season. Wallace missed a late FT and Wheeler 2 (one the front end of the bonus) that any one of which theoretically would have given the game to UK w/o any OT addendum
Right, nobody's perfect, especially early in the season. Also notable is UK and Duke almost always appear in the same bracket year after year and they also twice beat the crap out of UT's Big Orange cesspool (never a bad thing in BBN) so the 'random' placements in that region didn't surprise me even a little bit. UK was star crossed this season and it could have possibly been fixed with #34 not having had both O/D run through him (literally on D) at the 5 rather than him trying to become a more pro-viable complementary 4
This is perfect 😆 ... in the Dude's first appearance, I never got it before that he's inspecting *the dates* on the half & half in the cooler, likely looking for the expired and discounted cartons ... and when he finds one marked down, smells and tastes it before taking it to the checkout (where he's got a half & half 'stache). He also post dates the $o.69 check for the quart of h&h for 9/11/91 (GHWB on the television is talking about 'this aggression will not stand' and is generally presumed to be a taped replay on that TV in the scene, as that speech was in 199o ... TBL itself was made/released in 1998, which means the 9/11 post dating appears to be some kind of unintentional synchronicity decade foreshadowing deal). The reason for the above post was Doc has apparently finally answered my question(s) of whether he's actually seen this movie or not, as a foundation of the plot is there are 2 Jeffrey Lebowskis, with the Dude being the lesser while Maude's father, the old man, is the 'Big Lebowski' ... "No ... you're Mr Lebowski, I'm the Dude ... etc etc" is one of those iconic and repeatable lines
Then 'Tumbling Tumbleweeds' is where Cincinnati born Roy Rogers (he claims 'on second base' in a tenement his family occupied at the prior site of Riverfront Stadium) got his start in show business with his singing group the Sons of the Pioneers
Nice Rod tune choice, from the great album Atlantic Crossing, which never got its due, perhaps because the most radio friendly tune included lyrics about, um, amusing oneself while reading Playboy on a hot afternoon https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SuLmcnyOGaU
Freemantle is a really good player, but, XU is a better team right now than with him before. Hunter is light years better on D and his offense has been steadily improving. Dez has more playing time and his confidence has grown. XU is not deep but they are good and can be very good at times.
Won't argue with the rationale, but would Freemantle be putting up any better #s than Jerome is over the last 2-3 games? And would he still be pouting after every missed shot instead of GOING AFTER his own board? I dunno, but this team's overall chemistry is superior to any version of it with Zach IMO. Now depth wise, that's a whole new debate but safe to say Hunter would never have found this groove doing 8-10 mins off the bench.
Click those 3 dots to the right of 'reply' under your posts to gain the edits feature. It's rare for one of my pathetic droppings here *not* to reflect my obsessive editing habits. One of my old Black Lodge of Bengal Asylum messageboard assumed 'characters' was the hyper-obsessive pedant, [Ed.]
Yeah, without Freemantle, everyone has to be at their best. Could it happen? Sure,but the odds are against them. Having said that,go X!!! I had wondered why UC was playing on the road. Yeah, a dumb decision. As for Zeke, I think he'll take the best offer. Don't think that'll be the Bengals. Guess we'll see.
Not feeling sorry for lil Mick at UCLA. (Of course, some might say I'm a bitter Bearcat having suffered through his tenure as HC on the Clifton Campus.) Sure, why not X? Would love to see a Final 4 for the boys from VICTORY PKWY! U.C. out of the NIT early: agree it was at least U.C.'s fault with that whole floor thing. OMG. But, I don't believe Lahkin, "such as he is" made a clutch basket all year, and definitely missed key "layups" at the end of the season and in Tourney Games. OMG. Zeke, a Bengal? Another, sure, why not from me on that. Time to say bye-bye to Mixon. Sadly, Perine is gone and won't be there to carry the load.
Have you ever seen 2 guys on the same floor looked more like they belonged in some local YMCA beer league than Timme and Jaquez Jr?
