Tubby's best job of coaching?

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Considering this team was given up for dead and faced all sorts of distractions because of the suspensions, might this not be Tubby's best coaching job minus the national championship year? Just getting this team INTO the tourney is a freaking miracle, IMO. Somehow tubby convinced this team to not give up on itself when it very well could have. Well done Tubby and staff!
 

You need to look at the whole body of work. Tubby was the coach of the team that was left for dead too.

We're an odd team. We had a better record against top 30 RPI teams than anyone else in on the bubble. We also probably had the most bad losses of any at-large team in the tournament.
 

If this is Tubby's best coach job, how vastly inferior is he to Jamie Dixon? Pittsburgh isn't any better than us (probably slightly worse), yet they're a #3 seed.
 

Plinnius said:
If this is Tubby's best coach job, how vastly inferior is he to Jamie Dixon? Pittsburgh isn't any better than us (probably slightly worse), yet they're a #3 seed.
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Well, he's not inferior to Jamie Dixon, in fact, by every measurable stat, Tubby is the superior coach. Not to knock Dixon, he's a good coach, but to compare them in this way makes no sense, and doesn't address the original point that Tubby took a distracted floundering team and patiently built them into the cohesive, scrappy group that we've had the pleasure of watching over the last couple of days.

This guy is going to the Hall of Fame. For coaching. And this year is another example of why.
 

beowulftom said:
Well, he's not inferior to Jamie Dixon, in fact, by every measurable stat, Tubby is the superior coach. Not to knock Dixon, he's a good coach, but to compare them in this way makes no sense, and doesn't address the original point that Tubby took a distracted floundering team and patiently built them into the cohesive, scrappy group that we've had the pleasure of watching over the last couple of days.

This guy is going to the Hall of Fame. For coaching. And this year is another example of why.
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Fair point, but then also should he shoulder some blame for the team floundering in the first place? They are about where (or a little worse) people thought they would be.

I agree that the last couple weeks have been great, but if he gets that credit, he should get the rips for allowing them to get down too...
 


beowulftom said:
Well, he's not inferior to Jamie Dixon, in fact, by every measurable stat, Tubby is the superior coach. Not to knock Dixon, he's a good coach, but to compare them in this way makes no sense, and doesn't address the original point that Tubby took a distracted floundering team and patiently built them into the cohesive, scrappy group that we've had the pleasure of watching over the last couple of days.

This guy is going to the Hall of Fame. For coaching. And this year is another example of why.
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Yep. I find it incredible that this team is in the tournament.

On Feb 11, they crapped the bed on their home floor and 3 days later blew a 13 point lead to Northwestern. LW was a malcontent, Devoe was on training wheels at PG, our inside game was non-existent. YES, I GET THAT TUBBY WAS THE COACH ALL THE WAY THROUGH FEB 14 TOO, SO PLEASE SAVE IT.

Since that point, they have played 4 bad halves in 10 games. Ok, maybe 5 - counting the second half of Purdue game. Outside of that it has been above-average and sometimes great play. They blew some teams out and beat the best teams in the conference. They even almost single-handedly knocked Illinois out of the NCAAs.

Players have improved, the half-court offense has improved, players that were called D2 athletes by experts on this board became significant contributors and we won 7 out of 10 games and it should have been 8 of 10 (Purdue). Some of this is due to coaching. CLEARLY. It would have been very easy to mail it in. It had to be tough to convince those guys they could do this.

Hell, we've practically been in the (quadruple-elimination) NCAA tournament since Feb 18 vs. Wisconsin, but we just didn't know it. Now we do. Masterful. By Tubby. A month ago, I never would have believed it.
 

The US Airways captain who landed in the Hudson river was piloting the plane when it hit the birds that stalled the engine. Maybe he could have done something to avoid the incident, maybe not. It doesn't make landing in the Hudson any less remarkable. Based on expectations before the flight departed, you could say he disappointed. Based on his actions from the point of crisis, he's a hero. And no, I don't think college basketball is life and death, I'm just making a point.
 

howeda7 said:
The US Airways captain who landed in the Hudson river was piloting the plane when it hit the birds that stalled the engine. Maybe he could have done something to avoid the incident, maybe not. It doesn't make landing in the Hudson any less remarkable. Based on expectations before the flight departed, you could say he disappointed. Based on his actions from the point of crisis, he's a hero. And no, I don't think college basketball is life and death, I'm just making a point.
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I understand your point, mine is just that if you get the praise you get the crap as well...
 

