GoBigRed

To think there will probably still be some scalpers outside PBA trying to unload 2 100 level tickets for like $40 today when you can buy the nose bleeds at the door and proceed to move down to the 4th row without anyone noticing or caring. 

5 minutes ago, hskr4life said:

All this talk about Covid and sickness… I’m sick and unable to go today.  If anyone needs two, let me know.  They’re in the 300 section, but I haven’t been up to the 300’s since before Christmas.  I just sit in the 100’s.

I think we need to stop offering our fellow posters free Nebrasketball tickets. We are just encouraging more sickness amongst us all  I know I've encountered quite a few nauseous stomachs and near-ulcers this season. 

9 minutes ago, jimmykc said:

The main reason we don't have a higher percentage of three-pointers is because we don't get to play against Nebraska's defense.

I'm actually pretty convinced Fred developed a lot of false beliefs in his players' shooting abilities based solely on what they could do against our own defense in practices. As we now know, almost anyone can hit from 3 against us the way we play defense. 

Abdelmassih is like a Monopoly player who buys every property he lands on first until he runs out of money, but he never has a whole set of the same color. What does that get you in the end? A whole bunch of rental payments but no ability to build houses or hotels. 

1 hour ago, Blackshirt83 said:

There's zero reason those guys shouldn't be recruiting too. And they do. At least those two do. But it's not their primary role. Coaching is. Neither of them are on the same level as Abdelsmath as a recruier. And Abdelsmathisn'tanywhereclosetobeingas gooda coach as the other three. We haven't had a recruiter with his connections and ability to get players to come here in decades if ever. My point is regardless of wether you think keeping Fred is the correct move or not, getting rid of Abdelsmath because people want a sacrificial scalp isn't just dumb it would quite possibly be the dumbest thing that this program has ever done.

 

I am disgusted about what I have heard about this program under this staff's care but as much as I would have no real problem if they fired Fred tomorrow and wanted him fired as soon as I listened to our Sr. PG speak, I am actually now hoping he get another year, not because I have any faith Hoiberg is capable of turning things around I actually think the rest of this staff could. If someone from the Athletic department steps up and empowers them to do it. 

 

And if things don't improve enough at least you have shaved a bit off Hoiberg's deal and can try to bring in an actual capable head coach who might be willing to keep these assistants here, or at least one or two of them. 

say it with me:

Ab   del    mass   ih

Ab   del    mass   ih

Abdel   massih

Abdelmassih

1 minute ago, thrasher31 said:

This one was extremely shocking to see in writing, but not all that shocking when you think about it. 

That is crazy to start 19 games, average 23 minutes per game, and not hit double figures scoring until game 19. 

If we go 0-20, and we don’t make a change, the question becomes does Trev go full honesty mode and say “look, we can’t make a change because we can’t afford it to thanks to the previous athletic director. Ideally we would make a change but we aren’t in position to do so financially.”

how else do you spin 0-20 to the fanbase? Seeing progress? Trying hard? Young talented players returning?
 

What an unfortunate financial disaster Moos put us in. Fred makes more money than Scott Drew. 
 

If Trev is planning to bring him back another year only because he has no alternative, he’s probably begging for some wins soon to not have to sell people on 0-20 or 1-19. 

Have you ever seen a bench more confident that a 3 on the way is going in from a 27% shooter than they are for Lat Mayen?

4 hours ago, GoBigFred said:

That’s a good thought. 
 

However I will assume our game plan will be to let Davison and Davis combine for about 10 made threes tonight, and we’ll allow Chucky Hepburn to surpass his season high of 15 points. 

Update: Hepburn with 9 points on pace to break his career high of 15.

Davison and Davis combined for 5 threes (all Davison of course). On pace for 10 made threes. 

Nice play design there at the end. Props to Fred for drawing up a good one.

However, no props to Fred for continuing to play the same trash turnover-prone players who continue to screw up good situations they get put in time after time. 

43 minutes ago, hhcmatt said:

Probably a pretty big blow for a team that doesn't play a lot of bench minutes.

I'd say we absolutely want to make Ben Carlson have to score double digits to beat us.

 

 

That’s a good thought. 
 

