Virginia Coach classy in defeat

[05_never_again]

That has nothing to do with early exits, though. I agree that Boeheim is overrated; very strongly disagree that Self, Bennett, Miller or Cronin is. I'd take Self over Roy without thinking twice.

It does when you want to criticize a coach for early exits. If you have several early exits, but you also have several titles plus multiple runners up, you can forgive the early exits. It's honestly kind of funny how Roy gets a little bit of the Calipari treatment at times, like he has good teams, but actually isn't all that great of a coach. He has 3 titles, which is more than anybody else we are talking about in the conversation, plus Izzo.

I don't think it is unfair to say that Self should have multiple titles at Kansas, Bennett should have done more with his UVA teams in the tournament (although even that has to be balanced with the fact that their basketball program was nothing before he arrived), Miller should have a Final Four under his belt at Arizona, and Cronin's teams have badly underachieved in the tournament for the past several years.

Honestly, even some of the sheen has to come off Izzo at some point. He hasn't won a title since 2000 and hasn't even made it to the Sweet Sixteen in 3 years.

 

[NashVol11]

It does when you want to criticize a coach for early exits. If you have several early exits, but you also have several titles plus multiple runners up, you can forgive the early exits. It's honestly kind of funny how Roy gets a little bit of the Calipari treatment at times, like he has good teams, but actually isn't all that great of a coach. He has 3 titles, which is more than anybody else we are talking about in the conversation, plus Izzo.

I don't think it is unfair to say that Self should have multiple titles at Kansas, Bennett should have done more with his UVA teams in the tournament (although even that has to be balanced with the fact that their basketball program was nothing before he arrived), Miller should have a Final Four under his belt at Arizona, and Cronin's teams have badly underachieved in the tournament for the past several years.

Honestly, even some of the sheen has to come off Izzo at some point. He hasn't won a title since 2000 and hasn't even made it to the Sweet Sixteen in 3 years.

Or, it could be that even the greatest coaches in the sport fall in early rounds fairly often. A handful of first weekend exits isn't a big deal; everyone--Coach K and everyone else--has them. Really, the only coach who has consistently made the second weekend is Calipari, which makes it funny when people use tourney performance as the sole measure of coaching competence but also act like Cal isn't a great coach.

Shaka Smart has a Final Four. Thad Matta has two. Bennett is a much, much better coach than either one of them.

 

[05_never_again]

Or, it could be that even the greatest coaches in the sport fall in early rounds fairly often. A handful of first weekend exits isn't a big deal; everyone--Coach K and everyone else--has them. Really, the only coach who has consistently made the second weekend is Calipari, which makes it funny when people use tourney performance as the sole measure of coaching competence but also act like Cal isn't a great coach.

Shaka Smart has a Final Four. Thad Matta has two. Bennett is a much, much better coach than either one of them.

You have to look at everything in context though, and that coach's context can change drastically over time. Shaka Smart has one Final Four, which is one more than Sean Miller, but also hasn't advanced beyond the Round of 32 since then. He was also at VCU for a number of years, a place with limited resources, so the early bounces have to be looked at in light of that. However, he's been very underwhelming at Texas, a place with much bigger resources. Shaka has made a lot of hay out of that one magic run with VCU, and he's absolutely in overrated territory at this point.

I'm not sure what happened to Thad Matta post-2013. He was one of the top coaches in the country until then.

And you're right about Calipari. Like I was saying in my previous post he and Roy get lumped into this "at a great school, but not actually a great coach" category yet Cal has made it to at least the Elite Eight 6 times in 8+ years at Kentucky. Roy Williams has 3 national titles. Is there another active coach besides Coach K with at least 3? Cal and Roy seem to get an undue amount of flak for being overrated, yet we've named a ton of coaches in this thread with less success than them that actually appear to be overrated. I think it's simply got more to do with people think Cal is a sleazeball/cheater and Roy is a cheater, not that they are actually believed to be "overrated."

About the only coach in college basketball that is great and is actually agreed universally to be great is Coach K.

 

[RDU VOL#14]

K and Roy are the best coaches in the NCAA. Tony Bennett is a great coach as well, he just needs to get over the hump. It took K a long time, it took Dean Smith a long time to win a ship, it took Roy a long time, but once they did their excellence was magnified. Being a Duke fan and growing up in the heart of Tobacco Road I should want UVA to struggle, but I hope that the loss to UMBC won’t carry over to have a bad effect on Bennett’s career .

 

[05_never_again]

K and Roy are the best coaches in the NCAA. Tony Bennett is a great coach as well, he just needs to get over the hump. It took K a long time, it took Dean Smith a long time to win a ship, it took Roy a long time, but once they did their excellence was magnified. Being a Duke fan and growing up in the heart of Tobacco Road I should want UVA to struggle, but I hope that the loss to UMBC won’t carry over to have a bad effect on Bennett’s career .

Until he wins a title, he'll be known as the coach of the first #1 seed (and first seed overall) to lose to a #16. Sad but true.

 

[RDU VOL#14]

Until he wins a title, he'll be known as the coach of the first #1 seed (and first seed overall) to lose to a #16. Sad but true.

I agree. Until he makes a Final 4 or wins a title that will always be there. It had to happen sometime, but I’m just glad it didn’t happen to Tennessee or Duke.

 

[ainge10heisman]

last four.

if you count last five, he gets a sweet sixteen. For UVA (going against Duke and UNC every year), that's not too shabby. I think that UVa's problem is that one of the most inaccurate cliches in all of sports is their specialty: Defense (alone) does not win championships.

Their offense was mediocre all year. It was well known by anyone who watches a lot of ACC ball that anyone could beat them, it was just being able to hit the shots. No one thought it would be the first round though.

He should bring in a guru, an offensive genius. If he would hire an assistant like that and give him control over the O, then Virginia would win a National Championship within a couple of years.

Heck even a slightly above average O combined with their yearly D would likely be enough to push them over the top.