Jim Rose & the demise of UNL

[basketballjones]

I tried to stay away from this thread…. 
 

But honestly, he’s not “wrong.” I’m not a Jim Rose fan at all, but there’s pretty clear evidence that, especially the football team, went away from what was working before any type of true failure showed they had to. Solich literally had one bad season, and followed the next up with a 10-3 season. Needed to make some changes, sure, but Nebraska got caught thinking they needed to chase national recruits and be amongst the top of the Rivals rankings. We thought we had to act like USC, Miami, Texas, etc… to win like them. When that was never the case or foundation to our success. 
 

The foundation of NU’s success has always been “500 mile radius” guys who redshirted, developed, and played as redshirt juniors and seniors, mixed with national level recruits to take us to the next level. 
 

Both programs have got caught in a cycle of thinking there’s only one way to be successful, and that’s by having 4-5 star guys. Sure - the data has shown if you want to be in the Final Four football and basketball teams you have to have those types of guys… but we’re not even remotely close to that in either program. 
 

NU athletics used to be founded upon high quality development from the ground up, execution, and accountability. But in the early 2000s NU leaders thought we had to go in a different direction and tried to take the easy/lazy way out of focusing purely on the “star” quality. And it’s clearly failed because not only did they never get the stars others did, they also didn’t get or develop the local talent. 
 

So, not a huge fan of JR, but I think if you’re looking at this objectively, he’s not entirely wrong in his diagnosis and there’s truth in what he’s saying. 

Edited May 8, 2022 by basketballjones

[Handy Johnson]

9 hours ago, basketballjones said:

I tried to stay away from this thread…. 
 

But honestly, he’s not “wrong.” I’m not a Jim Rose fan at all, but there’s pretty clear evidence that, especially the football team, went away from what was working before any type of true failure showed they had to. Solich literally had one bad season, and followed the next up with a 10-3 season. Needed to make some changes, sure, but Nebraska got caught thinking they needed to chase national recruits and be amongst the top of the Rivals rankings. We thought we had to act like USC, Miami, Texas, etc… to win like them. When that was never the case or foundation to our success. 
 

The foundation of NU’s success has always been “500 mile radius” guys who redshirted, developed, and played as redshirt juniors and seniors, mixed with national level recruits to take us to the next level. 
 

Both programs have got caught in a cycle of thinking there’s only one way to be successful, and that’s by having 4-5 star guys. Sure - the data has shown if you want to be in the Final Four football and basketball teams you have to have those types of guys… but we’re not even remotely close to that in either program. 
 

NU athletics used to be founded upon high quality development from the ground up, execution, and accountability. But in the early 2000s NU leaders thought we had to go in a different direction and tried to take the easy/lazy way out of focusing purely on the “star” quality. And it’s clearly failed because not only did they never get the stars others did, they also didn’t get or develop the local talent. 
 

So, not a huge fan of JR, but I think if you’re looking at this objectively, he’s not entirely wrong in his diagnosis and there’s truth in what he’s saying. 

For every Ben Stille & Garret Nelson on the team, you don’t win unless you have players like Suh, Burkhead & Gregory…

[basketballjones]

31 minutes ago, Handy Johnson said:

For every Ben Stille & Garret Nelson on the team, you don’t win unless you have players like Suh, Burkhead & Gregory…

Are you agreeing with me or trying to make a point? Because You’re not making any point I didn’t already acknowledge. 

[huskerbill85]

Another old guy who lives in the past. Bo's best teams were with Callahan players, Miles put together some of Nebrasketball's best seasons. The problem with those guys were they were limited coaches. Keeping instate talent is nice but NIL is the way of the future on paper the school has done a great job at it so far. Now can Frost/Hoiberg execute? That's where the issue lays.

[Handy Johnson]

1 hour ago, basketballjones said:

Are you agreeing with me or trying to make a point? Because You’re not making any point I didn’t already acknowledge. 

Ideally it’s a combination of BOTH, but the point I’m making is unless you have some NFL guys on the roster (regardless of where they’re from) you’re not going to be very good… Look at the lack of All-Conference let alone All-American players we’ve had under Riley/Frost…

[basketballjones]

9 hours ago, huskerbill85 said:

Another old guy who lives in the past. Bo's best teams were with Callahan players, Miles put together some of Nebrasketball's best seasons. The problem with those guys were they were limited coaches. Keeping instate talent is nice but NIL is the way of the future on paper the school has done a great job at it so far. Now can Frost/Hoiberg execute? That's where the issue lays.

Bo was doing things much closer to the correct way, in the way I was describing, than Callahan. The revisionist history on Tim Miles's coaching career here is fascinating. He finished 10th, 4th, 12th, 11th, T-12th, T-4th, and 13th in the conference. You take away one of those "good" years and it's easily considered a massive failure. 

NIL is the way of the future for whom? It is not, at all, going to be the wild wild west like this for long - there's just no way. And even if it is, once the SEC school's and other major players operations catch up it's once again over for everyone else. 

[basketballjones]

9 hours ago, Handy Johnson said:

Ideally it’s a combination of BOTH

I literally said that in the post. 

[Handy Johnson]

7 minutes ago, basketballjones said:

I literally said that in the post. 

You certainly did, but my point followed that. We simply haven’t had enough GOOD players. Rose takes an overarching FALSE narrative that we’ve been “bad” for 20 years (we haven’t) then plays into the rampant provincialism around here that if we just had a few more Nebraska kids ALL would be right with the World…

[uneblinstu]

1 hour ago, basketballjones said:

Bo was doing things much closer to the correct way, in the way I was describing, than Callahan. The revisionist history on Tim Miles's coaching career here is fascinating. He finished 10th, 4th, 12th, 11th, T-12th, T-4th, and 13th in the conference. You take away one of those "good" years and it's easily considered a massive failure. 

