Some interesting and topical stuff in Seth Davis' mailbag

For some reason this opening question sounded very familiar and relevant.

I am curious about Steve Alford. How is it he can coach so well at New Mexico after having been so inept at Iowa? Has the Iowa experience improved his ability to coach or did he just give up and get out when he could? Seems like he should have been able to parlay the Big Ten tourney championships into something better.
-- Travis, Ypsilanti, Mich.

If Travis was trying to pay Alford a compliment, he did a pretty lousy job. Frankly, it doesn't take a whole lot of guts to rip someone from the safety of your cubicle in Ypsilanti, especially if you're not going to provide your last name. You want to show some guts? Voice that opinion to Alford directly.

I'm not sure if it showed guts or foolishness, but I decided to reach out to Alford myself on Tuesday and read him Travis' e-mail, word for word. Steve accepted the backhanded compliment with typical good cheer -- winning tends to put a guy in a good mood -- before offering up a feisty defense of his eight-year tenure at Iowa.
"We had seven winning seasons and we won two Big Ten [tournament] titles," he said. "If you look at the history of Iowa basketball, I think they've won four or five Big Ten titles of any kind. Yet, the perception is we weren't successful there."
Travis' e-mail is yet another example of just how misguided criticism of coaches can be. If fans aren't happy with their program -- and at some point, most of them aren't -- their reflexive reaction is to call for a coaching change. In the grand scheme of things, however, the coach is not nearly as fundamental to a program's success as many fans want to believe. All you have to do is look at Alford's record before and after his Iowa tenure, not to mention Iowa's record before and after Alford coached there.
It starts with unrealistic expectations. If Alford were the coach at his alma mater, Indiana, and he took the team to the NCAA tournament three times in eight years and failed to reach the Sweet 16, that could rightly be characterized as a disappointment. At Iowa, however, that was very impressive. After Alford left, he was replaced by Todd Lickliter, who had just been named National Coach of the Year after taking Butler to the Sweet 16. Lickliter won 38 games in three years and never finished higher than eighth in the Big Ten. He got fired and was replaced by Fran McCaffrey, who had just gone to three straight NCAA tournaments at Siena. In his nearly two years at Iowa, McCaffrey's teams have gone 10-22 in Big Ten play. Those guys didn't forget how to coach upon arriving at Iowa any more than Alford remembered how to coach once he got to New Mexico. Success and failure is about much, much more than the man on the sidelines.
Remember, too, that Alford didn't get fired at Iowa. He voluntarily left for New Mexico. Why? In the first place, he was undercut by his then-athletic director, Bob Bowlsby, who refused to stand up to the message-board crowd in Alford's defense. In addition, New Mexico offered Alford a commitment to basketball that Iowa couldn't. When Alford got to Albuquerque, he had a new practice facility and a full-time strength coach, two things he didn't have at Iowa. (Iowa just completed an expensive renovation of its arena last year, which included an upgrade of its practice courts, weight room and other facilities.) The Lobos get great fan support year in and year out, which helps recruiting. (It also encourages unreasonable expectations, but that is the nature of fandom.) During his five years at New Mexico, Alford's teams have never won fewer than 22 games.

Keep in mind that the year before he came to Iowa, Alford had piloted Southwest Missouri State to the Sweet 16. That's right, Southwest Missouri State. He is, by any standard, one of the finest college basketball coaches in America. He also got out of Iowa at exactly the right time, just as fans like Travis from Ypsilanti were getting the eight-year itch. Ask Illinois coach Bruce Weber about the eight-year itch. He's in his ninth season in Champaign, and he's about to get canned.
"In this profession, it's hard to stay long-term at one place," Alford told me. "Unless you're winning 20 games and advancing in the NCAA tournament every year, which is hard to do, it becomes very difficult. With all the social media and everything else, you need to have a total commitment from the administration, not just in publicly backing you but also providing the help you need. I feel like I have that at New Mexico."
In return, New Mexico has a winning basketball team and one very happy coach. We'll see if things turn out as well at the place Alford left behind.

On to the rest of the Bag ...

Great read, thanks SS. That piece about Alford is very relevant to the Gophers and even GopherHole. Interesting phrases used such as "unrealistic expectations" and "(refusing) to stand up to message board crowds."

...No, I'm not OK with mediocrity, Tubby Haters. Give it a rest.

