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Mens Basketball Program........

It certainly confirms what I suspected all along. Ronnie still had the ear of those recruits, actually new signees as they had already inked with Middle Tennessee, after already planning and accepting his new gig at Ole Miss.

Again, Mrs Grensing, I would really be careful about what you write on this public forum. Especially if it involves recruits.

Any contact from Ronnie after leaving MT with those kids or their families, in any capacity, would be a very serious NCAA violation. I'm quite certain a Level 1 violation infact, the most serious of them all. That is roster tampering.
I appreciate your concern, I really do but there have been no violations. I hope I could provide some facts to shift the narrative that Kermit had a plan to betray MTSU and steal recruits. He did not. He gave his heart and soul to MTSU. He had the tenacity to command discipline and success even with the current athletic administration. CNM is a good man, he had a track record at UNCA for a hiring AD to recognize. I have heard that the talent of the players that had to sit out is better than what we saw on the court this year. Now that MT is at the very bottom, up is where they will go. Hopefully some of the recruits that still have MT on their list will sign. Also, CNM is not going anywhere anytime soon. He has a solid contract and he will be given time. My husband and I plan on going to the game Saturday to support the team. We will continue to do so the best we can and hope like all of you in this forum, they get their act together and start winning some games. We hope CNM will get tougher on the day to day operations and command more accountability and toughness. I believe when he gets players to campus, they really enjoy playing for him. One more thing, there is so much potential to have a thriving fan base but even when we were winning conference championships and going to the NCAA tournament, we only had a few games a year with a great turnout. If you remember, Kermit was always marketing as well as winning. Since following this forum, I give all of you credit because you follow MTSU football, basketball and baseball really well. The emotion in the threads just shows you care. Middle needs more of that.
 
Kermit should have been fired after years 6-9. He was mediocre prior to hiring a quality group of assistants. but Massaro is Little Middle and let him stick around until he struck lightning in a bottle. Glad he did, but most coaches don’t all the sudden up there winning percentage by 10 % in year 10 without cheating or getting extremely lucky in assistant hiring/players. Kermit’s year 2 in Oxford is about what I expect until he finds his petty cash drawer for players again like he “allegedly” had at some previous stops. But I digress.

No coach deserves a 2nd season after winning 4 or 5 D1 games in year unless he is bringing a team back from from severe NCAA penalties.

CNM will be back next year due to a great coaches contract/terrible AD contract. Giving someone a contract you can’t buy out is idiocy. Speaking of idiots...

No matter what happens, CM doesn’t demand success at a high enough level, and I expect he will fail miserably in his decision making with CNM and the next coaching hire.

Watching something I love in the hands of mediocre massaro and McPhee is sad. The program won’t get better until they leave or getting lucky.
 
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I am having a hard time seeing how there were not some violations by the previous staff. If Ronnie Hamilton actually said he would help keep the recruits at MT if Grensing were to be hired, that implies he was talking to them and would talk to them as a coach of Ole Miss. Also if Kermit did not have a plan to steal the recruits he would not have taken them regardless of who was named HC at MTSU. It appears MTSU was not their concern or it would not have mattered who was hired as HC. None of this really matters anymore, but I am not going to believe the previous staff did not violate any rules during the transition.
 
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It’s clearly a violation in contacting MTSU signees when you no longer work for the school.. it wasn’t a violation by Grensing necessarily as I’m assuming he was still employed by MTSU throughout the hiring process.. these aren’t items unknown to program so nothing new to see here..

I appreciate her post in the continued support of the program.. she’s also not wrong about the guys sitting out.. I watched 2 live drills in practice this week where teams with redshirts beat the starters 38-14 & 27-8.. I’ll be at the game Saturday as well- regardless of the season it’s always good to show thanks to the seniors
 
I appreciate her post in the continued support of the program.. she’s also not wrong about the guys sitting out.. I watched 2 live drills in practice this week where teams with redshirts beat the starters 38-14 & 27-8.. I’ll be at the game Saturday as well- regardless of the season it’s always good to show thanks to the seniors

This gives me more hope and confirms what I have heard a few other places as well. Add a decent signing class with Fussell and possibly Houston, and maybe one of those guards... all the sudden we could be in the top 1/3 of the conference next year and competing for a ship the next. Just my opinion.
 
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It’s clearly a violation in contacting MTSU signees when you no longer work for the school.. it wasn’t a violation by Grensing necessarily as I’m assuming he was still employed by MTSU throughout the hiring process.. these aren’t items unknown to program so nothing new to see here..