NIL is the way of the future for whom? It is not, at all, going to be the wild wild west like this for long - there's just no way. And even if it is, once the SEC school's and other major players operations catch up it's once again over for everyone else. 

OR you keep both and say he had the two best seasons the program had this century. 

[kldm64]

On 5/5/2022 at 11:58 AM, Cazzie22 said:

The football landscape is vastly different from the glory days.  Nebraska should expect to “compete” every year for the B1G West Title in FB and on occasion maybe win a B1G Championship.  In BB we should expect to be competitive most seasons and eventually win a NCAA Tournament game or two.  

 

Don't disagree with you but even more shows you have bad the football team is when it can't even be competitive in the West Division which is a cupcake.  NU fans bitch when we have to play Ohio State and Michigan in the same season cause the schedule is to hard.  Image being in the East division where lower end teams have to run play Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan St and Penn State every year?   We got a gift being in the West and still can't compete which is even more sad.

[basketballjones]

39 minutes ago, uneblinstu said:

OR you keep both and say he had the two best seasons the program had this century. 

OR you keep both and say he flopped and lost the locker room on the two best teams we've had this century. Or didn't recruit a full roster either. 

[huskerbill85]

4 hours ago, basketballjones said:

Bo was doing things much closer to the correct way, in the way I was describing, than Callahan. The revisionist history on Tim Miles's coaching career here is fascinating. He finished 10th, 4th, 12th, 11th, T-12th, T-4th, and 13th in the conference. You take away one of those "good" years and it's easily considered a massive failure. 

NIL is the way of the future for whom? It is not, at all, going to be the wild wild west like this for long - there's just no way. And even if it is, once the SEC school's and other major players operations catch up it's once again over for everyone else. 

I'm not a Tim Miles fan but getting this program to the tournament,  winning 22 games one year, getting to the NIT is an accomplishment for this program. I'm not sure people realize how poor of a basketball school Nebraska is.

 

As for NIL not being a way of the future this just shows outdated thinking. Players are now getting paid. That's  not going away.

[basketballjones]

3 minutes ago, huskerbill85 said:

As for NIL not being a way of the future this just shows outdated thinking. Players are now getting paid. That's  not going away.

In what way does it show outdated thinking to posit that there's no way it will remain the wild, wild, west that it currently is? That seems blatantly obvious. Nebraska has a distinct first-mover advantage in this arena, hence why we are having major success with NIL so far (Football anyways). Others are going to catch up, very soon. We beat Texas for Oshaun because their operation is effectively not up and running yet (along with our staff building great relationships and our school showing how we will support the young man). 

This won't always be the case. Hence why "program building," will always be more important for NU than "team building," from year to year. 

[uneblinstu]

4 hours ago, basketballjones said:

OR you keep both and say he flopped and lost the locker room on the two best teams we've had this century. Or didn't recruit a full roster either. 

You can frame the Miles era in any number of ways so figure whatever argument you want to make. 

[TheGov21]

I'm not buying the whole reason why Nebraska football struggles is because we can't keep instate players here. For the most part they get them. Recently the Omaha kids are leaving but that was mainly because Frost chose not to recruit them and they want to go to winning programs.

 

 

Now I will give you that basketball has had more misses not getting guys, but it's not like they weren't trying. They wanted Matt Hill but he chose Texas. They wanted Akoy but he went to Louisville. They wanted Gessell but he went to Iowa. They wanted Hunter and Chucky but they went to Gonzaga and Wisconsin. They wanted Baylor to come here but he chose Creighton. 

 

The problem with missing out on elite local talent is that the program isn't good. Why would you want to come to Nebraska if you could go to Gonzaga, Louisville, Texas or Wisconsin? Those teams are competing to go to Final Fours were Nebraska is just hoping to sneak into the tournament. 

[HuscurAdam]

8 minutes ago, TheGov21 said:

They wanted Gessell but he went to Iowa.

 

Gessell has made it clear he wanted to come here but Doc didn't recruit him.  

[HuscurAdam]

On 5/9/2022 at 9:32 AM, uneblinstu said:

OR you keep both and say he had the two best seasons the program had this century. 

 

OR you keep all 7 and say Miles made one NCAA tourney and had five bottom-4 finishes in 7 years.  I loved the guy, but that's just not good enough.

[TheGov21]

6 minutes ago, HuscurAdam said:

 

Gessell has made it clear he wanted to come here but Doc didn't recruit him.  

 

I was a little iffy on him when I wrote it, but just ran with it

[uneblinstu]

56 minutes ago, HuscurAdam said:

 

OR you keep all 7 and say Miles made one NCAA tourney and had five bottom-4 finishes in 7 years.  I loved the guy, but that's just not good enough.

Sure, that's another one. There are more ways to frame his tenure here than you'll find at Hobby Lobby.

[Norm Peterson]

2 hours ago, HuscurAdam said:

Gessell has made it clear he wanted to come here but Doc didn't recruit him.  

 

 

WHAAAAAT?!?

 

This is historical revisionism.

 

We were in a pitched battle for Gesell. He went to Iowa because he wanted to go to Iowa, not because Nebraska wasn't after him.

[Huskerpapa]

44 minutes ago, Norm Peterson said:

 

 

WHAAAAAT?!?

 

This is historical revisionism.

 

We were in a pitched battle for Gesell. He went to Iowa because he wanted to go to Iowa, not because Nebraska wasn't after him.

I thought basement posters played a major role???