Also found this one interesting

In your last mailbag you said it would be difficult for a coach to recruit in Chicago without cheating. Could you clarify what you meant by that? I'm not here to say you should or should not have said it. I just simply don't understand what you meant.
-- Dan, Cincinnati

It's probably unfair to generalize, but there's also no reason to dodge the truth: There's a lot of cheating going on in big cities. The reason is simple: there is more of everything there. More players, more high schools, more AAU teams, more media outlets, more sneaker money, more agent runners. I would never say it's impossible to recruit successfully in a place like Chicago without cheating, but if you ask anybody in this business, they'll tell you that they agree with me that it's hard.
My specific context here was in reference to the soon-to-be-open Illinois coaching job. The prevailing wisdom is that the most important qualification is the ability to recruit Chicago successfully. I disagree. Hey, it's a big country! Even if you can get good players out of Chicago without breaking rules, those kids come with a lot of advisers, relatives, friends, AAU coaches and other hangers-on who will get in their ears and complain about their lack of minutes and scoring opportunities.
A coach should never limit himself to a single geographic area, especially at a prominent place like Illinois. In fact, often times that coach is better off recruiting players from somewhere else. The players are often better off getting away from home, too.

I kinda' figured the Alford stuff would draw some discussion, but I was actually more interested in the questions about the RPI.

I think that Alford played it perfect in terms of leaving Iowa City. He's a smart guy. He beat the posse out of town yet arguably ended up with a better job, and now has a fan base that cares a lot more about basketball than Iowa does. I always thought Alford was a solid coach, where he got in trouble was that whole Pierre Pierce thing. Probably should have given Pierce the boot instead of having him sit out a year, but that's just my opinion.

920/414 Gopher said:

Great read, thanks SS. That piece about Alford is very relevant to the Gophers and even GopherHole. Interesting phrases used such as "unrealistic expectations" and "(refusing) to stand up to message board crowds."

...No, I'm not OK with mediocrity, Tubby Haters. Give it a rest.

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Are you trying to indicate that when Tubby was hired expectations about the program should not have been raised? Wasn't he hired to in fact raise the level of the program? This idea that Minnesota basketball hasn't been a top half of the conference team on a consistence basis therefore the hiring of Tubby should not allow for the expectations to be raised is ridiculous. I am not one that is saying Tubby should be fired but this just sounds like an excuse for the pro-Tubby crowd.

scools12 said:

Are you trying to indicate that when Tubby was hired expectations about the program should not have been raised? Wasn't he hired to in fact raise the level of the program? This idea that Minnesota basketball hasn't been a top half of the conference team on a consistence basis therefore the hiring of Tubby should not allow for the expectations to be raised is ridiculous. I am not one that is saying Tubby should be fired but this just sounds like an excuse for the pro-Tubby crowd.

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We have a winner....

raising the expectations was only good until tubby arrived on campus. The the excuses started.

scools12 said:

Are you trying to indicate that when Tubby was hired expectations about the program should not have been raised? Wasn't he hired to in fact raise the level of the program? This idea that Minnesota basketball hasn't been a top half of the conference team on a consistence basis therefore the hiring of Tubby should not allow for the expectations to be raised is ridiculous. I am not one that is saying Tubby should be fired but this just sounds like an excuse for the pro-Tubby crowd.

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No, scools, that wasn't my point at all. That's why I edited my post and added that last sentence...to avoid being accused of being overly Pro-Tubby. I'm arguing that a lot of people's eyes got a little too big when they found out that a coach with a national championship was coming to coach the Gophers. Admittedly, I am one of those people. I'm not arguing that we should have little to no expectations because of past mediocrity, I'm arguing that maybe our expectations were/are a bit too high for Tubby. As Seth Davis talks about in his article, blame for Iowa's (in our case, Minnesota's) problems can't all be placed on the coach, but that's where most of the blame is placed when a team struggles.

Regardless, our young team showed what it can be tonight. We just have to learn how to close games and how to play with poise and confidence as a group. Things should be better next year. If they're not, I'm willing to agree that Tubby will have fallen short of expectations. But with the player attrition and injuries we've had over the past couple years, it's been tough for me to hold my expectations at a consistently high level.

scher215 said:

For some reason this opening question sounded very familiar and relevant.

I am curious about Steve Alford. How is it he can coach so well at New Mexico after having been so inept at Iowa? Has the Iowa experience improved his ability to coach or did he just give up and get out when he could? Seems like he should have been able to parlay the Big Ten tourney championships into something better.
-- Travis, Ypsilanti, Mich.

If Travis was trying to pay Alford a compliment, he did a pretty lousy job. Frankly, it doesn't take a whole lot of guts to rip someone from the safety of your cubicle in Ypsilanti, especially if you're not going to provide your last name. You want to show some guts? Voice that opinion to Alford directly.

