Norm Peterson

Has anyone heard anything about Derrick Walker? The only thing I've seen was a kind of cryptic tweet from Robin Washut saying it was a medical issue and that Hoiberg declined to elaborate. Oddly quiet on that front so maybe we can assume it was no big deal and maybe a precautionary, game-time thing. No reason to risk exacerbating anything during an exhibition that doesn't count, right? OR maybe I've just been oblivious to the discussion, and someone posted about it somewhere else. If it's been posted somewhere else, I apologize.

I don't like calling for the coach's head before the start of the season either. But I absolutely detest watching the slow-motion train wreck of a team falling apart on an about-to-be-fired coach because half of them have given up hope of saving the guy's job and the other half are trying too hard to make up for everyone else. I don't know how this season will turn out. It is certainly possible this whole discussion will be rendered moot by virtue of the fact that Hoiberg turns things around and gets things going the right way. He could still save his job. I don't think the die is cast yet. But if, by mid-January, it's clear not enough progress has been made, the merciful thing for everyone involved might be to just pull the trigger and get it over with. Let an interim finish the season. Let the guys hit the reset button and play for pride. And give the fans something hopeful to talk about.

Very fair question. I'll try to give you an answer that rises to the level of the question. Watching a lame duck coach, who's sure to be fired, flounder as the season moves along is PAINFUL. It's painful to the fans; it's painful to the players; it's painful, I'm sure, to the staff. It would be better to put things out of our collective misery by firing a coach who's gonna get canned anyway and replace him with an interim than to watch half the players give up and the other half try too hard to make the hero plays that would somehow save the season or save the coach. An interim coach sets a sort of reset button. Instead of agonizing about the diagnosis, you have the diagnosis and can move forward. It allows the players to play for something new. We might not be able to salvage a winning season, maybe not save the coach's job, but we can salvage some self-respect. I think you see that with the football team. And a mid-season coaching change also allows you to get a jump on who the available coaching prospects will be and send out feelers to see who might or might not be interested so you can focus your search when the season concludes. I'm not saying they will or won't fire Hoiberg. But if it becomes manifestly apparent that the end is nigh, and he's just marking time until the hammer drops, and the product on the floor becomes unbearable to watch because of the level of futility the players feel about the situation, then I'd say drop the hammer.

Happy Halloween!

Those poor Irish.

Our former head coach getting some Halloween love.

It's entirely possible -- perhaps even likely -- that his people weren't fully forthcoming with our people about the current status of his condition until he was actually being evaluated by our people. Let's just say our folks didn't drop the ball on this one.

Who would it be if you're not a betting man?

Well, who are our best three players? Who on our team would be in contention for a roster spot at Creighton? Or any other high major program? I remember a year when Tim Miles said he had 4 guys who anyone else in the league would take. And not just take but would have probably started for at least half of the Big Ten. Do we have anyone who would start at any other Big Ten program? If so, who?

Well, fortunately, we landed a stellar 2023 recruiting cla ...

I've been rethinking this. I think there's more to the equation than just a willingness to fire a coach mid-season. They didn't wait till the buyout went down substantially. Must have therefore had *significant* motivation. Recently-released metrics indicate there was a very low bar to keep his job and reinstate his $5 mill salary. Chances are they lose to OU regardless, so ... Did they not want to risk him beating Indiana as his last game before firing him? Could they have fired him IU game-day morning? Probably couldn't have done that. Rumors swirling about a turbulent life off the field may be the difference between a coach who gets to finish a season and a coach who does not? Does this save Hoiberg, hypothetically? Problem is now this: Firing Frost after game 3 instead of waiting until the buyout goes down puts you in a new predicament: Mickey Joseph having success. If MJ picks up home wins against Illinois and Minnesota and then either Wisconsin or Iowa to finish the season, he'll have six wins -- Frost's metric. How do you not hire him permanently at that point? Does the ND win count for bowl eligibility? If he gets bowl eligible ... Rumors I've heard, though, they aren't looking at Joseph. Is this incorrect? Would they consider MJ? If you intend to fire Frost, but don't want to permanently hire any of the potential interim candidates, Game Theory, or whatever strategic concept you'd employ, would suggest the following: Let Frost stay on and lose to OU. Fire him either before or after the IU game (probable loss) and save the difference in buyout $$$. His interim would then not have enough season left to right the ship and get bowl-eligible; saves you the PR problem of not appearing to give the interim guy a chance. Go after whoever you want at the end of the season. Can we reasonably, logically infer, therefore, that Trev is open to hiring MJ if we earn a bowl invite? Can we also reasonably, logically infer, therefore, that there was much more than a losing record involved in the decision to terminate Frost early? There were some good reasons to wait even if he was doing poorly, and they did not. And, how this applies to Hoiberg is that it seems reasonable to conclude that there's not likely to be a mid-season coaching change in hoops even if we seem headed for another 7-10 win season.

So, @49r, just for shits and giggles, can you include North Texas and Wyoming in your weekly updates? I mean, just y'know for comparative purposes as we progress through the season. "Here's how a couple of other random schools just happen to be doing during this same season." That kind of thing.