However I will assume our game plan will be to let Davison and Davis combine for about 10 made threes tonight, and we’ll allow Chucky Hepburn to surpass his season high of 15 points. 

If Matt thinks the talented players we are bringing in are 0-8, then I wonder what our record would be if the players he recruited from out of state weren’t talented. 
 

or perhaps he’s passing the blame for our record onto someone else.
 

To tie it back to Nebraska basketball, I fully expect if and when we do ever get our first NCAA Tournament win, it will later be vacated on a technicality. 

"This is the best recruiting class in program history!"   to 

"This is the worst team in program history."   in just 3 months is so Nebrasketball.

According to RealTimeRPI our best win is over Southern and it isn't really close. 

18 hours ago, NUdiehard said:

 

For me, this is the wrong standard to assess.  The question is not can a different coach win 4 games in the BIG rather than 2 (or 0 or whatever).  The question is can the coach take this program to a point that it is a semi-regular contender for the NCAA tourney and occasionally wins a game or two in the tourney.  That is the standard that any coach should be measured by.   I will happily trade these 3 crappy, crappy seasons if in years 5 and 6 Fred has a NCAA tourney level team and therefore a foundation to keep that rolling into the future.  Heck, I will even sacrifice next year again if we can reach that point in year 5.  Maybe its because I have been doing this for 45 years now that whether its 2 conference wins or 7 conference wins if its not ever resulting in the NCAA or at least high level NIT then what's really the difference?   Sure, watching a 7 win team is better than a 4 win team, but either way NU is playing day 1 in the B1G tourney and not even sniffing NCAA tourney.  

 

The past 3 years are now a sunk cost.  Keeping or firing Fred will not change that.  The question is what/who gives NU the best chance of being a tourney level team by year 2024.  I will roll the dice on Fred because he has proven he can do it while coaching in a power 5 conference.  He may need to make some adjustments to his staff, recruiting philosophy, scheme, etc., to adjust to Nebraska and the B1G.  Fine.  Give him time and see what he does.  If NU is still at the bottom of the B1G after year 5 then he is a goner and we can play this charade all over again with some no-name mid-major coach.

 

The logic of many is confusing IMO.  Here are the facts:

 

1.  Fred Hoiberg -  coached a power 5 school for 5 years (prior to NU) and went to the NCAA tourney 4 of those 5 years and the sweet 16 in one of those years.

 

2. Nebraska basketball program - Has only been to 1 NCAA tourney in the last 20 years (despite 4 different coaches) and has NEVER won a single game in the NCAA tourney.

 

3. CONCLUSION of the masses - the problem clearly lies with Fred and not the Nebraska program. 

 

Uh, OK. 

So we should keep Hoiberg because he had success at a different school from 2010-15 (6-10 years ago)?

Hoiberg is 20-58 (.256) in year 3 at Nebraska.

Miles was 47-49 (.490) after 3 years at Nebraska with an NCAA Tournament appearance.

Doc was 55-40 (.579) after 3 years at Nebraska with two NIT appearances.

Barry Collier was 38-50 (.432) after 3 years at Nebraska.

Danny Nee was 51-46 (.526) after 3 years at Nebraska with an NIT third place. 

If we went 12-0 to finish the regular season, Hoiberg would still have a much worse winning percentage (.356) than Barry Collier after 3 years.

Is Nebrasketball a historically bad program? Sure. But is it historically a 25% winning percentage program that is always dead last in the conference? No way. Hoiberg has taken us to extreme new lows. You act like he's just doing what all the other coaches before him did. No. At least they had some mediocre success at some points. 

At what point does current job performance outweigh something you did 6-10 years ago at your job? Can you be completely failing at your job for three years and embarrassing your company left and right but just go up to your boss and say "but hey, remember when I was so good 6 years ago? Remember that. I can do it again. I promise. Even though I haven't come remotely close to anything resembling that success in 2.5 years here, I can still do it." 

I was excited when we landed Fred based on his previous success at ISU. But here we are on the back half of the 3rd season and what I see with my eyes is a terrible basketball team with a terrible record and a 9 man rotation that will probably have 6 of them leaving after this year. 

3 hours ago, Chuck Taylor said:

I'm with you completely except for Hansen. He's terrible, doesn't coach defense and doesn't run a structured offense. He's cheap to keep, though, and they have a lot of financial issues.

