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On 3/4/2019 at 9:10 AM, Machinator said:

Who would you define as a "big name" at a basketball school?

I think we would all agree that the traditional blue bloods (UNC, Duke, UCLA, Indiana, Kentucky) are out of bounds. What else?

For posterity's sake, top 5 blue bloods are UNC, Duke, UCLA, Kentucky and Kansas.

Indiana would be more in the next tier with 'Cuse, Louisville, Nova, Michigan.

IU has punched above their weight in converting FFs to title wins but they don't have near the tourney wins or FF appearances as the top 5. 

This is mainly a function of Kansas failing to close the deal when they get there. 

*To expound, I think you would have a much better shot at stealing a coach from Indiana than from Kansas. 

Edited by ztejas
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3 minutes ago, ztejas said:

For posterity's sake, top 5 blue bloods are UNC, Duke, UCLA, Kentucky and Kansas.

Indiana would be more in the next tier with 'Cuse, Louisville, Nova, Michigan.

IU has punched above their weight in converting FFs to title wins but they don't have near the tourney wins or FF appearances as the top 5. 

This is mainly a function of Kansas failing to close the deal when they get there. 

*To expound, I think you would have a much better shot at stealing a coach from Indiana than from Kansas. 

I always thought Indiana was a blueblood, but maybe I'm wrong.

Either way, forgetting Kansas was regarded on my part.

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11 minutes ago, Machinator said:

I always thought Indiana was a blueblood, but maybe I'm wrong.

Either way, forgetting Kansas was regarded on my part.

If you look at all-time tourney wins, 5 schools have 105+ and then the 6th on the list (Louisville) has just 76. 7th, Syracuse, has 68. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCAA_Men's_Division_I_Basketball_Tournament_all-time_team_records

Indiana has more titles than they should, Kansas has less. Kansas has been a perennial power more often and won a lot more on average than Indiana. 

 

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5 hours ago, Bitterwhiteguy said:

I think Texas could compete with Indiana & UCLA for coaches these days, depending on context.

Schools Texas is unlikely to win a bidding war against: Duke, UNC, UK, KU, Louisville, Villanova, Gonzaga (at least while Few is there), Michigan State (ditto Izzo), Syracuse, UConn, Virginia. Some of the smaller schools in the Philly area/Big East area will punch above their weight when it comes to retaining coaches they really want as well. Texas could pry somebody out of, say, Xavier but they'd have to seriously overpay to get that coach.

all of this kind of talk is superfluous. it's not as if all of the ncaa coaching jobs are going to open up at once and Texas will have to bid against these blue blood schools for coaches. once Mack took the Louisville job, that made the Texas job *the* potential job opening for any coach eho might be looking to upgrade or change scenery. there aren't going to be a bunch of better job openings popping up left and right, in fact there probably won't be any better job openings popping up any time soon. any coach who's looking to move will be looking at Texas. Hard. 

Look i've made the same case  over and over  for where the Texas job stands in terms of allure and it's pretty much unarguable that it's one of the top jobs in the country. From the pay, to the (lack of) pressure and expectations, to the city, to the University, to the facilities, to the fact that Texas is the most fertile basketball recruiting ground in the country, to our recent success and pedigree as a program, we have it all. It's an extremely desirable job that any coach who might be looking to change scenery would have to seriously consider. It's a great job with a metric shit ton of upside, and very very little risk so long as you are a better coach than the likes of Shaka, Drew, and Weber. It's a dream job for a lot of people, and the posters/blog writers who continue to insist that the Texas job is just "meh", and that we can't compete with any school who got good at basketball before Texas did have *clear* agendas and are totally incapable of being objective about anything UT related. It's a dynamite job that would attract the attention of essentially every available coach out there. 

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8 hours ago, Newdoc said:

Is that a 10 second show between commercials? Because that's about all the time it would take to explain "one high, four low then run a single slow screen at the top of the key."

As if I’m not already ballistic over how this clown is running the program, the “gym rat” wardrobe he sports on his own show makes me wonder if he sleeps in a shelter. Dude, you’ll pulling down 7 figures. At least go on there looking halfway professional, even if we all know you’re not. The players being interviewed show up dressed way better than their “leader.”

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On 3/4/2019 at 8:17 PM, Goo Punch said:

What Buzz Williams and Va Tech have done since losing their best player (Justin Robinson, an outstanding college player who's been out for 8 games) is extremely impressive. Buzz is flying towards the top of my list of potential Shaka replacements.

 

I like Buzz but the more I look at his resume I think he's overrated. Virginia Tech was a mess when he took over but look at the last 6 years under Buzz (5 years at V-Tech and final year at Marquette). 

