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| Kiltedpard |
Stick a fork in emWas @ the Navy debacle. FYI our tax dollars have been well spent. Alumni hall is a beautiful facility. LU has a lot of nerve calling their's an arena. This is an arena!Regarding our Hoopsters, with the exception of Gruner and Willen, (Possibly Benbow) it appears they have packed it in. We did not play defense, we did not get back on defense, we turned it over on really dumb passes, showed no spark, no enthuesiam, no passion, very lackadasical, overall it was a horrible showing. I really hate to be critical because I'm sure these guys are busting their tails in practice, but, it was a Leone like performance. I am really dissapointed in this season. I really thought we would improve during the year, but, I don't see it. And I really don't understand the whole second half of the PL league each and every year we do worse? Did I say, I am really dissapointed in this season? I guess I just don't understand????? Go Pards! |
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| Long Time Fan |
Re: Stick a fork in em
And hoe does this reflect on Fran? |
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| Andy |
Re: Stick a fork in em
Thanks for the first hand report, k-pard. Sounds ugly. You'd think the one given with a young team would be enthusiasm and energy. |
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| Xboreturns |
Alumni Hall was built in 1988 with $13 million tax payer dollars. The other $17 million was "private funds". However, if you look at the bronze plaque listing the donors, you will see that they are all companies that have/had major contracts with the DoD. The plaque is off to your left when you come in, near where the elevator is.
I should have also noted that the USO gave a half million in honor of Bob Hope. |
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| Kiltedpard |
Re: Stick a fork in emAnd hoe does this reflect on Fran?[/quote]A good question? An LU grad told me "Fran's the best at making chicken salad out of chicken s@#%." With scholarships, I would have thought we would be able to get more than chicken s@#&! What do the players and former players say? The players have to play. Are we not recruiting the players we need? Are we expecting too much too soon? Has the rest of the league figured us out? After they see us once they know how to stop us the second time around? IMO we should expect to win 3 out of 4 from the academies and not get our hats handed to us by 23 when we do lose!  We turn the ball over too much, we don't shoot well (especially on the road) and now we don't defend. There is something missing. It's D1 Big Boy basketball and we are handing someone a $200,000 education. Is it generational? One senior = lack of leadership? Did you get the impression that I'm frustrated here?
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| carney2 |
Re: Stick a fork in em
I need someone with hoops knowledge to enlighten me, but it appears that, with only one or two exceptions (Willen is the only one that comes immediately to mind), we are recruiting the same caliber of player that we had without scholarships.* In fact, most of these guys would probably not be in the top 20-25% of that non-schollie group. Fran needs a hustler, a recruiter, on his staff, even if the guy doesn't know the difference between a crossover dribble and a pick and roll. *If he makes it, will Ryan Willen be the first Lafayette freshman of the scholarship era to be chosen Patriot League All-Rookie first team? I think so, and if I'm right that is a pretty damning statement for a program with a strong basketball tradition trying to emerge from the depths. What about J.D. Pelham? He's 6'10". That counts for something in basketball played at this level. If he can't play why was he recruited? He's appeared in only half of the games and is averaging only 3.8 minutes in those. (He averages less than 2 per game for all games this season.) Even "projects" get off the bench occasionally. Does he rate the "project" label? Why is this guy consuming cheeseburgers at College expense? It's time to see what, if anything, he has. Another season is in the crapper, so if the guy has any future at all, why not give him a feeling that he's part of things and has a reason to work in the off season? Just one of the dozens of things that are frustrating and confusing about this bottom of the barrel program. |
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| sasquatch |
I think the collective expectations for scholarship freshmen is way to high. If you look at all of D1 very few freshmen as a percentage get minutes, most that do are at the 1,2 or 3 spot. Outstanding freshman bigs are usually fast tracking to the pros.
I can scan the ACC or SEC rosters and stat sheets and see that highly touted (read ranked) bigs are getting very little playtime. The sad fact is they do not have the footspeed or strength to compete against upper classmen in game situations. It takes the immersion efffect they get once away from home and owned by the bball and strength coaches to be able to compete. The ones that do succeed are usually prep products, held back twice in their k-12 years or just blessed physically. I have a hard time laying all the blame on the 4-5 position given how many turnovers our guards are generating and the inconsistent jumpshooting from same. Live by the jumpshot die by it. Kari and Willen attack the basket well and we look much better when they do they just do not do it enough. |
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| bison137 |
Re: Stick a fork in em
Last LC player on the all-rookie team was Andrew Brown in 2005-06. Before him, you have to go back to Kenny Grant and then Tyson Whitfield. |
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| Bells1 |
Since the input of a former player was solicited I will respond. Commenting on a public forum is not really my cup of tea. I will not disparage players or coaches. I'm sure that every effort is being made to turn things around. My belief is that it is true now as it was when I played - recruiting mistakes made at this level of basketball and academics are magnified. It is a mistake to bring players in solely based on height, hoping that they will develop into D-1 players. I am disappointed that effort is being questioned. Giving your best effort should never be a question. On the assistant coach issue - again I have no firsthand knowledge of the present situation but I do know the importance of having experienced, capable assistants. An assistant making a lateral move to a NEC school is troubling. Are economics an issue here? If so it would seem to be penny wise and pound foolish. We are handing out $200K scholarships largely based on the efforts and evaluations of the people in this position. Norm Gigon was an integral part of the program's success during his years on the Hill. He had a keen sense of the type player and person that would do well at Lafayette (probably news to some on here that he was involved with the basketball program). He was able to scout and recruit without being too involved in the day-to-day (although he served as a great confidant). Not sure if we have someone in that role today.
