Hot Stove: UNC Basketball

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SnoopRob said:
That is a good summation of the current situation, although I would say that tradition & legacy still have some weight, due to the resources and brand that Carolina Basketball has built over 70 years. I would also say that add that this is not the first time that college basketball has faced significant transitions and Carolina Basketball as not only survived but thrived through each of them by being innovative within the sport and the overall system of college basketball.

But a good summation is only the first step to addressing the new reality of college basketball. While the chaos will eventually subside as more rules/guidelines for the transfer portal and NIL are developed, it is highly unlikely that the landscape will go back to anything like what it was just 5 years ago. So the question facing Carolina Basketball is "What does the program do to not only survive but to thrive in this new landscape of NIL & transfer portal?"

Economic history is full of business sectors that were revolutionized by changes in the field and where the leaders of those sectors faced the basic issue of evolving to address the field as it now exists or remaining static & eventually being left behind. A great example of this is Kodak in the camera sector; Kodak was the leader in film cameras, yet created the first digital camera in the 1970s. But they didn't want to adapt to the development of digital cameras by other companies and remained committed to film and film cameras. Despite being the market leader in cameras for decades and being innovators by creating digital photography, Canon and Nikon passed Kodak because Kodak didn't evolve as the market changed. Kodak was out of the consumer camera market by 2012 because they stayed in the film camera business too long and never competently moved over to digital cameras.

Carolina Basketball is at a crossroads with the changes going on in the greater world of college sports plus the still fairly recent retirement of Roy. Carolina Basketball can either cling to its past and refuse to adapt or they can bring the best of the history and tradition of Carolina Basketball with them as they evolve to meet the future of college basketball. My hope is that they choose the latter and we end up a blue blood for decades to come and not someday known as the "Kodak of College Basketball".
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Nominated for awesome post award. We have some great writers (real world authors?) on this board.
 
SnoopRob said:
Overall, money is likely not the biggest problem facing Carolina Basketball.

I do think that money is/has been a significant problem with some recruitments (e.g. Stojakavic), where other schools are willing to bust their budget for a player that we just aren't willing to match. But that's beyond the program's control and the key is to have enough foresight and a wide enough net to be able to get an overall high-quality team with the overall top-tier budget we are said to have.
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UNC offered Stojakovic more than both Stanford and Illinois.

EDIT: I am wrong. UNC's offer was bigger than Illinois, not as big as Stanford's offer.
 
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stankeylegjones said:
UNC offered Stojakovic more than both Stanford and Illinois.
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That is not consistent with what I've read, which is that Stanford came in with a whopper of an offer and that Illinois raised their offer in response, yet still below Stanford's, but that UI's money plus comfort/fit was enough to get him to commit. I haven't heard exactly where we fell in the pecking order of money except that we were below Stanford and likely, at best, roughly on par with Illinois (and may have been below them). The hold up over the weekend seems to have been a bidding war that broke out, started by Stanford plus Illinois getting their funds up enough to still be selected.
 
SnoopRob said:
That is not consistent with what I've read, which is that Stanford came in with a whopper of an offer and that Illinois raised their offer in response, yet still below Stanford's, but that UI's money plus comfort/fit was enough to get him to commit. I haven't heard exactly where we fell in the pecking order of money except that we were below Stanford and likely, at best, roughly on par with Illinois (and may have been below them). The hold up over the weekend seems to have been a bidding war that broke out, started by Stanford plus Illinois getting their funds up enough to still be selected.
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Sorry, you're right. I read Ben's statement wrong (page 26 of the Stojakovic thread). I'm going to update my previous post.
 
stankeylegjones said:
UNC offered Stojakovic more than both Stanford and Illinois.
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I don't know anything in particular. But Illinois has a number of Eastern Euro players coming in next year which may have been attractive to Stojakovic such that the money difference between UNC and Illinois was less of a factor than one might usually expect.
 
dcphx said:
I don't know anything in particular. But Illinois has a number of Eastern Euro players coming in next year which may have been attractive to Stojakovic such that the money difference between UNC and Illinois was less of a factor than one might usually expect.
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From IC thread it sounds like Underwood sold him and Peja on the fit with their roster.
 