I'm not sure if it showed guts or foolishness, but I decided to reach out to Alford myself on Tuesday and read him Travis' e-mail, word for word. Steve accepted the backhanded compliment with typical good cheer -- winning tends to put a guy in a good mood -- before offering up a feisty defense of his eight-year tenure at Iowa.
"We had seven winning seasons and we won two Big Ten [tournament] titles," he said. "If you look at the history of Iowa basketball, I think they've won four or five Big Ten titles of any kind. Yet, the perception is we weren't successful there."
Travis' e-mail is yet another example of just how misguided criticism of coaches can be. If fans aren't happy with their program -- and at some point, most of them aren't -- their reflexive reaction is to call for a coaching change. In the grand scheme of things, however, the coach is not nearly as fundamental to a program's success as many fans want to believe. All you have to do is look at Alford's record before and after his Iowa tenure, not to mention Iowa's record before and after Alford coached there.
It starts with unrealistic expectations. If Alford were the coach at his alma mater, Indiana, and he took the team to the NCAA tournament three times in eight years and failed to reach the Sweet 16, that could rightly be characterized as a disappointment. At Iowa, however, that was very impressive. After Alford left, he was replaced by Todd Lickliter, who had just been named National Coach of the Year after taking Butler to the Sweet 16. Lickliter won 38 games in three years and never finished higher than eighth in the Big Ten. He got fired and was replaced by Fran McCaffrey, who had just gone to three straight NCAA tournaments at Siena. In his nearly two years at Iowa, McCaffrey's teams have gone 10-22 in Big Ten play. Those guys didn't forget how to coach upon arriving at Iowa any more than Alford remembered how to coach once he got to New Mexico. Success and failure is about much, much more than the man on the sidelines.
Remember, too, that Alford didn't get fired at Iowa. He voluntarily left for New Mexico. Why? In the first place, he was undercut by his then-athletic director, Bob Bowlsby, who refused to stand up to the message-board crowd in Alford's defense. In addition, New Mexico offered Alford a commitment to basketball that Iowa couldn't. When Alford got to Albuquerque, he had a new practice facility and a full-time strength coach, two things he didn't have at Iowa. (Iowa just completed an expensive renovation of its arena last year, which included an upgrade of its practice courts, weight room and other facilities.) The Lobos get great fan support year in and year out, which helps recruiting. (It also encourages unreasonable expectations, but that is the nature of fandom.) During his five years at New Mexico, Alford's teams have never won fewer than 22 games.

Keep in mind that the year before he came to Iowa, Alford had piloted Southwest Missouri State to the Sweet 16. That's right, Southwest Missouri State. He is, by any standard, one of the finest college basketball coaches in America. He also got out of Iowa at exactly the right time, just as fans like Travis from Ypsilanti were getting the eight-year itch. Ask Illinois coach Bruce Weber about the eight-year itch. He's in his ninth season in Champaign, and he's about to get canned.
"In this profession, it's hard to stay long-term at one place," Alford told me. "Unless you're winning 20 games and advancing in the NCAA tournament every year, which is hard to do, it becomes very difficult. With all the social media and everything else, you need to have a total commitment from the administration, not just in publicly backing you but also providing the help you need. I feel like I have that at New Mexico."
In return, New Mexico has a winning basketball team and one very happy coach. We'll see if things turn out as well at the place Alford left behind.

On to the rest of the Bag ...

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This is why I'm no fan of Seth Davis.

There are factual errors galore in that explanation, and many more errors of omission to strengthen Davis' mediocre (at best) argument that Alford did a great job in Iowa City given what the program was when he took over.

First of all, Iowa was an NCAA Sweet 16 team the year before Alford arrived on campus. Then, Alford missed the NCAA tournament 5 times in his 8 years at Iowa. The Hawkeyes missed the NCAA tournament 5 times in the 21 years prior to Alford's arrival (behind Lute Olson, George Raveling and Dr. Tom Davis). Iowa had been to five Sweet 16s, including an Elite Eight and a Final Four in the prior 21 years before Alford got there. They've won ONE NCAA tourney game in the 13 years since Alford arrived (including the Lickliter and McCaffery eras). Alford finished in the upper division of the Big Ten three times in his 8 years at Iowa and higher than 4th only once. Iowa finished in the upper division of the Big Ten 16 of the 21 years prior to his arrival and nine times higher than 4th.

In 16 seasons as a Division I head coach, Steve Alford has won a total of four games in the NCAA Division I tourney with only ONE win in the last ten years.

Alford's been a servicable head coach, but Seth Davis is fairly loose with the facts in hyping him up as a coaching pillar.

920/414 Gopher said:

No, scools, that wasn't my point at all. That's why I edited my post and added that last sentence...to avoid being accused of being overly Pro-Tubby. I'm arguing that a lot of people's eyes got a little too big when they found out that a coach with a national championship was coming to coach the Gophers. Admittedly, I am one of those people. I'm not arguing that we should have little to no expectations because of past mediocrity, I'm arguing that maybe our expectations were/are a bit too high for Tubby. As Seth Davis talks about in his article, blame for Iowa's (in our case, Minnesota's) problems can't all be placed on the coach, but that's where most of the blame is placed when a team struggles.

Regardless, our young team showed what it can be tonight. We just have to learn how to close games and how to play with poise and confidence as a group. Things should be better next year. If they're not, I'm willing to agree that Tubby will have fallen short of expectations. But with the player attrition and injuries we've had over the past couple years, it's been tough for me to hold my expectations at a consistently high level.

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