Mens BB

[Utes 69]

I listened to the Josh Grant podcast, he had a lot of good info, the only thing I disagree with is the statement that Alex Jensen is the only person in the whole wide world to turn the program around! there are several young energized coaches that would fill the roll just fine,

[Minnesota Ute]

By him saying that, I had to conclude that this is already a done deal. Otherwise why go out on that limb dragging the rest of the program with him.

The last thing a prospective new coach wants to hear is a Utah legend saying in essence, any hire that isn’t Alex is a disappointment and will fail. He also was highly critical of Craig for not allowing alumni to ‘help him’. What person would take a high pressure job upon hearing that a bunch of people from the outside are going to tell him how to do his job and if he doesn’t listen he will be fired and summarily excoriated openly in the media.

He also said at one point “If the decision can be announced sooner…”, not decision made, not candidate found, not if the search goes quickly, so…

My conclusion is it’s done, or Josh did us no favors and would have been much better off keeping his trap closed (as much as a love him for some of the best bball watching years of my life).

[Jim Vanderhoof]

You bring some good points Minnesota. I think the biggest disconnect with Smith was recruiting and style of play not actual coaching. You can’t tell me there isn’t any local players the last couple years that aren’t better than Little and Erickson. Smith just recruits talent but some don’t fit his system. The most successful past coaches had a system and recruited players to fill roles in that system. That’s why the turnovers are so high.

[The Miami Ute]

Jim, I always said that if the Utes could find a guy that recruited like Coach K and coached like Smith, they’d be an eternal presence at the Dance. Unfortunately, those guys are extremely hard to find.

[Jim Vanderhoof]

Yes NBA ties matter in recruiting Miami. Coach K had them Smith doesn’t. No point guard and lack of athleticism has been the Achilles heal of Smith. His recruiting and playing style doesn’t fit a P4 conference. Smith should have listened to the past players 4 years ago. If it’s true he rejected Millers offer to help coach he deserves to be fired. How can you refuse help from one of the greatest point guards of all time when that position has been a bust in his tenure?

[Rick]

Jim,
He didn’t even return Miller’s calls offering his services. Smith had an assistant finally return the call after Andre had called a few times over several weeks.

[Jim Vanderhoof]

That’s unbelievable to me. I would have reached out to Andre if I was Smith. My sympathy for Smith is fading fast.

[Tony (admin)]

Wow I didn’t know that. RED FLAG.

[TomahawkCruise]

Yep, to me this is the reason why his firing is justified. He disrespected a Utah legend who was only trying to reach out and help make Smith successful.

The way he handled that was absolutely inexcusable.

That honestly p**sed me off when I heard Grant say that.

[GunthersRevenge]

I agree with some of the comments that it kind of seems like it’s a done deal to hire Jensen. It seems like a major factor in the hiring decision this go around is booster support. Not sure if this is accurate, but lots of talk that the boosters had turned against Smith. In my opinion, not too many candidates would get the boosters and some fans more re-engaged than Jensen, especially if Andre Miller also got brought in as an assistant.

[Jim Vanderhoof]

Jeff Johnson said on DJ and PK that Miller didn’t want to be head coach but wanted to help out. Why wouldn’t you find a spot for him? He is close friends with Jensen. Wouldn’t it be amazing to get both!!

[Minnesota Ute]

I dare say that parts of my anatomy respond favorably to that idea…

[Charlie]

I just got back into the country and restarted a news feed. I can’t believe we have a chance to upgrade our Men’s BB program to Alex Jensen. That and even the possibility that Andre Miller would help out would be almost like having Rick come back. I hope Utah has financial resources to make this all happen.

[Minnesota Ute]

Someone else brought up a good point that as a job at a state university, they have to create the vacancy (aka fire smith) then post the position and interview applicants that are qualified. There may be some EEOC boxes to check as well. I’m not sure how true that is or what the requirements are exactly, but that sounds like it could be the reason that, while it is a done deal, it can’t yet be announced yet.