For the record, I wouldn't want Hansen. My point is, if he were head coach of this team, do I think they would have more than 6 wins and more than 0 Big Ten wins? Yes. Yes I do.

14 hours ago, NUdiehard said:

Last, if you fire Fred, who are you going to get?  Please spare me the latest hot and up-and-coming coach.  Whoever that is, he ain't coming here.  It was a miracle we got Fred.  Fire him after 3 or 4 years and the already small pool shrinks even further.    

 

I hate this line of thinking so so much. And yet Husker fans just love to say it over and over and over no matter the sport. 

The most successful coach we've had this century was a little known guy from Colorado State. The most well known coach we've had this century is quite possibly the worst head coach in Nebraska basketball history. 

So who are you going to get? Anybody who wants a large paycheck? How will they fare? Who the hell knows, but one thing I do know, I think you could close your eyes and throw a dart at any NCAA Division I mid-major school and take their head coach and that person would certainly at least have us at 0-8 in the Big Ten this season and more than likely would be better than 5-42 in 3 seasons. 

Shoot, Trev could just go ask Derrin Hansen up at UNO to come coach here and we would be better than we are right now. I am not kidding. 

The "who else are you going to get" argument is so pointless when your current head coach is coaching the worst team in a Power 5 conference. 

14 hours ago, NUdiehard said:

So he deserves the chance to prove he can do it here as well, and that means he must have at least 5 years.  The reason I say 5 years is because it is only in the 5th year of a coaches career that the coach has all his players including 4 and 5 year seniors on the roster.  I would say the same for most any coach, and definitely for a proven commodity like Hoiberg. 

 

Every player on this roster was brought here by Fred (brought here by Matt A. I mean). So "getting his own players" excuse is ridiculous. 

And although they haven't spent 4 or 5 years in the program under Fred.....Alonzo Verge, Kobe Webster, Trey McGowens, Lat Mayen and Derrick Walker are all more than experienced enough Division I college basketball players. Fred has plenty to work with, but the team is a joke. What is two more years going to go? I'm pretty confident all those players above will be gone after this year, along with Bryce. Maybe Lat comes back, but that would hurt us more than help us. He's awful.

So we start over next year with the experience of Keisei Tominaga (Jr.), CJ Wilcher (So.), Keon Edwards (So.), Wilhelm Breidenbach (So. coming off a knee injury) and Eduardo Andre (So.). And then a bunch more newcomers who you can use the excuse of "just gotta give them some time, then it will work." That group of potential returning players...I have a hard time believing any one of them would be in the rotation on a top-half Big Ten team next year.  

I have no idea why people are hellbent on just giving more time to develop these players when so far all the players we've had in 3 years Fred has developed into a 5-42 Big Ten team. So you think that magically they're going to develop Keisei, CJ, Keon, Wilhelm and Eduardo into a top half Big Ten team? 

7 hours ago, Blackshirt83 said:

This pisses me off on so many levels. First of all this is jiust another showing that there is a significant amount of ineptitude on this coaching staff.

 

BUT once again it's another complete and total lock, this team is full of guys that don't deserve a single thing they have been given. They don't deserve their scholarships. They don't deserve to wear that laundry or represent this state and university and they sure as hell don't deserve for anyone to pay money or spend time watching them play.

 

I mean excuse me. You need your coach to do that for you? You're a fifth year damn senior, act like it. You shouldn't need your coach to hold you accountable. You shouldn't need your coach to hold your teammates accountable. That's your job. It's your damn team. You're the ones playing.

 

 

This may not be the right time or place, but I heard somewhere on the radio last week I think that all the starters are driving cars that have been given to them.

On 1/14/2022 at 10:53 PM, brfrad said:

We better put faith in Fred right now.  He is not going anywhere for at least 3 years, barring Trev doing the impossible.  Getting Fred to agree to a reworked contract.

 

3 years? You truly believe he gets 3 more years no matter what (if we can’t restructure his contract)? 3 more years of 0-20 to 5-15 conference seasons would be detrimental to ticket sales and attendance and overall interest. Attendance is already bad for Big Ten games against decent opponents. It will only get worse. I completely disagree with that sentiment that we’ll just let him ride out his contract for 3 more years. 
 

that Kobe Webster interview was jarring. The players don’t get along. They don’t trust the coaches. The coaches seemingly don’t care. They run this ship like an NBA program with free agency. 
 

