Yes
No
Orien Greene played for Jessie after transferring from Florida. He went on to play a few seasons in the NBA. I believe he started with Boston. We did have to vacate games during his time due to the determination he played while ineligible. After he transferred from Florida, he had poor grades. He supposedly gained eligibility through correspondence courses. Turns out those courses were not academically viable or approved by NCAA. Perhaps the compliance officer should have done a better job in that determination. I do wonder if there was subtle pressure put on her back then to make the decision the basketball staff wanted. Orien got into trouble recently for some Cecil Collins type activity.
I say let Dr. Maggard get his feet grounded, survey the field, then start makes some changes to advance all of the athletic programs at UL. Hopefully, sooner than later. For the love of God, please make contracts to where UL does not get the shaft!
Ideally you want 3 things out of a great coach.
Spot talent: Check
Develop talent: Check
Bring it all together: Waiting
If you have 2-out-of-3, you deserve extra time. Lots of it.
I am not sure the SBC was ever ranked as high as 13 in Jessie's years. We are 13 of over 30 leagues now. Perhaps it was. APR was put in right after Jessie left here. The upsets Marty pulled off were major coups and we have not come close to doing that since. Unfortunately, he could not beat UNO often enough. That and the departure of Butch Pierre sealed his fate. Butch was key to much of his success.
They absolutely deserve to be back, that being said next year is key to their fate. I personally believe expectations for next year will be higher than ever, even when Long announced he was staying for his senior year. Washington, Stove, and Bartley as Seniors, the 3 P5 transfers, and the most high profile recruit straight from high school during Marlin's tenure.
Along with the win loss record, I want to see how the staff handles this years freshman class as they will all see a decrease in playing time. Miller might welcome it with his knee issues, and if Brown is willing to redshirt that would be best. How Evans and Davis will fit in next year remain to be seen. Each of those guys needs to stick around as they could all develop into key players by the time they are seniors. If the attrition bug bites again that would be another cause for concern with this staff.
I think having a "real" AD in terms of experience will create the working conditions that will allow our coaches to be accurately evaluated. Right now we're not sure.
I love how we either have lots of talent and Marlin does nothing with it or that he can't recruit talented players. Maybe some of you have been bitten by the alternate facts bug.
Marlin's approach to program building seems to reflect his coaching style, methodical. He is getting players that can play, they graduate and don't make negative headlines off the court. We all want a MBB program in the top third of the conference or better but I don't think we should be willing to sell the universities soul to do it. Remember these are STUDENT athletes.
Very good post here. I have said I expect next year to be better than this one but I make no guarantees. With the transfers and a high profile recruit coming in, chemistry may be an issue and we know one reason this year's team did better than predicted was because of chemistry. The way Jay Wright has played recently makes me think he will be missed more than some realize. Still, we should have more depth next season which may prevent a long rough patch. We were able to recover from the one that hit this year but it took so long to get out of it many had written them off. Of course they never stopped believing in themselves. Key to a good season is how do you react when tough times come. One will next year. Getting out of it quicker will be the key to if they are able to improve upon this year.
If chemistry is a problem then we have bigger problems. It is not like these guys are transferring in at the beginning of next fall. They will have been here for a full year. I understand you are talking about playing chemistry but there should still be no excuse. Personally I would love to see two sets of five rotating in at each media timeout and lets run the floor.
Geaux Cajuns
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