52-55 conference record. Finished 6th, T 15th, T-7th, T-7th, 7th, and currently 5th in conference play. 0 tournament wins. Missed the tournament 3/6 years. Lost to a 8 and 9 seed in the tournament. 

Is that resume over the last 6 years suppose to get me excited? Maybe he makes a run this year in the NCAA tournament. 

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I mean he won the Big East twice in its modern heyday and then turned VT from a team that had gone 16-17, 13-19, and 9-22 (9-22!!!) in consecutive years into a program that's won 20+ games in four straight years after one single transition year. Hell yeah I want someone like that taking over at Texas. Especially considering that he's 47 years old and has a couple of decades of major D-1 coaching ahead of him.

He's also a native Texan who played his college ball at Navarro and got his masters from A&M-Kingsville. He'd be a huge upgrade over Shaka and someone who could potentially settle down for the long haul in Austin. Hell yes I want Buzz Williams taking over at Texas. He's never been at an alpha program before yet all he does is compete at their level. Give him our resources and there's virtually zero chance we aren't winning 22+ games with regularity in short order.  I'd literally chip in for the buyout if it meant hiring Buzz. 

Edited by Goo Punch
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12 minutes ago, Goo Punch said:

He's never been at an alpha program before yet all he does is compete at their level. 

We aren't a substantially better program than Marquette. Matter of fact, you can make the argument that Marquette > Texas. 

Maybe you have a different interpretation of "alpha program" but it's not like Marquette was a bad job. 

Marquette has as much history if not more than Texas in these last 30 to 40 years. 

Edited by texasstrong12
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31 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

I like Buzz but the more I look at his resume I think he's overrated. Virginia Tech was a mess when he took over but look at the last 6 years under Buzz (5 years at V-Tech and final year at Marquette). 

52-55 conference record. Finished 6th, T 15th, T-7th, T-7th, 7th, and currently 5th in conference play. 0 tournament wins. Missed the tournament 3/6 years. Lost to a 8 and 9 seed in the tournament. 

Is that resume over the last 6 years suppose to get me excited? Maybe he makes a run this year in the NCAA tournament. 

Doing that at arguably the best conference in college basketball, at a school with almost zero basketball success for decades.  Just beat Duke for the 3rd time @ VT'S home coliseum.  He's succeeded wildly there.

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12 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

Doing that at arguably the best conference in college basketball, at a school with almost zero basketball success for decades.  Just beat Duke for the 3rd time @ VT'S home coliseum.  He's succeeded wildly there.

Conference ranks these past 6 years (based on RPI). Maybe this differs based on Kenpom. 

'19 ACC (3rd)

'18 ACC (4th)

'17 ACC (1st)

'16 ACC (2nd) 

'15 ACC (2nd) 

'14 Big East (4th) 

The bottom of the ACC isn't very good. That's the worry with Buzz. I'm betting he's been stacking most of his wins in the ACC against the bottom half of the conference which hasn't been that great. 

Edited by texasstrong12
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21 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

We aren't a substantially better program than Marquette. Matter of fact, you can make the argument that Marquette > Texas. 

No you can't. It's time for people to get with the times. It's 2019. History doesn't matter like it did earlier in my lifetime. You know what the real difference was between the blue bloods and everyone else? TV. In football, up until maybe the generation that preceded mine, OU, Texas, USC, ND, NU, Bama, Michigan, and Ohio State, were *literally* on TV more than every other team in the country combined. There were like 3-5 games on TV per weekend. Those schools had inherent advantages from that exposure. Nowadays anybody can be good at any sport. There's never been more exposure, nor has there ever been more talent, both in the player field and the coaching field. Texas is unarguably bigger than Marquette in basketball. It's not even remotely close.

Heres why: the people who set this market are the players and coaches, who inevitably become younger and younger as time goes on. Georgetown, and Syracuse, and Marquette, and Pitt, and UCONN, and IU, and Temple, St.Johns, and even UCLA and a bunch of other formerly great programs have no more cache or advantages than any number of schools with far less basketball tradition. Everyone is on TV; everyone has seven different Nike jerseys. Sure the top 2% will always be the top 2%, but the teams who make up the following 13-18% will continue to be fluid and ever changing, and it's been a long time since Marquette was a bugger name than Texas in the eyes of players and coaches. These "we aren't a blue blood" excuses hold no water. 