:pig:
gopherbadgerman said:
I understand your point, mine is just that if you get the praise you get the crap as well...
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I give Tubby about 5% of the blame for Mbakwe and White not being on the team this year. That caused most of our issues. I give him more of the blame for Nolan, but even that's ultimately on the player. Yes, there are still games we could have won down the stretch, but the biggest issue was still the missing players. All coaches get too much blame and too much credit. But it's always a feat when you keep a group of 18-21 year-olds who's season appears over from quitting on you.
 



I have wondered since Al was suspended what the folks that blamed Tubby were seeing in our roster on paper that said we were a tourney team. On paper were we really supposed to beat Wisky, Illinois on the road,and Michigan State in a neutral site, and make the tourney. GOOD JOB TUBBY
 

gopherbadgerman said:
Fair point, but then also should he shoulder some blame for the team floundering in the first place? They are about where (or a little worse) people thought they would be.

I agree that the last couple weeks have been great, but if he gets that credit, he should get the rips for allowing them to get down too...
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Were you not on this board when Minnesota lost? There were people openly hoping Tubby would leave. So I'm not sure where you get the idea that everyone was letting Tubby slide when they lost. It was the quite the opposite. That being said, Tubby is one of the best in the business and he does excel at this time of the year. His teams always play better late than early. So a lot of it does have to do with coaching.
 

gopherbadgerman said:
I understand your point, mine is just that if you get the praise you get the crap as well...
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Okay, then, we've heard the crap, get started with the praise. Actually, a lot of fans, and evidently way too many on message boards, carry the lame blame craze praise to heights previously unknown to humankind. Do you people believe that losing teams and coaches didn't want to win? Or is it that you need to win so badly you can't swallow the same loss your team has to and still man up to it? At any rate it's pretty ugly.
 

The last 7 games were a nice run and just good enough to get to the NCAA going 21-13/9-9. Good stuff. The team finally played close to its potential.

But wait!

Didn't we make it last year too with an identical 9-9 BT record and 22-11 and had just about everyone back? Not so sure I would call that "greatness".
 



Bayfieldgopher said:
The last 7 games were a nice run and just good enough to get to the NCAA going 21-13/9-9. Good stuff. The team finally played close to its potential.

But wait!

Didn't we make it last year too with an identical 9-9 BT record and 22-11 and had just about everyone back? Not so sure I would call that "greatness".
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I don't think anyone is saying the team itself is "great." What we're saying here is that Tubby did a great job of getting them to the tournament because of all the crap that went on during the year. Last year, as a I recall, the team was pretty much distraction free. This year, there was a distraction at every turn and they still made the NCAAs despite it all. I think that's the point here.

As such, I'm more than happy with the job Tubby and his players did in making the national tournament again.
 

I think Tubby did an OK job coaching this group.

Positives:

- found some chemistry at the end of the season with Joseph at the point.

- did a good job continuing the development of Sampson and Iverson (big guys just take time)

- continued to play a very tough defense - with a willingness to mix it up (trap/zone/man to man) to keep the opponent guessing.

- stayed very positive and focused even with all the distractions.

Negatives

- Until the end of the season, never found a usable role for Bostick which I felt hurt the team (Bostick being one of our few players able to create offense)

- Williams/Cobb seemed to plateau very early in the season with little late season improvement.

- Never found an offensive set that would generate a few good looks at crunch time (loved the high/low with Sampson/Iverson during the tournament)

But the biggest negative - he seemed at times not to have the team's attention. A couple of critical games the team came out flat as pancakes with sub par effort.

My guess is Tubby would give himself a B for the season - above average but not great. I am thrilled he is our coach!!
 

I love how the world is Black and White in some peoples world. I'm thankful that I can see other shades otherwise life would be pretty simplistic.
 

Most importantly, the season is not over. If this team goes on a run- and they might- this might be Tubby's best season.