Calheel said:
That is not the word I heard. Sounds like Lubin burned a lot of bridges with the staff when he went into the portal at the last minute. Think they intend to deploy his funds elsewhere at this point and he would not necessarily be welcomed back.
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This seems like it's more likely the truth... not that we may ever know exactly... but this seems as plausible than anything. Spend the coin NOW... forget Drake and VAL.
 
Calheel said:
That is not the word I heard. Sounds like Lubin burned a lot of bridges with the staff when he went into the portal at the last minute. Think they intend to deploy his funds elsewhere at this point and he would not necessarily be welcomed back.
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Interesting.

It’s truly the wild, wild, west out there.
 
Bridges burned aside, still think you're much better off spending that money on VAL elsewhere

I wonder how many teams will be in the stakes for Fland should he return. Arkansas and who else?
 
duluoz said:
Yep. And in the midst of all this, IMO it’s pure folly to think that a coaching change would amount to anything more than a rash act of frustration and wishful thinking in this environment. And it would come at the cost of sacrificing not only the learning curve in process for HD (continuing that of Roy before him), but also would likely sever, once and for all, all ties to Carolina tradition and family that won us all over in the first place.

Because I’ll tell you what, if it’s (just for example) Calipari on the sideline with a bunch of 5-star future pros, then I really don’t care how many new banners they hang. I’d much rather see an attempt at a true rebuild with HD at the helm, and I don’t care what it means for wins and losses in the short term.

This chaos is going to calm eventually, or else the money will dry up as fast as the ratings do, and big-money college hoops just won’t survive in the same way. So one way or another the dust will settle. When it does, I’d like to know that Carolina was one of the schools who stayed true to itself, even if it took some bumpy seasons to do so.
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Agree with this. Those acting as if Hubert has done some irreputable harm to the program are fools. At worst he's a place holder between the old and new era of college hoops. At best, he figures this coaching thing out and is able to lead the program forward

Something has to give eventually. If we really are looking at a reality where teams replace 90% of their rosters year over year, it will be not only tough to care much at all, but to build teams that win consistently at a high level, regardless of coaching level

With that said, I think there's much to be desired from an x's and o's stand point and style of play from what we've seen so far. Whether or not his job is determined by it, this season will be a huge opportunity to show improvement there
 
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Heelsandeers said:
Agree with this. Those acting as if Hubert has done some irreputable harm to the program are fools. At worst he's a place holder between the old and era of college hoops. At best, he figures this coaching thing out and is able to lead the program forward

Something has to give eventually. If we really are looking at a reality where teams replace 90% of their rosters year over year, it will be not only tough to care much at all, but to build teams that win consistently at a high level, regardless of coaching level

With that said, I think there's much to be desired from an x's and o's stand point and style of play from what we've seen so far. Whether or not his job is determined by it, this season will be a huge opportunity to show improvement there
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I don't terribly disagree with his need to show serious improvement. My biggest concern is that we lose something we can't get back during a time where doing well has a huge element of chance.
 
finesse said:
I don't terribly disagree with his need to show serious improvement. My biggest concern is that we lose something we can't get back during a time where doing well has a huge element of chance.
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I don't think HD has shown that he's something "we can't get back." Whatever you think of his job performance to date or his prospects, I don't think it's plausible to put him on a can't lose list.
 
Bigs23 said:
Who is on that list?
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I don't know. I was responding to the other poster. Dean would have been on that list. Roy (in fact he was, because we didn't land him first time 'round). K. Probably Self. Hurley (who I think overrated but he did win two championships).

The arguments tend to be along the lines of "HD is terrible" versus "HD is doing OK with what he was given." Nobody is really contending that HD is actually good, let alone great. When I say "actually good" I mean relative to expectations at UNC.
 
superrific said:
I don't think HD has shown that he's something "we can't get back." Whatever you think of his job performance to date or his prospects, I don't think it's plausible to put him on a can't lose list.
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That's not what I'm suggesting. Who on your list of coaches has the least bit of connection to the UNC tradition? It might turn out that tradition is no longer needed or desired. That's not my choice to make. I don't mind saying that. as it stands, I'd rather err on the side of tradition than go headlong down a path that no one knows where it ends. One way is easier to recover from.
 
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