They would be dominating like George Mikan of course, I mean just in their appearance aspect and demeanor
I guess I still am not a fan of letting Perine leave. I’m not sure we will end up with a better 2nd back then him. Maybe he wanted to leave, what do I know?
UC is not the Huggins, Cronin, or even the Brennen Bearcats. That’s sad. I heard someone say yesterday that Cronin wanted to stay at UC but they didn’t try to keep him. Shame. Is basketball still important to UC or are we a football school now? (I can say “we” because I pay my sons tuition to attend there). Where are the fiery timeouts and the adjusted game plans after a timeout. Do the kids just ignore the play calls and decide to jack up three’s on their own? Well...next season!
Can X win it all?? No
I'll start off by agreeing with you that it was a ridiculously shortsighted decision to force your program into back to back hornet nests because of a floor remodel. But I have a few counterpoints when it comes to the insinuation the UC program was anything less than a total sinking ship when Wes Miller took over:
1) The 2020-21 Bearcats went 12-11 in Brannen's final season at UC. Even if that entire team came back its not like Wes Miller started where Brannen started with a team coming off an NCAA Tournament and conference POY returning for his Sr season.
2) NINE players left the program to enter the transfer portal either during or after the 12-11 season. That is an absurd amount of a .500 team that quit on Brannen by the end of the 20-21 season. Maybe you prefer sinking ship over dumpster fire but whatever you call it Wes Miller didn't inherit a thriving program when he took over in mid April 2021. Well after most recruits had committed to schools for the 2022 season.
3) Lakhin was a medical redshirt and never played a minute of basketball for Brannen. He also wasn't very good his redshirt FR season which was played under Miller. All of his improvement from FR to SOPH season is due to Miller and his coaching staff (considering he's the only CBB coach he's played or -- most likely -- practiced for.)
4) Nothing to do with UC....but XU has 3 players that account for 17 YEARS worth of college basketball seasons. A ridiculous advantage that has never existed in college basketball before now. Yet I see no qualifying of success based on the random luck they've received by being able to play players who are 24 years old and in their 150+ career college basketball games.
Wow, so petty and jealous how you're handling Xavier's success. You left a couple obvious things out in your anger. X was smart. They hired an intelligent, solid, experienced coach. That's to their credit. Too bad UC did just the opposite. They hired a clown act in Miller. He is a push over of a coach. And he will bolt town the first chance he gets to go back to the Carolinas.
Lahkin was Brannen's recruit. NOT Miller's. That was the point. It's about Miller's horrible recruiting. Miller, in his 2 recruiting cycles, has brought in about a dozen guys, and almost all of them stink. That's a fact, Jack. Next time, try sticking to the point. As for Lahkin's development, I say he would be much farther along under Brannen's coaching than he is under Miller's. Brannen played inside. He had real experience. Miller was a undersized runt and crummy scrub at NC. He was a walk-on.
The 9 transfers line is a distortion. Of the six who left after the season, 2 returned. Most of the guys who left have done nothing elsewhere. As for DURING the Covid season, lots of kids sat out, then decided to quit their team, which you conveniently left out. They got all screwed up being trapped in the dorms and playing in front of no one. I was glad to see the Madsons, Sanders, and Harvey go. Brannen would have gone out and gotten better. Those guys were crybabies.
Brannen was well loved by most of his guys at NKU. He was very successful there. He was a very successful college player, just like Huggs. Also like Huggs, he's a tough coach who doesn't put up with crap. Miller coddles his guys. He's Travis Steele, 2.0. Steele got all walked over. So does Miller. Nolley got more and more careless and selfish as the season went on, jacking 3s whenever he wanted to, throwing passes behind the back, playing hard only when the mood struck him. Miller ignored it. Miller belongs at a mid major. This is not the right place for him. He's been pretty lost here. He tries hard; UC is not a good fit.
Good to see you read what you wanted to read instead of what I actually said. I made no issue of XU success. I simply stated there has been no qualifying of that success like their is any time UC was mentioned this year.
You keep making up whatever you want to make up though. Enjoy the offseason.