Additionally, trial by fire for Joseph, Sampson and Iverson may have a huge pay-off next year. I think Joseph and Nolen sharing the point could be an awesome thing next year. Nolen would cure our late game ball-handling woes while Devoe brings offense.
 

UST82Gopher said:
My guess is Tubby would give himself a B for the season - above average but not great. I am thrilled he is our coach!!
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Since some of you insist upon missing the point, I'll bite.

1st 2/3 of season grade for Tubby: B- (I give him a break on distractions, but took too long to get a coherent half-court offense, took too long to bench LW when he would whine and go into FU-mode, causing other problems, didn't get much from Iverson, which was much more important due to 2 missing bigs)

Last 1/3 of season grade for Tubby: A+ (stated above)

As an aside, in response to:

>>Until the end of the season, never found a usable role for Bostick which I felt hurt the team (Bostick being one of our few players able to create offense)

Totally agree with this (it's perplexing). Also, put more blame on Tubby for Al Nolen situation than most.
 

Winnipegopher said:
Most importantly, the season is not over. If this team goes on a run- and they might- this might be Tubby's best season.

Additionally, trial by fire for Joseph, Sampson and Iverson may have a huge pay-off next year. I think Joseph and Nolen sharing the point could be an awesome thing next year. Nolen would cure our late game ball-handling woes while Devoe brings offense.
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Agree with if they make a run, it may be considered one of his best coaching years. If they make the final 8, I would go there...
 

GopherJake said:
Since some of you insist upon missing the point, I'll bite.
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I am not sure I am following you. The thread title is "Tubby's best job of coaching?" My comment was no - I think he would rate it a B.

Tubby has won a National Championship - a feat of coaching no matter what the talent level is. He also had some tremendous overachieving teams at Tulsa and George that would merit consideration.

Personally, I think he did a better job coaching us our 1st year - that roster was a mess and he lead them to 20+ victories!

Now, if we win it all..............
 

I own up to being super frustrated with Tubby this year. Never wanted him to leave, obviously. But there was a point where player development had me scratching my head. A couple weeks later...I'm psyched about Devoe and the future of our bigs.

We still desperately need a Grier-type guy.

I am happy we're in the tournament!
 

UST82Gopher said:
I am not sure I am following you.
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Sorry, you are right, the title of the thread reflects something other than the "point" some are missing. Some of us sort of "tangented" from that and started a sub-topic.

Some on this thread say I have to consider the season as a whole, and I do, but not for this particular point. That's allowed. The point I was saying people are missing is that from Feb 14 he did one helluva job. They kept saying he did an average job for the season. I'm saying I am ignoring - for the purposes of the point - the first part of the season.

Put it this way, have you ever said something like this:

"Player XYZ didn't have a very good first part of the year, but man did he come on strong and peak when it really counted."

That's what I'm saying about our coach.
 

Amen, Winnie

Winnipegopher said:
Most importantly, the season is not over. If this team goes on a run- and they might- this might be Tubby's best season.
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I'm not issuing any grades for Tubby -- or this team -- until the 2009-2010 season is completed. I'd love to defer the grades until late at night on April 5th.
 

Winnipegopher said:
Additionally, trial by fire for Joseph, Sampson and Iverson may have a huge pay-off next year. I think Joseph and Nolen sharing the point could be an awesome thing next year. Nolen would cure our late game ball-handling woes while Devoe brings offense.
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I'm hoping we can continue to develop an in-and-back-out game much more consistently next year ... it sure was sweet to watch over the past several weeks and especially in Indianapolis.

BTW, I remember earlier this season people were wondering how we'd replace Westbrook's offensive presence next year. Devoe's performance during the tournament helped answer those concerns.
 

Lots of good points on both sides in this thread. I feel like Tubby did an excellent job from say the Wisconsin game on (with a glaring omission being the game in Ann Arbor) and deserves praise for getting the team in the tournament. That said, the Gophers are currently 1-5 in games decided by one point or in OT, not a sign of great coaching. We lost numerous large leads this year and also have 4-5 bad losses. I hope we can be considering this among Tubby's best coaching jobs in a week or so meaning we are still in the tournament.
 

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