Edited by Goo Punch
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2 minutes ago, Goo Punch said:

No you can't. It's time for people to get with the times. It's 2019. History doesn't matter like it did earlier in my lifetime. You know what the real difference was between the blue bloods and everyone else? TV. In football, up until maybe the generation that preceded mine, OU, Texas, USC, ND, NU, Bama, Michigan, and Ohio State, were *literally* on TV more than every other team in the country combined. There were like 3-5 games on TV per weekend. Those schools had inherent advantages from that exposure. Nowadays anybody can be good at any sport. There's never been more exposure, nor has there ever been more talent, both in the player field and the coaching field. Texas is unarguably bigger than Marquette in basketball. It's not even remotely close.

Heres why: the people who set this market are the players and coaches, who inevitably become younger and younger as time goes on. Georgetown, and Syracuse, and Marquette, and Pitt, and UCONN, and IU, and Temple, St.Johns, and even UCLA and a bunch of other formerly great programs have no more cache or advantages than any number of schools with far less basketball tradition. Everyone is on TV; everyone has seven different Nike jerseys. Sure the top 2% will always be the top 2%, but the teams who make up the following 13-18% will continue to be fluid and ever changing, and it's been a long time since Marquette was a bugger name than Texas in the eyes of players and coaches. These "we aren't a blue blood" excuses hold no water. 

I think we definitely have advantages over Marquette but they're not a bad program. I think a lot of people view his tenure at Marquette as a "rebuild" when reality is they were already a pretty good program 20 to 30 years prior to Buzz. 

 

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2 minutes ago, texasstrong12 said:

 I think a lot of people view his tenure at Marquette as a "rebuild" when reality is they were already a pretty good program 20 to 30 years prior to Buzz. 

 

that would make us a good fit for him-- we're not a "rebuild" either, there's talent on the roster and nothing systemically wrong with our program, athletic department (for a change), etc. 

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11 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

Look i've made the same case  over and over  for where the Texas job stands in terms of allure and it's pretty much unarguable that it's one of the top jobs in the country. From the pay, to the (lack of) pressure and expectations, to the city, to the University, to the facilities, to the fact that Texas is the most fertile basketball recruiting ground in the country, to our recent success and pedigree as a program, we have it all. It's an extremely desirable job that any coach who might be looking to change scenery would have to seriously consider. It's a great job with a metric shit ton of upside, and very very little risk so long as you are a better coach than the likes of Shaka, Drew, and Weber. It's a dream job for a lot of people, and the posters/blog writers who continue to insist that the Texas job is just "meh", and that we can't compete with any school who got good at basketball before Texas did have *clear* agendas and are totally incapable of being objective about anything UT related. It's a dynamite job that would attract the attention of essentially every available coach out there. 

You of all people should know that few things are inarguable, and this isn't one of them.  We see the allure, but that does not mean that fans and coaches of other programs do, at least not to the same extent.  We have more money than most, but until recently, have not shown any interest in putting much of it into the basketball program or facilities.  I also think you are over selling the lack of pressure and expectations.  If that were truly the case, we would likely still have Barnes, and this thread would not exist, or it would at least have fewer pages.  Also, fan apathy is not a positive.  Maybe some coaches will see it as a challenge in a "I will make the fans show up" way, but most successful coaches want to go where the fans care.  Do we really want a coach who wants to be here because the expectations are low?  As far as I can tell, that's what we have now. 

Edited by idigTexas
OU sucks
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1 minute ago, idigTexas said:

You of all people should know that few things are inarguable, and this isn't one of them.  We see the allure, but that does not mean that fans and coaches of other programs do, at least not to the same extent.  We have more money than most, but until recently, have not shown any interest in putting much of it into the basketball program or facilities.  I also think you are over selling the lack of pressure and expectations.  If that were truly the case, this thread would not exist, or it would at least have fewer pages.  Also, fan apathy is not a positive.  Maybe some coaches will see it as a challenge in a "I will make the fans show up" way, but most successful coaches want to go where the fans care.  Do we really want a coach who wants to be here because the expectations are low?  As far as I can tell, that's what we have now. 

That's 100% because of the buyout. Shaka would be a dead man walking without it. The man is easily worse than Tom Penders and the vast majority of fans i see are convinced that he's coming back next year. That should tell you about fan expectations here. 

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9 minutes ago, Goo Punch said:

That's 100% because of the buyout. Shaka would be a dead man walking without it. The man is easily worse than Tom Penders and the vast majority of fans i see are convinced that he's coming back next year. That should tell you about fan expectations here. 

I mean you kind of contradicted yourself.  There are expectations here.  Not super high, but expectations to compete in the Big 12, make the tourney every year, and make a run past the first weekend every few years.  Shaka has failed miserably to date with those expectations, and like you said, would be out on his ass if Patterson didn't gift him a ridiculous contract.  I think most fans that are convinced he is coming back also realize it is 100% due to the buyout.  