I can definitely see another season. But I think they would need to win at minimum 6-7 conference games next year and finish in the top 10 of the conference to earn a fifth year. 

2 hours ago, Chuck Taylor said:

We won't go 0-20 or even 1-19 because that would make the decision easy. We'll win 2 or 3 in order to fracture the fan base between, "Fire him!" and "He deserves a 4th year and/or we can't afford the buyout." 

Actually we will go 0-20, then we’ll beat Northwestern in the Big Ten 14 vs. 11 game. Then we’ll pull an upset over 6 seed Indiana to make the quarterfinals, where we’ll play the 3 seed and get beat by 20. Then half the fanbase will want to run it back next year.

I don't know what's more embarrassing:

Paying out the largest buyout ever for a basketball coach.

Or bringing back a coach who is about to coach an 0-20 or 1-19 or 2-18 Big Ten Team, in his third season, and waxing poetic about what a great job he's doing and how the future is bright. 

On 1/18/2022 at 12:08 PM, The Polish Rifle said:

If we fired Hoiberg after this year it would be the highest buyout ever for a CBB coach. If fired after next year, it would be tied for the largest buyout ever with Wake/Danny Manning - and significantly larger than next highest buyout. The contract is awful...

Thanks, Bill. 

Just catching up on this thread and my main takeaway is that I laughed, and then I got sad when I realized that I have full confidence Norm Peterson would have this team at least at 6-11 right now. Is it that hard to imagine any one of us could take this group into these 17 games and say "alright guys, go out there and play ball and if you look tired or you're not trying on defense, I'll sub you out for someone who will" and we wouldn't have at least 6 wins? 

Western Illinois

Sam Houston

Idaho State

Southern

Tennessee State

South Dakota

Kennesaw State

Our players should be able to win all 7 of these games with no "system" or "philosophy" or "game plan". If you put our best 10 and any one of these teams' best 10 in a shirts vs. skins game, I have full confidence we beat all of them. Instead we're paying someone millions upon millions to get even less out of them.

When I started this thread on December 4 after the loss at Indiana I was pretty frustrated with how our 5-4 season had gone so far.

Since that day, we are 1-6 with an average margin of defeat of 20.2 points in those 6 losses, and we have the one rousing home win against Kennesaw State. If you had to draw up an absolute bare minimum expectation for the 7 games following the Indiana loss you would probably say 1-6 with an average margin of defeat way smaller than 20 points.

I know, Trey and Wilhelm being out as hurt. Every team deals with shit. No excuse. 
 

On December 4 we had 5 wins and realtimerpi projected us for 10 total. You thought that was bad…now we have 6 wins and our projection is 8. Amazing.

I’m strengthening my stance. I see no hope for this staff’s future here. We are winning anywhere from 0 to 5 Big Ten games this year. Whatever, it’s all the same: horrible. But if Trev isn’t going to base his evaluation of this staff on wins and losses this year (since he called this Year 1 of his evaluation for all our coaches), we will see will he hold true to his word of “I want to see players that play hard and fight and compete (talking about football).”

Because if you do an honest evaluation of this program, the vast majority of the time they do not play hard, fight and compete. They have spurts of it, but a 20.2 ppg margin of defeat is what it is: getting beaten soundly all the time. 
 

It’s very rare to have a complete dogshit Power 5 basketball team and not be able to say “at least we have a bunch of talent returning and/or sitting out on the bench this year.” We don’t have that. We have a shit team that if we are being honest has no real founded source of optimism heading into next year. That’s what is most depressing to me. We have the next 2 months of this to look forward to and then nothing on paper next year to be excited about (and please don’t try and sell me on the optimism of returning a handful of Big Ten role players at best and one big man recruit who has done nothing here. Every Big Ten team has that and more every year.) 

Sorry for the long rant and bumping this thread. It’s just that the reality should be setting in for everyone. We went with quick fix bandaid approach for 3 years and now here we are with a horrible team and even worse, we aren’t building anything.