True, but the difference between last place and where they finished isn't significant enough to justify paying someone else double what I would take to obtain basically the same results. I feel I've been discriminated against. What, because MY grand dad was a farmer and not the 2nd worst coach in Husker hoops history? That makes him better? Psh. Not buyin' it.

OK, I did my own digging on Kenpom's end-of-year standings. 2017 -- 320th 2018 -- 146th 2019 -- 158th 2020 -- 77th 2021 -- 72nd 2022 -- 57th 2023 -- projected 67th Wow. That's pretty consistent improvement over the years for the Mean Green. Interestingly, their current coach took over, well, the year AFTER they went 8-22 and finished 320th in the Kenpom rankings. So, his first season, they jumped from 320th to 146th. Their coach's name is Grant McCasland, in case anyone is interested. That's kind of neither-here-nor-there. The discussion is about Kenpom rankings. And, as an aside, I guess I would just say it would be cool if he could accomplish the same kind of trajectory at a bigger school in a major conference, like Nebraska for instance.

This Kenpom thing. It's not based on gut feeling or personal opinion, right? It's like somebody objectively crunching numbers and coming up with a system that weighs the stats that his research into those stats indicate matter. Right? For no particular reason, can anyone like @49r look up historically where the North Texas Mean Green has been ranked in Kenpom over the last 5-6 years? Just curious. Apropos of nothing in particular. Except Kenpom, obviously. Since this is a Kenpom thread and I want to keep things topical.

I promise you this: I could have easily -- EASILY -- led Nebraska to last place finishes in conference the last three years and I would have been willing to do it for HALF of what they paid Fred Hoiberg.

That seems awfully personal, jimmy. But, yes, and it was glorious.

Once bit, twice shy.

Every now and then, a player comes along who turns out to be special when you weren't really expecting it. A lot better than you thought. A lot better than anyone thought. And, as a result, the team does better on the season than anyone expected. Sometimes it's a total newcomer who was way under the radar; sometimes it's a vet who's been around awhile and it just never clicked before and, all of a sudden, boom, he becomes a world beater. A few years ago, that guy was James Palmer, Jr., who was far better than probably anyone had any right to expect. Before him, it was Terran Petteway. For this team to climb out of the cellar this year, I am convinced that at least ONE of our guys is going to have to have a special year. ONE of our guys is going to have to be way better than we thought he'd be. A guy that opposing teams are forced to game-plan around. A guy that could carry the team. A guy that will challenge for All-Conference honors. Many of us think our roster is composed of a bunch of role players with very little star power. Do we have a star this year? If so, who is that guy going to be? And, throw this in there as well, will he be good enough to win us some games we weren't supposed to win? Thoughts?

And those four teams are ranked #351, #330, #361, and #227.

Just thinking about this today. 1. To what degree is style-of-play going to be influenced by personnel? We have people pointing out maybe low scoring games might be in our best interest. They may be right. 2. Who's going to get the buckets? CJ is enough of a sharpshooter to spread the floor but it's always nice to have a guy who can attack the glass and draw in the defenders so that a guy like CJ can find an open look. Do we have a guy who can drive effectively? Where are the points going to come from? 3. So, it looks like Sam will run point. Derrick made his living on the P&R. How good is Sam at setting up a guy like Derrick for the P&R? Because Derrick isn't creating his own shots. 4. Will we have an identity? If so, what? 5. Will we finally have a group of players more concerned with team than individual success?

Well, yeah, and "literally" literally means "in actual fact," but people often use it to mean something emphatically figurative. Similarly, while "metric" means "quantifiable measure," there were still aspects of the "metric" for Frost that weren't quantifiable, i.e., "show ... improvement." And, yes, there was some conflating. But I suspect the line was the same for both. In other words, do these things and you get your compensation back; don't do them and you're done.

Heat on Hoiberg after 3 straight 20-loss seasons at Nebraska (3newsnow.com)

I think, at a minimum, he should have to get a post-season invite and be top 10 in the Big Ten. And that's not asking a lot. Unless we're just giving him a pass on the first three seasons and hitting a reset button that says, for some reason, we believe in you and think you'll get it done here so we'll give you more leeway than we've given any prior coaching staff and let you start over in year 4. But, to say you'll keep him even if he doesn't produce a single winning record in his first four years here, provided you get close to a break-even record this time and the team shows improvement, would be an unacceptably low bar in my opinion.

USA Today apparently won a thing under the Freedom of Information Act to get the metrics of what Scott Frost needed to do to get back his $5 million/year salary AND a 1-year extension. Apparently, it was put in writing when his contract was redrafted. HOWEVER, Fred Hoiberg's metrics were not put in writing, so USA Today didn't get those. Frost's metrics were that he had to show improvement, win six games, and get to a bowl game. That seems like a very modest objective for him to have to achieve in year 5. What's your best guess on what Hoiberg would need to do? If his metrics had been reduced to writing, what do you supposed they would have been? After ruling, Huskers AD publicizes metrics in Scott Frost contract (espn.com)