Thoughts on '09-'10 Basketball

It’s not Rick-bashing to state the obvious. Barnes’ weakness since he showed up in Austin has been X’s and O’s. Look at the conference championship game leads he has blown, the final four semi-final, and this year’s conference season. The other coaches in this league have figured out his system and he hasn’t adjusted. And watching him on the sidelines is so frustrating, because it doesn’t look like he’s trying to adjust. Barnes needs to answer to that and is he willing to admit he needs to improve?

This team should go to Oz cause they got no brain,no courage and no heart.

As a friend of mine suggested, this is barnes’ “mulligan” year.

then you look down the road to North Carolina who probably won’t even make the tourney and say is Roy Williams that bad?

When I was in high school we had a team that was undefeated and stae ranked.Our point guard got killed in a car accident and the team fell apart.

I don’t know if Ward and Balbay going out hurt that bad but i can’t find any other excuse.

1. IMO, it got to the point where I just didn’t want to see J’Covan & JHam on the floor at the same time. They each started playing in the team philosophy once they weren’t playing together.
2. Until this year, Damion has been more of a support / role player. He took a huge step up and carried this team on both ends. Lottery pick?
3. Bradley’s already a good player who has his moments of greatness. The three J’s all have a ways to go. JHam looks like he could be special in a year or two.
4. Mason’s best game was the last one. He was good on both ends and kept ‘em in the game with his aggressiveness. He did this all year last year and I’m just not sure why he digressed so badly. I thought he was going to be Royal Ivey quality by now.
5. So many shooters left open all year on defense. You’re right – it’s inexcusable. Defense takes intensity and will. Really fearing that this’ll be worse next year. Avery’s the only intense defender coming back on the perimeter.
6. Bad & non-existent point guard play has killed them this year. Really impressed at what Damion did offensively w/out a PG.
7. When’s the last time UT hasn’t had atleast 1 great guard? Been a long time.
8. Fouls = Lazy defense moreso than physical play.
9. Barnes always has a strong rebounding emphasis.

Barnes is still a great coach and he’ll be back. His track record is too consistent to bash. I never saw so much frustration in him before this year. Can you blame him? Damion, Bradley, & Johnson impress, Balbay was a push, but Mason, PIttman, J’Covan, JHam, Jai, Varez, Hill, Wangmene, etc… ALL have disappointing seasons. Very hard to overcome. Never understood the rotation & coach’s doghouse for several but I’d have to give coach the benefit of the doubt. He’s knows ’em better than we do. It worked for Coach Dale in Hoosiers, right?

Barnes has been good as a program builder and a recruiter. I think he teaches basic skills well and he certainly has given us no reason to complain about his personal character or his work ethic. I don’t think he should be fired either. But, he has to improve his in-game coaching. Is he willing to do that? Roy Williams did hit the skids this year, but he has won tournament championships – conference and national titles. Hey, even Penders won a conference tournament. You can’t anoint Barnes a great coach until he starts winning at least conference tourneys.

Uncanny –
We got similar issues with Rick Barnes as we do with Greg Davis. But Rick Barnes is screwing up a log worse than G.D.

on almost all of his points. The only thing I would add is that I think the talent level of the current team is one additional factor. It is hard to fault Barnes on recruiting based on the talent he has brought through UT, and you can’t fault him when he brings in a talent that is one and done. With that said, if you have a team of 5 Kevin Durants, you don’t have to be much of an x’s and o’s coach. (Vince Young made Greg Davis a great coach for a couple of years) When, for much of the year we had a starting backcourt of Balbay and Mason and you compare that talent level to say, Carter and Dunn, Clemente and Pullen, Collins and fill in the blank, Sloan,etc you see that the talent doesn’t measure up. I know you can’t get all the Mickey D’s all americans every year and that high school talent doesn’t always translate to the college level, so recruiting can be a bit of a crap shoot. But if you go through the UT roster player by player, there are too many, in my opinion, who are just not players at the collegiate level. Could they be “coached” to a higher level – I don’t know. I only hope that Thompson is as advertised for next year and that they are able to sign Joseph too, because other than them we have the same cast back next year assuming none transfer/bail out.

and Pittman having a horrible season. The coaches also are having a bad season. The team looks sloppy and poorly coached every week.

The bad news is that it might get worse next year. The PG problem won’t be fixed next year. Texas won’t have a big body next year (they don’t this year b/c Pittman is on the bench most of the time). Damion James will be gone.

Next year starters: Johnson, Bradley, Hamilton, Balbay (ugh), and Brown? Hopefully a freshman will live up to their recruitng hype and make a big impact early.