[Rick]

I am getting really sick and tired of folks on here constantly saying that Larry was a better recruiter and Smith was a better coach. I’m sorry but the numbers just simply do not support that absurd theory. Here are some real numbers:

Larry had 5 20+ win seasons in 10 years, 50%.
Smith had 1 20+ win season in 4 years, 25%
Larry’s overall win percentage was .568 overall and .503 in conference
Smith’s overall win percentage was .512 overall and .395 in conference
Larry had to start and manage the transition from G5 to P5, Smith did not.
Larry made the NCAA tournament twice, getting to the round of 32 once and the Sweet 16 once.
Smith never made the NCAA tournament.
Larry made the NIT 3 times.
Smith made the NIT 1 time.
Larry followed Josh Grant’s key to success by landing local top talent like Jordan Loveridge, David Collette, Rylan Jones, and Brandon Carlson.
Smith did not and also lost our best returning big to our hated rivals down south.
Larry recruited, coached, and put multiple guys into the NBA and they are still in the league.
Smith put Carlson in the league but he was not his recruit.
Larry knew the importance of guards in the college game and had some excellent players during his time here like Delon, Taylor, Van Dyke, Wright, Bonham, Barefield, and Jones.
Smith gave us Worster and Madsen and that is about it unless you want to count Devon who didn’t play a whole season and then left us for St. Johns.

I could keep going but there is absolutely zero objective facts supporting Smith as the better coach than Larry K.
He was not a better coach and he was not even in the ballpark in recruiting. If you want to compare him in a good light, you can pull up Boylen and Ray and you might have a case.

[Minnesota Ute]

I’m not one that wants to die on that hill. All I’ll say is that from my perspective, I thought Larry was a s**tty X’s & O’s coach. Too many times we just looked lost on end of play situations, in-game adjustments were minimal, and rarely did we get good looks off of inbound plays. From what I’ve seen, it seemed like Smith did a better job in these areas and was the main reason why I was hopeful with him. But I just don’t think he ever had the horses to turn that into winning.

That said, he had other issues that drove me crazy, not the least of which is his stupid rotations, turnovers (which I think is related), and poor free throw shooting. Rebounding was decent but not a staple like Majerus, defense was better this year but last year, especially our 3-pt defense, was atrocious.

At the end of the day, I’m glad both are gone and I’m hoping Alex is the second coming of RM.

I would add that with some of the talent he had, I think he would have advanced further in the dance with better coaching.

[The Miami Ute]

Rick, none of what you posted proves that Larry was a better coach or even as good a coach as Smith. All you really did is copy and paste stats. Now, if you’d have thrown some analytics in there, then maybe we could have a conversation. I for sure completely believe that Larry was a better recruiter but a much crappier Xs and Os guy than Smith. How many times, with all the talented guys that Larry had, did we see Utah run the crappiest offensive sets time after time? Sure, he put guys in the NBA but was that due to his coaching prowess or because the individuals were so talented? Now, why do I think Smith is a better coach? Quite simply because he’s been able to make some chicken salad with chicken s**t…if I look at Smith’s teams, the only one that would start in any of Larry’s teams is probably Branden Carlson, and he was a Larry recruit. That’s how much of a talent deficit Smith has, of his own doing, compared to Larry. Again, all of this is my opinion but I’m sticking to it.

[Jim Vanderhoof]

Throw out all the stats, past success, recruiting etc and just focus on the eye test. I’ve been watching Utah basketball since Jack Gardner days. Gardner, Pimm, Foster and Majerus all had players that fit team roles and played team basketball. Role players set picks got rebounds and played solid defense and set up the scorers.

From Majerus to coach K a blur. Coach K had better players than Smith but neither one ever passed the eye test to me. Turnovers, bad defense, bad free throw shooting, lack of continuity on offense and defense. Hard to even watch as a long term BB fan. I 100% agree with Josh Grants assessment of the program.

Who’s the better coach K or coach Smith?
I would say neither.Lets take a vote based on attendance. Utah fans have a high BB IQ. People will come to watch well coached teams and smart BB.

[Rick]

I’m sorry but results are the only stats I care about and if you take away the absolutely dreadful team that Larry inherited from Boylen his first year, Larry’s winning towers over Smith. If winning isn’t the measure than what the hell is? Nerdy, David Locke-esq made up ratios? In college, I look at winning, graduation rates, elevation of players to the next level, and recruiting. Larry beats Smith like a drum on all or almost all (not sure about graduation rates) of those levels. Was Larry perfect, no. Was he the best coach we have had since Majerus, yes. Oh, and by the way, since Majerus is 20 years! Man am I getting old!

