UCONN / G'Town postgame

[Vol Horn 4 Life]

Jim Calhoun:

".....they wanted it more than we did.....their fans I mean..."

Nice play!

 

[Alex_de_Large]

I thought he said Our fans, as in, the home crowd tried as hard as they could to get them back into the game. Still, he pretty much threw his team under the bus which is kinda chickenshit.

 

[austintex]

Typical Calhoun.

 

[Bob in Houston]

I've thought UConn was less than the sum of the parts for some time. A lot of quick shots, contested shots. They got back in the game by moving the ball, taking open threes, but when they got close, it was "What can I do?"

 

[Alex_de_Large]

Bob, I value your opinion. What is your take on what Calhoun said after the game? To me is sounded like he deflected all the blame to the players. Granted, they did play poorly. But the coach has to take some blame too, no?

 

[Bob in Houston]

It's hard to tell. Sometimes, the players deserve to be thrown under the bus.

Now, there are coaches, like Rudy T, who never would do it... but he was a pro coach who had been an NBA player and understood the mindset of a pro playing 82 games, and also was afraid of speaking off the cuff after a game..

In college, IMO the coach is an instructor as much as a director. One of the reasons I like Barnes so much is that when they lose badly or play poorly, he will say it, and he will say what he asked them to do and what they failed to do. He also occasionally will say who didn't do it.

Difference with him, and you can hear these sorts of comments on his radio show, is that he's already told the players, probably multiple times, what he expects of them. So, when they are called out publicly, it's not something they haven't already heard.

In Calhoun's case, what we did not hear was, "I screwed up, too." You will hear that from time to time from Barnes. But if we're making comparisons, I also think Barnes has gotten more out of his players the last few years than Calhoun has.

We may be able to judge the effectiveness of Calhoun's comments by how the team responds. But if this is just one more practice riff, delivered from a podium, then I'd say it's Jim covering for his own deficiencies.

 

[Alex_de_Large]

For UCONN's sake, I hope he did that to challenge his team. It's early, and it was just their first Big East game. But they better shake it off quick with the likes of Pitt, Notre Dame, Louisville and WV all on the road.

 

[Bob in Houston]

Yeah, the BE has at least eight other really good teams. Win or lose, you have to move on. I heard JTIII, probably postgame, say they have to forget about winning and think about Pittsburgh. It's something akin to what Texas football went through this year.

But I really didn't hear Calhoun say they have to move on, we'll get it straightened out, we have too many good teams left to worry too much about one game... there's a difference.