Moreover.....it was actually 11 that potentially left at the end of the season....but I don't remember Davenport or Adams-Woods officially having entered the portal so I didn't include them. But 9 players quit the team or entered the transfer portal at the end of the season. When Miller was hired in mid April he was able to re-recruit Saunders and Mason Madsen back to UC.
Wanna count with me?
1) Rapolas Ivanauskas (left 7 games into the season)
2) Tari Eason (transferred to LSU)
3) Mason Madsen (entered transfer portal at end of season, Miller re-recruited him back)
4) Zach Harvey (entered transfer portal at end of season, transferred to UCSB)
5) Chris Vogt (entered portal after season, transferred to UW)
6) Gabe Madson (left team 2 games into the season, transferred to Utah after the season)
7) Mike Saunders (entered transfer portal at end of season, Miller re-recruited him back to UC)
8) Mamoudou Diarra (transferred to Tennessee Tech)
9) Keith Williams (transferred to WKU)
One final thing because its a ridiculous take that can't be ignored RE: Lakhin. I get you're just a hater (of Miller...or perhaps just an XU fan and a hater of UC in general?) but what an asinine comment in regards to Lakhins development on the college level.
Brannen inherited a conference championship roster and turned it into a .500 team within 2 years. But he would have been better for Lahkin's development than the man that has actually been developing him (successfully).....because Brannen is also tall?
Georgetown must be leading the NCAA's in the development and draft picks of big men since Patrick Ewing had been HC for several years....right? He's tall so his big men must be the best...because tall. Excuse me...my eyes have rolled out their sockets and I must retrieve them.
Wasn't planning on commenting since this is one of the worst efforts on your part ever, by your own admission, but then I decided a comment of the same quality is in order. Here goes;
I've finally figured out what is wrong with UC and Miller in particular. It goes like this; *crickets*.
David Bell has to do the following to get the Reds playing better; *crickets*
So and so is definitely going to be the Bengals new running back next year. You heard it here first. *crickets*
I can do even worse next time. Have an indeterminate weekend.🤐
What a wimp out. As the 'adult' to us youngsters, you have a mature duty to bring the heat to the comments under this scenario, rather than just tanking like this ... for shame
Off days happen. Even to the best.😀
Ok Tanky Tankerson
Still love some old Stewart but for flat out scorchers can do no better than (I Know) I'm Losing You
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVBJETtEwxI
Don't beat yourself up Doc... just bring back Kelly on your off days. Huge thanks to Michelle for what to do this weekend! Very valuable.
Certainly not a "dumpster fire", but Wes Miller did come into a mess of a situation, with much of the team in the portal following all of the issues with Brannen. So he first had to talk some of the players who ultimately stayed into staying. I still feel like Wes is the right guy, and I am resigned to reminding myself that "progress" next year may look flat, or maybe even like a small regression, with UC entering the Big12. He deserves 5 years to show what he can do, especially with what sounds like a good group of new players coming in next year.
X was only given a 30% chance tonight...but then, who listens to ESPN anyway? I say let's go X. Just need some hot 3 pointers and they are on their way. And, I'm thinking Creighton will beat Princeton. Too bad they are on at the same time, but that's what recorders are for. Another long night with the hoops. Nice way to spend a rainy evening.
Last nights "games" are exactly why I don't Bet on them. I would bet with my heart, and clearly that is not a good idea.
ESPN owns 538 .com, so that's where that projection comes from. They are quite down on the chances of the Xmen, with only my darkhorse impossible dreamers/channelers of global consciousness-wielding Princeton pocket protectors less of an overall chance
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2023-march-madness-predictions/
The 'sages of the ages' are raining down their 3s shooting random data probability-altering mojo from the burgeoning planetary noosphere onto the squared up, open PU 3ball practitioners ?
https://noosphere.princeton.edu/
The games have been great, the MSU - K State game was strong! PS - Kelly did a wonderful job yesterday!