Also, if you are better at Xs and Os, then you should probably win more, right? Or is there some kind of consolation prize for coaches like that?

[TruckStopTerrors]

Disagree. I don’t think you can take winning statistics as the be all end all. Coach K was able to recruit talent that Smith couldn’t. I don’t think this is debatable. This is where opinion comes in. I think Smith got more out of the talent he had to work with than Larry did. I do think he was a better X’s and O’s guy.

Neither coach is acceptable if you want a long-term successful program. Larry definitely deserved to get fired just as Smith did. The problem again lies with ultimately ending up with Smith after Larry was fired. I don’t know the ins and outs of how we missed out on AJ the first time around. Grant makes it sound like Harlan screwed it up. Anyway, let’s hope for the best this time around.

[Rick]

That is your opinion. The actual results say otherwise. That is my point. You are basically saying that if Smith was a better recruiter he would have better results. Recruiting is a HUGE part of coaching success in college basketball so Smith had a glaring weakness that contributed to his lack of success. Hypotheticals do not win games. Winning games is the number one job of a coach. If it is something different, please tell me what it is.

[TruckStopTerrors]

You’re looking purely at results and using that as a metric as to why one guy is a better X’s and O’s coach yet ignoring the absolute fact that Larry was a far superior recruiter. There are many bad coaches in basketball in general that are fortunate enough to have a good roster which overshadows how truly bad they are. There are also good coaches that will lose their jobs due to a lack of talent. I don’t understand how you make the leap you did. Context is definitely warranted. Yes, it is the opinion of the majority on this site that Smith is a better coach in terms of system etc but a worse recruiter. You disagree, that’s time. Your argument for disagreeing isn’t a good one however.

[bopahull]

Larry was an improvement over Boylen, but that wasn’t exactly a hard act to follow. He had reasonable success early on but I think he became disheartened when teams like ASU paid players to play, I think Markannen(spc?} switching to ASU in the last minute put him over the top. He seemed to become quite bitter towards college BB after that. He lost a lot of descent players to the transfer portal after that. Larry was never a great Xs and Os coach, he thrived on talent, so when he felt he couldn’t compete with the big boys unless he cheated like they did he went downhill fast.

Craig was an improvement over Larry in the Xs and Os department, but never came close to the recruiting that Larry did. Overall I’d say Larry was more successful but Smith was the better coach. Neither one was the great coach Utah needed to return to greatness.

It will be interesting to see what happens next.

[Minnesota Ute]

Interesting point about Larry being bitter over losing players to cheating programs. I never considered that, but I could see it. You bust your ass sweet talking and sucking up the kid and the parents, you are already fighting a difficult battle to try to get kids to want to come to Utah, then you lose out because some crooked program drops some $$. That would be frustrating, especially when you aren’t the best X&O guy and need that superior talent to compete.

[The Miami Ute]

Personally, I can see Smith getting picked up by a G5 team and once again having success, to include return trips to the NCAAs. He just doesn’t have what it takes to be a consistent winner at a P4 program.

[Fred]

Yep…that’s his niche. Wouldn’t surprise me a bit if he ends up somewhere like the Missouri Valley Conference and does well.

[The Miami Ute]

You never know…Utah State has lost their head coach at the end of the previous two seasons. Right now, they stand at 24-5, even after last night’s blowout loss to Boise State, with another NCAA trip in their future. It wouldn’t surprise me to see Jerrod Calhoun hired away this offseason and Smith make a return trip to Logan. Remember, you heard it here first.

[Fred]

He could have gone anywhere except BYU and Utah and still be a Saint in Logan. But he pretty much left them in the middle of the night and put a very bad taste in some of their mouths. He’s “persona non grata” up north.

[Jim Vanderhoof]

He left the Aggies in a bind. They don’t want him either. He inherited Sam Merrill who plays a lot for the cavaliers and the center that plays for the Celtics. Inheriting two NBA players in the MW will get you to the dance. He has never recruited an NBA caliber player. Maybe one of the Dakota colleges will take him back. He has 4 million coming so he doesn’t need to worry about money for a while.

[The Miami Ute]

$5M is what his buyout is…probably $4M after taxes though.

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