You can be a great fan of more than one program. I have season tickets to 4 different programs. I think the GOPHERS are better than Nevada but that does not mean Pitino is a better coach. Musselman has done a fantastic job so far. Pitino has done a nice job this year but no one would say what he has done so far is fantastic. That does not mean i am not a fan of the program or that i hope Pitino fails because i do not. I just have very high standards for what a great coach gets done . This is a fan base that thinks Jerry Kill did a great job, i think he did ok. People think Clem did a great job i think he harmed the program in a big way. Dutcher, fair to good. Lets see if Pitino gets them to a conference power, that is what great coaches do. Each fan can decide for themselves how to define it. Just because we define things in a different way does not make someone less of a fan. I know several people who give the largest amounts to this program who are not impressed and nationally the perspective from peers his name simply does not surface among coaches. Prove it by continually getting better. HE WILL HAVE THE TEAM IN THE TOURNEY THIS YEAR. And he deserves credit for that but then compete at the top of the conference next year. Instead of assuming that he is great, i will be cheering for it.
With what Jerry Kill inherited, he DID do a great job. And had the health issues not interrupted what he had going on here, my guess is last season would have been a 10-12 win season and recruiting would have continued to improve over previous years and this next season would have been another double digit win season, too. He was building depth and strength, he was getting the program to the point where they could have stopped needing to rebuild and could have instead, started to simply reload. He got players going into the NFL again. He was the most respected Div 1 cfb coach in the business outside of Saban, and if on-field performance wasn't given such importance, he would have been considered THE MOST respected coach in all of football. He would have gotten us to the Big Ten title game and into the Top 10 in the rankings on a regular basis and possibly to the point of beating out the likes of OSU and Michigan and PSU, as well and into the Cfb Playoffs. I believe that if given enough time, another 4-6 years, he may have gotten us a Natl Title.
He inherited a dumpster fire with one of the lowest fb budgets and almost the worst facilities in the conference and DESPITE all of those obstacles, got the team to the point of being able to win 8 games consistently, and was able to beat the likes of Iowa and Nebraska and Wisconsin and was able to keep close to Championship caliber teams like TCU and OSU.
Dutcher also inherited a program that was recovering from a scandal and NCAA sanctions, yet was able to produce one of the greatest lineups in NCAA mens bb history in that 1977 team that went 24-3, and a Big Ten Title team in 82, and Dutcher's teams also produced a sh1tload of NBA players. Had that 1977 team been allowed to compete in the NCAA tourney, that would have helped recruiting a lot and Dutcher may have done more than win that one Big Ten Title in 82.
And no one here is saying that Pitino is a great coach, or that he's done a fantastic job so far.
What people ARE saying, is that he's got recruiting going in the right direction, and now we are seeing the results of that improved recruiting on the court, as the Gophers have gone from worst last year to a projected #7 seed in the NCAA tourney this year.
Pitino's team this year has a Top 25 rating in the RPI, and has a Top 25 ROAD win, 2 Top 50 TRUE ROAD wins, and 3 Top 50 non-home wins.
THIS Pitino has more Top 50 rpi wins (4) than the elder Pitino has with UL. UL is only 3-5 vs Top 50 rated rpi teams so far this season.
THIS Pitino has kept this team from losing a single home game vs a non-Top 50 rated team, and he's kept them from losing a single ROAD game vs a team rated worse than #79 in the rpi.
10 of the 11 Top scorers, rebounders, shot blockers and ball stealers on this team are coming back next season.
And the top 3 scorers, the top 5 rebounders, the top 4 ball stealers and the top 5 shot blockers are all coming back.
That is close to the entire starting lineup. Springs will be missed, obviously, but with the recruiting class we have coming in, the future simply looks frigging awesome.
Oh, and as for Clem, NO ONE HERE thinks Clem didn't harm the program. And no one here is claiming that Clem was a GREAT coach.
He inherited great players from Dutcher, that combined with some good players he brought in, he benefitted from that original group being together for 4 years, growing together, learning how to play together, and finally learning how to win when it mattered most, in March.
But then he had to rebuild, and struggling to do so fast enough after his own team had raised the bar in 1990, he started recruiting head cases and non-students and he started cheating by having someone do their homework for them so as to keep them seemingly eligible. Now granted, those players were entertaining to watch and the 1997 season was a very memorable season for most Gopher fans, and despite that season being stripped from the record books, that doesn't change the fact that it happened and most Gopher fans, if not all Gopher fans, at the time, did really enjoy that season.
All of that said, NO ONE HERE claims Haskins to have been a "great" coach.
All I've done is compare what his teams did in 1989 and 1990 during the regular season with what Pitino's current team is doing during the regular season, so as to see what could be ahead for THIS team come NCAA tournament time.