UK lost an OT game to that same MSU outfit early in the season that kicked off their subsequent sugar in the gas tank season. Wallace missed a late FT and Wheeler 2 (one the front end of the bonus) that any one of which theoretically would have given the game to UK w/o any OT addendum
Don’t forget the two coaching blunders from Cal. Guarding inbounds and letting msu easily go full court with easy tying basket
Right, nobody's perfect, especially early in the season. Also notable is UK and Duke almost always appear in the same bracket year after year and they also twice beat the crap out of UT's Big Orange cesspool (never a bad thing in BBN) so the 'random' placements in that region didn't surprise me even a little bit. UK was star crossed this season and it could have possibly been fixed with #34 not having had both O/D run through him (literally on D) at the 5 rather than him trying to become a more pro-viable complementary 4
Thematically, Timme = the Dude. The caricature of MFB is more your "Mr (Big) Lebowski" type in TBL milieu
This is perfect 😆 ... in the Dude's first appearance, I never got it before that he's inspecting *the dates* on the half & half in the cooler, likely looking for the expired and discounted cartons ... and when he finds one marked down, smells and tastes it before taking it to the checkout (where he's got a half & half 'stache). He also post dates the $o.69 check for the quart of h&h for 9/11/91 (GHWB on the television is talking about 'this aggression will not stand' and is generally presumed to be a taped replay on that TV in the scene, as that speech was in 199o ... TBL itself was made/released in 1998, which means the 9/11 post dating appears to be some kind of unintentional synchronicity decade foreshadowing deal). The reason for the above post was Doc has apparently finally answered my question(s) of whether he's actually seen this movie or not, as a foundation of the plot is there are 2 Jeffrey Lebowskis, with the Dude being the lesser while Maude's father, the old man, is the 'Big Lebowski' ... "No ... you're Mr Lebowski, I'm the Dude ... etc etc" is one of those iconic and repeatable lines
https://youtu.be/kETSULfAgGg
Then 'Tumbling Tumbleweeds' is where Cincinnati born Roy Rogers (he claims 'on second base' in a tenement his family occupied at the prior site of Riverfront Stadium) got his start in show business with his singing group the Sons of the Pioneers
https://youtu.be/JQc5gDXQGIs
Nice Rod tune choice, from the great album Atlantic Crossing, which never got its due, perhaps because the most radio friendly tune included lyrics about, um, amusing oneself while reading Playboy on a hot afternoon https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SuLmcnyOGaU
Freemantle is a really good player, but, XU is a better team right now than with him before. Hunter is light years better on D and his offense has been steadily improving. Dez has more playing time and his confidence has grown. XU is not deep but they are good and can be very good at times.
At this late stage, offense is more important than defense, imo. That's why Freemantle over Hunter.
Won't argue with the rationale, but would Freemantle be putting up any better #s than Jerome is over the last 2-3 games? And would he still be pouting after every missed shot instead of GOING AFTER his own board? I dunno, but this team's overall chemistry is superior to any version of it with Zach IMO. Now depth wise, that's a whole new debate but safe to say Hunter would never have found this groove doing 8-10 mins off the bench.
Typo : things to do not thugs.
Click those 3 dots to the right of 'reply' under your posts to gain the edits feature. It's rare for one of my pathetic droppings here *not* to reflect my obsessive editing habits. One of my old Black Lodge of Bengal Asylum messageboard assumed 'characters' was the hyper-obsessive pedant, [Ed.]
Wayne, I tried your suggestion, but after clicking on the three dots I didn’t see an option to edit. I do appreciate your help!
Should open up a secondary window with choices 'edit comment' or 'delete comment'. Your browser may be hiding that window from you?
X has been to three elite 8s. One each with Matta, Miller, and Mack.
Yup. I covered 'em all. Thanks
Yeah, without Freemantle, everyone has to be at their best. Could it happen? Sure,but the odds are against them. Having said that,go X!!! I had wondered why UC was playing on the road. Yeah, a dumb decision. As for Zeke, I think he'll take the best offer. Don't think that'll be the Bengals. Guess we'll see.
More likely Zeke gets zero offers other than some vet min afterthought to somebody's training camp