Donovan praises Stokes and Tennessee...

[bleedingTNorange]

Originally Posted by cncchris33

Florida's lineup wasn't one I would consider to be big. Outside of Patric Young at 6-9, Will Yegoute is 6-7 and hurt half the year, Erik Murphy is 6-10 but plays out of the paint quite a bit, and Cody Larson at 6-10 rarely played.

I was counting Murphy since he did match up with our bigs, and he is big, even though e doesn't play it.

As I also mentioned though, uconn, very big front line and very talented. And not for nothing, but I felt our bigs, especially stokes, held their own against UK. I'd say they faired about as well as anybody against UK.

I agree Maymon is short, but so was Barkley and Blair, and they made it work fine. He uses his quickness to best guys to the spot. As far as stokes, what he lacks in height, there are few bigs as strong as he is, so he just gains position and doesn't relinquish it. Our bigs did a great job last year, and outplayed just about all the bigs thy faced, and that was with jarnell and kenny only playing about 6 games together. So with all 3 of those guys going, I think our posts are the best in the SEC, and one of the best in the country.

[esarmstrong]

Originally Posted by zansdad

And Pearl went 1-3 vs Billy G and let Meeks hang 54 at TBA. Sometimes stats are useless.

Winning and losing games is a useless stat?! I would think that the only stat that is truly important is who wins and who loses.

And what exactly do select stats about Bruce Pearl and Kentucky have to do with Billy Donovan and the price of tea in China?!

Donovan's futility with UT spans 16 seasons and more than one coach. He has had difficulty with Bruce Pearl, Cuonzo Martin, Jerry Green and Kevin O'Neal. We aren't talking about two seasons of games against one coach or one game where a opposing player catches lighting in a bottle.

Engage your brain next time before typing. Best to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt...

[zansdad]

Originally Posted by esarmstrong

Winning and losing games is a useless stat?! I would think that the only stat that is truly important is who wins and who loses.

And what exactly do select stats about Bruce Pearl and Kentucky have to do with Billy Donovan and the price of tea in China?!

Donovan's futility with UT spans 16 seasons and more than one coach. He has had difficulty with Bruce Pearl, Cuonzo Martin, Jerry Green and Kevin O'Neal. We aren't talking about two seasons of games against one coach or one game where a opposing player catches lighting in a bottle.

Engage your brain next time before typing. Best to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt...

No, arbitrarily picking out a coaches record vs one university or one other coach is unimportant. My use of Billy G was an example of how a more successful coach may have had a losing record vs a specific coach or university and in the long run it doesn't matter.

Donovan was 2-0 vs O'Neil while going 5-11 in the SEC, that doesn't seem like stuggling. He went 4-4 vs Green during one of the most successful 4 years spans of UT basketball while building a program at Florida, again doesn't seem like struggling. He went 5-3 vs Buzz, which doesn't seem great but that is a .625 winning percentage vs an in conference opponent so while not great is acceptable. He went 5-8 vs Pearl and 0-2 vs Martin. Much of his struggles with Pearl might have to do with Lofton (2-6 vs Florida) as Pearl (4-3 since). And Martin is a small sample size.

At the end of the day Tennessee fans can only dream about having a coach as successful as Donovan has been at Florida. With 3 Final 4's and back national championships, I think his coaching resume is just fine. And saying he struggles vs Tennessee is pointless.

I engage my brain plenty, thanks. And Pack Sand, you arrogant blow hard...

[esarmstrong]

^^

Irony: Someone that claims that stats are "useless" who then turns to stats to try and prove a point.

BTW, congrats on your ability to go to Wikipedia and copy down a bunch of ... STATS.