Fair enough point and maybe those weren't the best examples because K and Calipari are good coaches, though Cal seems to be slipping. Closer to home, look at Stanford. Good recruiting, consistently underperforms that talent miserably. And while USC has had a couple of runs under Enfield, they've been outcoached and beat in the first round two years running and that wasn't because of the vagaries of tournament play. Would we like to have had their level of success lately? Sure. But they've underperformed their talent most years.dimitrig said:bluesaxe said:If college basketball was only about recruiting Kentucky, Duke and USC would still be in the tournament.dimitrig said:sluggo said:Yes. It has been everything with Fox. Literally everything except getting his players to play hard. And I think you are right the coach needs to do it all. He has recruit well enough to give his team a chance, and he has to beat teams with similar or even slightly better talent. If you watched Cronin at UCLA, by far the best coach in the conference, the talent is good but not overwhelming. But he has molded his team in an amazing way. I want Cal's version of Cronin.tequila4kapp said:Fox' main failing has been everything. Literally everything.dimitrig said:Sure. I guess my point is that I don't want a coach who is good at X's and O's but who can't recruit. Fox's main failing has been at recruiting. Yes, his offense sucks, too, but no coach is going to win big with the roster Fox assembled.calumnus said:Of course he would have done better if he could recruit, but the reason he can't recruit is because of who he is. Kids with other options just don't want to play for him.dimitrig said:It's all about recruiting in basketball. Not just highly rated recruits but recruiting for need and balance.sluggo said:My last report on Pasternack, FWIW, and I have been more impressed with every game. I was only able to watch the first half because of work, but I discount them not having the legs for a whole game against Baylor. In the first half they played Baylor even with very good ball movement and passing. They had to scramble, so it was not so much fancy strategy, but rather confidently working for a good shot, which they got almost every time down floor. I still think they gave up too many easy baskets because they should not have been playing pressure man-to-man. I hope Pasternack mixes it up on D if he comes to Cal, though I sort of doubt he will. I care more about offense anyway.sluggo said:Watched the final against Fullerton. Pasternack very much out coached the Fullerton coach. Fullerton had the quickness advantage so UCSB had to work a little harder on offense than against UCR, and they showed more. They had some secondary actions and some nice screens to free up their best shooter Wishart. On defense they forced Fullerton into mostly tough shots, though Fullerton had no offensive cohesion, maybe because they were tired. While they only won by 10, it felt like they were in control the whole time.sluggo said:
So I watched UCSB beat UCR 92-87 last night. I think the game answered some questions about Pasternack and raised some others. I realize it was only one game, and I hope to learn more today and in the NCAA tournament if UCSB wins today.
Offense: A critique of Pasternack was that his teams played at a slow pace and did not take many 3s. In this game they did not run the ball up, but they attacked immediately. And they shot every open 3 and went 8 for 15. So neither was an issue, at least last night. They shot 57% overall. The team shared the ball and had good spacing. For those like me who like structure, they had one early action, which they did well, then it was mostly one-on-one with on ball screening and little off the ball. Which is typical, but not great. It will be interesting if they have more against better competition.
Defense: Cal constantly hiring "great" defensive coaches has made me not care so much about defense. But UCSB's defense was bad. Over helping to give up easy 3s, under helping and allowing easy shots around the basket, constant, stupid fouling to keep UCR in the game. I also did not like that they hedged and recovered on every pick-and-roll. So the offense knew exactly what they would do and could attack it. If you are bad at aggressive man-to-man, you should play something else. I understand why UCSB is lowly ranked defensively.
Players: I really liked Norris, a forward with a face up game, and Pierre-Louis, an ultra quick guard who does not shoot great. Both are seniors and could maybe come as grad transfers. The announcers could not stop talking about sophomore Ajay Mitchell. He is a good player, a left-handed combo guard who can finish with either hand. But he is not great. He is a career 30% shooter from 3 and just an okay athlete. Of course Cal would take him, and he is an upgrade over Askew, but not by as much as I would have thought.
Overall: I like UCR's coach Magpayo. Pasternack? There are reasons to hire him but they are not on the basketball side.
Mitchell did a good job getting to the basket, and he is a great finisher. But he struggled defensively with the quickness of the Fullerton guards. I don't think his skills would translate to the PAC like some think they would.
It will be interesting to see what they do in the tournament.
I was wondering how much Mitchell would or could pick it up against better opponents, and he did. Baylor had one guy on him and a second guy cutting off his drive. Mitchell showed great vision, consistently opening up their defense with his passing. He had many hockey assists if that was a stat in hoops. He was 0-2 on 3s and did not hit a jumper while I was watching. That is something to work on.
Saw a little of Kennesaw State and their coach Amir Abdur-Rahim. Too bad they got done by the refs, they played incredibly well. After three coaches in a row at Cal where screens were more like dance moves than basketball plays, it was nice to see Kennesaw's players repeatedly stick Xavier's players. AAR had his team fired up but playing smart. And there is just some "it" factor about him.
I could see AAR, Magpayo, and yes, Pasternack leading Cal to a much better place. Others too who I don't know about.
I will take any competent coach if he can recruit.
I think even Fox would have been able to accomplish more if he had been bringing in the horses. The ceiling was low as we saw at Georgia, but it would not have been as miserable as these last two seasons if Fox or someone on his staff had been able to recruit. Not only did Fox not bring anyone of note in, but he lost the guys he had been given.
Can Pasternack recruit to Cal?
Also, I disagree with the sentiment about recruiting being the be all end all in college hoops. It is massively important, but so is coaching chops, so is having the trust and respect your players, so is donor/alumni relations, etc. There's a reason the head coach gets paid the most - he needs to nail all aspects of the job; there's a reason why assistant coaches that are primarily responsible for recruiting get paid less - it is merely one element of the HC job.
Are you kidding me?
UCLA's 2022 class had a 5 star and 4 stars. 2023 has a 5 star and 2 4 stars.
2021: 1 5 star and 1 4 star
2020: 1 4 stars
2019: 1 4 star
2018: 1 5 star and 4 4 stars
Of course this isn't all Cronin's doing as he wasn't even the coach until 2019.
College basketball is about recruiting.
Not every player needs to be a 5 star player, but if the coach can't bring in good players the program is doomed.
Kentucky and Duke have 17 Final Four appearances each.
The Tourney is single elimination and anything can happen, but hoping you luck into a Final Four is not a strategy.
The point really is that there have been a lot of teams with top level talent that never did much with it because the coaching side wasn't good enough. If I have to choose between a guy who can only recruit and a guy who can only coach, I probably go with recruiting, because there's at least a chance of reaching Lavin level success. But what I want is either someone good at both or someone who is good at one and recognizes the need to hire someone good to fill the other role.