One last thing - Leave John Leone alone. He's a good man who ran into a bad string of circumstance. An undue amount of injuries due to the ridiculous rubber floor certainly hurt him as much as anything. |
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| Andy |
I date back to Gigon's years and, no, I wasnt aware of his basketball involvement--interesting. BTW, interesting article on Gary Williams and his refusal to engage in "third party recruiting." http://mobile.twp.com/detail.jsp?...50532&rc=sp&p=1&all=1 |
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| Kiltedpard |
Thanks for your input. I too date back to the Norm Gigon days and knew that he was involved with our programs (hoops and baseball). I am trying like heck to avoid disparaging anyone, coach, assts., players, because I beleive, maybe naively that everyone is doing their very best. I am also not bashing John as I beleive he is a great guy and is great for the college. He just needed to find the right job @ LC. My frustration is, we have a good coach, we have a great college, we have good facilities, we have some tradition, and now with scholarships we are still struggling. I want us to succeed on a consistent basis. |
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| Lafalum |
If you think we have all the elements we need then why aren't we succeeding....the reason is one or more of those elements are not in place.
So pick and choose which one. We can put on a happy face and be great supporters of the college but if nothing changes......nothing will change. The recruiting environment has changed, the league has changed, the college's resources are diminished. Lastly, I am not convinced that one high order athletic goal for this admistration, and I mean the people in Markle or Kirby, is winning. For one there are other fiscal priorities and and object is to bleed as much into their priorities as posible and for the other its to preserve their jobs. Winning is farther down on the list. That's the way I see it. Until that's changed we are stuck or maybe we'll get lucky. I'd rather not wait for good luck |
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| Long Time Fan |
As long as we're talking about frustrations, here are mine with this program.
1. The turnover rate in personnel, players and coaches. I think that one of the reasons this season has been particularly difficult is because Hines and Andersen left after their freshman years. I think they showed enough skills and athletic ability that they both would have started at the begining of this season. I also think Tom Leszczynski would have been a solid contributor the past two seasons. I suppose that Fran is a tough guy to work for and play for, but I'm sure Ralph Willard is too and Pat Flanery was also. It just seems there is more turnover in personnel the past ten years than I ever saw in the previous forty. 2. In recruiting it seems that we are getting our "fruit" from the lower branches of the tree. Who was the last Lafayette player to be named first team all league at the end of the season? Would anyone argue that we are not the least athletic team in the league and have been so for years? 3. Where are the Black basketball players at Lafayette? We have a problem in this respect--and I don't know what it is. |
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| Andy |
How badly would our current team with three scholarship recruiting classes lose to our 03-04 roster?: DeBerry, Winston Davis, Farrell, Dill, P. Betley. Bench--Jamal Douglas, Knitter, Hilliard, Capusan. Would you guys agree we'd lose by 20? Where is the upgrade in athleticism? Heck, where is the upgrade in talent? The difference IMO is that we had very good asst coach recruiters. |
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| Kiltedpard |
Well, we were picked last pre season and that's where we are. I guess everyone knew and we were just optimistic. We are what we are and that's not very good. I was hoping we would be improving. Maybe we can get the Bison at home tonight? Sigh!
Go Pards! |
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| The Maroon |
It's funny you mention Leone. In the spring of '92 we had a Philly recruit on campus who joked he wasn't being recruted by the Big 5, but the little 3 (Rider, Drexel and Lafayette). I know we were in the running for him until the end, but he wound up at Drexel--and later went on to pick up a couple rings with the San Antonio Spurs. He was Malik Rose. I can guarantee you if Malik Rose came to Lafayette John Leone would have been the coach beyond 1995, Fran would have been snatched up by another program. The entire complexion of the program would have changed. I'm not trying to play the what-if game, I'm just trying to point out how near misses--especially in basketball--can change everything. Adonal Foyle, Sitapha Sivane, Brian Ehlers, Pat McNaughton....I won't argue for a second those guys did it alone, there was plenty around those guys--but talent tends to get drawn to talent. If you ever see Craig Kowadla sometime who was recruited heavily by Colgate, watch his eyes light up when he thinks what might have been if he could have played PG with Foyle on his team. My point is, basketball recruitign more than any other sport is about recruiting "THAT" player---it starts a lot of positive momentum. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say the men's team has bottomed out. Willen is that kind of player. He's leading the team in points and rebounds in conference games. He's a star---this year has sucked, but we only lose one player and we have ourselves a star. Gruner and Kari will form a solid back court. Mintz is ready to take it to the next level. Willen I've already covered. Visockas will hopefully recover. If we could ever figure out what to do with Benbow's unique game he could be a potent weapon. No we're not gonna challenge for a title next year, but I can say with assurance that this is the bottom. Now I will head to the women's forum and explain why they could actually get worse. |
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