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3 minutes ago, Skipper said:

I mean you kind of contradicted yourself.  There are expectations here.  Not super high, but expectations to compete in the Big 12, make the tourney every year, and make a run past the first weekend every few years.  Shaka has failed miserably to date with those expectations, and like you said, would be out on his ass if Patterson didn't gift him a ridiculous contract.  I think most fans that are convinced he is coming back also realize it is 100% due to the buyout.  

When I say "lack of expectations" I mean in comparison to the pay and to whatever other schools may be courting Coach X. For example we all know that Shaka turned down UCLA. Compare the expectations there and here. They haven't been consistently good-great since Wooden and they still expect to be UK or Duke. Here if you make the tourney every year and make a run 1/3 years you can't get fired. If you make the final four you're a legend. If you actually do win a title you're a certified demigod. That's a pretty sweet deal compared to the other schools that Coach X would be considering. 

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I'm probably in the minority on this, but if I was a coach personally looking for a job, I'd want to go to the school with extremely high expectations and pressure.  I would want and would believe I would thrive under that pressure, but I do think logically most coaches would rate a potential Sweet Sixteen (reasonable to shoot for this every year and if you get lucky with being hot/good matchups in the brackets or a magical roster/chemistry here and there some years you make a deep run) program with lower initial expectations as a plus for sure.  

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21 hours ago, Skipper said:

Exactly.   It's amazing many in this forum don't seem to understand that at the end of the day CDC is running a business.  When it was obvious Strong needed to go, there were real economic consequences if he returned another year.  CDC has to be doing a cost-benefit analysis here and it wouldn't surprise me if it makes more financial sense to not eat the buyout this year and let it reduce more.  Especially given all of the projects currently underway.  Hiring a new coach is not going to automatically result in massive increased donations or season ticket sales to make up the additional $3MM+.  I'm guessing if Shaka is gone, it's because some prominent boosters that actually give a damn about basketball decided to step up and make it happen.   How many give a damn about basketball that haven't already been tapped out given all of the other projects?

It is a sunk cost no matter what. Shaka is a failure. He's going to get his money no matter what, but why wait another year and allow him to kill the program anymore?

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1 hour ago, Goo Punch said:

When I say "lack of expectations" I mean in comparison to the pay and to whatever other schools may be courting Coach X. For example we all know that Shaka turned down UCLA. Compare the expectations there and here. They haven't been consistently good-great since Wooden and they still expect to be UK or Duke. Here if you make the tourney every year and make a run 1/3 years you can't get fired. If you make the final four you're a legend. If you actually do win a title you're a certified demigod. That's a pretty sweet deal compared to the other schools that Coach X would be considering. 

That is a sweet deal, but again, I don't want a coach who sees it that way.  Wanting to go somewhere because you will be celebrated for doing less isn't a quality that we should value. 

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2 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

No you can't. It's time for people to get with the times. It's 2019. History doesn't matter like it did earlier in my lifetime. You know what the real difference was between the blue bloods and everyone else? TV. In football, up until maybe the generation that preceded mine, OU, Texas, USC, ND, NU, Bama, Michigan, and Ohio State, were *literally* on TV more than every other team in the country combined. There were like 3-5 games on TV per weekend. Those schools had inherent advantages from that exposure. Nowadays anybody can be good at any sport. There's never been more exposure, nor has there ever been more talent, both in the player field and the coaching field. Texas is unarguably bigger than Marquette in basketball. It's not even remotely close.

Heres why: the people who set this market are the players and coaches, who inevitably become younger and younger as time goes on. Georgetown, and Syracuse, and Marquette, and Pitt, and UCONN, and IU, and Temple, St.Johns, and even UCLA and a bunch of other formerly great programs have no more cache or advantages than any number of schools with far less basketball tradition. Everyone is on TV; everyone has seven different Nike jerseys. Sure the top 2% will always be the top 2%, but the teams who make up the following 13-18% will continue to be fluid and ever changing, and it's been a long time since Marquette was a bugger name than Texas in the eyes of players and coaches. These "we aren't a blue blood" excuses hold no water. 

Yeah, you can, and it's actually really easy to do so. Marquette has more tournament wins, more national titles, and more elite eights and final fours in the more modern tournament era. 

Since 2000? Maybe a wash. Going forward? Texas should be the better program, and definitely is the more attractive job. 

But history wise, I don't think Texas really has much on Marquette. 

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18 minutes ago, idigTexas said:

Recently = whenever it was that it was officially decided to build a new arena to replace FEC.

