I do feel like over the past few years, we have had a tendency to either dig ourselves into deep holes that we have to get out of or lose sizable leads later in the game. It’s far from being every game, but more frequent than in prior years.
I think it's a fair criticism. We seem to play our best ball down 15 or so. This was particularly true last year. Full court press seems to create energy. I also wish we did more to get Caleb involved on offense early. He tends to get hot and stay hot.
I can't speak to the actuality of that. My memory isn't that good nor am I that dedicated a student of the game. One thing that has happened to all teams is that the overall talent has gotten better as the value of playing basketball for money has increased. That's pure economics. That's led to more colleges getting serious about recruiting and having more good players to split among more places. That doesn't mean the rich don't still get richer but it does mean that the used to be easy games aren't so easy and there's a lot of people we haven't heard of that can put up points in a hurry. It wouldn't surprise me if that doesn't make for streakier games.
Has overall talent gotten better? I can certainly see it based on raw or potential talent, but I’m not so sure about overall talent. It used to be that not only did players with elite talent stay past their freshmen year, but many stayed in college through their senior year. In any event, more extremely talented players used to multiple years of college ball.
The defense was bad against FSU, too, they just missed a bunch of wide open shots.
As I said, I haven't put this together very well. Just the increased numbers of foreign players has increased the overall talent level, imo. And, except for those that go directly to the pros, we still get that talent but in a rawer form. When you add that one of the unintended consequences of the whole portal thing is that late bloomers get to move to places where they are needed for their maturity and end up getting chances they otherwise might not have gotten. I know the best college teams aren't as good on the whole but for many reasons the difference between the 1st and 100th best teams now are less that 1st and 40th in the 80s as best as I can tell.
Are the players not accountable for their effort and performance?
Is the coach not accountable for getting them to play with effort and making sure the team has the best possible gameplan with the players he has to give them the best chance to win?
Everything with you is poor coaching.
The coach is responsible for everything that happens on the floor. Everything.
They are the ones on the court. Who else can do it? Are you suggesting shock collars to get their attention? No gameplan survives lack of effort and if pride in yourself and your school doesn't do it, then coaching won't do it either. Coaching is to help you learn how and what to do. The rest is about the player stepping up and being responsible. That was true when it was an "amateur" game and it's damned sure true now if you're taking money.
I do agree that teaching D is not his strong suit. I would LOVE to see HD swap out one of the current assistants for Jackie Manuel...
Getting players to buy into D is harder now in the transfer portal era with coaches not having a stick any more. Especially for coaches like HD who is on the hot seat. It's not like in Roy's day when he could sit a talented player on the bench or refuse to start him... and when fans complained, he could just throw out a "dad gummit," ignore them, and go about his coaching business.
Blue Bloods have more money and it's easier for players who have achieved at lower levels to transfer to attractive programs for more money and exposure... assuming the pitch is right.