Well, then, I don't agree with that. We paid enough to keep Rick Barnes when NC State, Indiana, and especially Kentucky came sniffing around, we renovated the Erwin Center while he was here, and we built the Cooley Pavilion, which is as good a practice facility as a college player is going to get.

The Erwin Center sucked, but it's only 40 42 years old this year. It's unusual for college basketball programs to build new arenas at all, but certainly more frequently than that, so if that is your standard for measuring whether we're spending on basketball, I don't think it's a fair one.

Edited by SwanderedTalent
it's not 2017 anymore, what the fuck
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1 minute ago, ztejas said:

Texas should be the better program, and definitely is the more attractive job. 

But history wise, I don't think Texas really has much on Marquette. 

I wish we could keep those two things distinct and separate on this thread. There are plenty-- a dozen or so? maybe more?-- programs more accomplished (or highly regarded by East Coast media) than ours that aren't as attractive a job as ours. 

Shifting gears, I think the home-court advantage thing is overrated, as it pertains to how attractive that makes a job for a coach. The six most important games he'd coach in a given season are all going to be neutral site games. Specifically to Texas, I don't think it's a factor at all in our next hire-- how the fans (students) will turn out and how raucous they'll be is a total guess because of the new arena.

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4 minutes ago, SwanderedTalent said:

do you think our recruiting has been substandard over the past 15 years?

No, that doesn't mean we should rest on our laurels either. That's a Mack Brownian / late-era Dodds-ish way to look at things. For all you know, we could pull in even better players with a stronger home court advantage.

Not to mention the very real difference having an actual crowd makes in winning games (see the OU game this year).

The coaching is substandard and needs to be addressed, but there's no reason that the fan presence and atmosphere can't be improved at the same time. Thankfully, Del Conte understands that.

Edited by Machinator
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Just now, Machinator said:

No, that doesn't mean we should rest on our laurels either. That's a Mack Brownian / late-era Dodds-ish way to look at things.

I'm not suggesting we do that, but I'm also not fond of the notion/implication that our basketball culture is a problem. This discussion about the attractiveness of the Texas job is unrealistically colored by our tendency towards weak crowds. I agree that we are fortunate Del Conte understands the situation.

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1 hour ago, HtownHorn said:

It is a sunk cost no matter what. Shaka is a failure. He's going to get his money no matter what, but why wait another year and allow him to kill the program anymore?

Because it's not.  You then have to pay a new coach likely $3MM+ (in addition to any buyout they may have) so you are either paying just Shaka or you are paying double for a basketball coach in 2019-2020 in a sport where revenue is relatively static.  In other words, I don't think UT basketball increases revenue by $3MM by firing Shaka this year so the decision would result in a net loss on the balance sheet.   And given all of the AD projects going on, it probably makes sense to not eat that cost this year and instead let the program tread water.  CDC can justify that to the average fan if the horns make the tourney.  That's the business case for keeping Shaka which CDC obviously will consider.   

Edited by Skipper
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3 minutes ago, Skipper said:

Let the program tread water.  CDC can justify that to the average fan if the horns make the tourney.  

That's the biggest thing. While making the tournament might not please anyone on this board it's not the type disaster on the level of losing to Kansas in football. 

The program is probably in a better position to tread water with Shaka for another year too because of recruiting. The '19 class is loaded so even if you fire Shaka a year from now you are at least giving the next coach some talent. 

That really wasn't the case with Strong. Recruiting was a dead man walking after the Kansas loss. 

 

 

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4 minutes ago, GreenspointTexas said:

Last I checked, our ath. dept. isnt exactly strapped for cash. 20 million dollars is chump change at Texas

If it were football, maybe. The donors don't want to spend that kind of cash for any of the other sports.

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1 minute ago, texasstrong12 said:

That's the biggest thing. While making the tournament might not please anyone on this board it's not the type disaster on the level of losing to Kansas in football. 

The program is probably in a better position to tread water with Shaka for another year too because of recruiting. The '19 class is loaded so even if you fire Shaka a year from now you are at least giving the next coach some talent. 

That really wasn't the case with Strong. Recruiting was a dead man walking after the Kansas loss. 

 

 

All of this.  Plus, the massive swings in revenue in basketball compared to football.   Can you imagine the massive drops in season ticket sales, attendance, and donations if we kept Strong another year and let LSU hire Herman?  It was going to be really bad even if Strong would have beaten Kansas.   Just not anywhere even close to the same dynamics in basketball.

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2 minutes ago, GreenspointTexas said:

Last I checked, our ath. dept. isnt exactly strapped for cash. 20 million dollars is chump change at Texas

It's not, and if an AD gets in the habit of spending money like he's not running a P&L, he ends up having to borrow from the academic side of the house.

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