I appreciate her post in the continued support of the program.. she’s also not wrong about the guys sitting out.. I watched 2 live drills in practice this week where teams with redshirts beat the starters 38-14 & 27-8.. I’ll be at the game Saturday as well- regardless of the season it’s always good to show thanks to the seniors
I wish I could go watch a practice to see for myself.
 
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Complements to two coaches:

I am personally aware of the emotions involved when losing a job you really enjoyed and also in not getting an advancement when you thought you were ready for a position. It's damn hard. Lots of issues. Much respect to Grensing & family for how they have handled the situation. I have never met Grensing (Davis and Case were the only two on the previous staff I was ever around) but his positive character is showing.

and to McDevitt: It is very easy for a coach to over-hype players sitting out, especially when there are not too many positives. From what I have heard from McDevitt in interviews he mentions these players when asked but is not overly lavish in his praise. I hope that from what kingaling42 has reported we do have much to look forward to from the players sitting out. I do respect McDevitt's approach in not making extravagant claims about these players.
 
I've been around our football program enough to not hang too much hope on potential.

I guess the scrimmage gives me hope.

Roy Williams should have a lot more grace than CNM. He has earned it.
 
Having better players is only fixing half the problem. How are we going to fix bad coaching next season? The horrible defense and the pedestrian offense will be there next year unless McDevitt improves drastically as a coach. Having a few better players might help us win a few more games next season but we will not be competing for a championship unless the coaching improves immensely.
 
Not trying to overly hype the guys sitting either but it was clear to me in observation that the guys not playing this season check a few boxes that are missing now.. I've also seen guys that were practice all-stars that couldn't replicate that in live game action so time will only tell but these are guys that contributed at other D1 programs so it's not my first concern.. having watched the team in person for the first time this year I finally get some of the reasons that we saw some frustrating and consistent problems.. I think many of you should see some practices before you comment.. I hope to see more toughness out of this bunch- I still wonder if that's a weakness that the coaches haven't really addressed especially with Scurry graduating.. but that's just my personal agenda and this generation of players are certainly different than many of us in that mindset..

I'm not going to single players out here- but a lot of things change when you have more talented players- they can guard better, close gaps/passing lanes because they're quicker, players with higher basketball IQ's puts them in better off-ball positions because they can actually absorb the instructions provided- higher IQ allows for more offensive and defensive strategies to be employed.. short of some major jumps you're still another recruiting cycle/year away from where things could get interesting.. so to me it looks like a single (terrible) year setback.. bad year undoubtedly but hopefully just one year.
 
Other than Dishman, who else is sitting out?
Jordan Davis and Jalen Jordan are the scholarship players sitting out. Also have two D1 transfer walk-ons that had to sit out. Brian Coffey and Marcus Mitchell.
 
Jordan Davis and Jalen Jordan are the scholarship players sitting out. Also have two D1 transfer walk-ons that had to sit out. Brian Coffey and Marcus Mitchell.
Marcus Mitchell's bio is interesting - a former QB:

2018-19 (Sophomore at Mississippi Valley State): Played in 18 games, starting in five contests … Averaged 3.8 points and 2.6 rebounds per game while shooting 41.9 percent from the field … Tallied a season-high seven points on four occasions, including his Division I debut at Nebraska … Pulled down a season-high seven rebounds coming off the bench against Southeast Missouri State.

2017-18 (Freshman at Columbia State CC): Played in 30 games and earned one start for the Chargers … Averaged 5.6 points and 5.3 rebounds per outing, shooting 52.3 percent from the field … Turned in perhaps his best outing at Cumberland, pouring a career-high 20 points and grabbing a career-high 14 rebounds

2016-17 (Freshman at Southern Arkansas): Began his career in collegiate athletics on the gridiron as a quarterback at Southern Arkansas.
 
This is so hard to read. I guess when there is no actual real hope that blind optimism in the face of reality is the only way to go.

So, we have some guys siting who can beat the ones who aren’t. So instead of winning 15% of our D1 games we can expect to win 25% or maybe even double our performance all the way up to 30% next year. What a turnaround.

I can’t believe I read up above someone mention top third. Sometimes I feel I’m the only one actually paying attention to what’s happening within the program. Well maybe me, FR, and JT.

SMDH.
 
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This is so hard to read. I guess when there is no actual real hope that blind optimism in the face of reality is the only way to go.

So, we have some guys siting who can beat the ones who aren’t. So instead of winning 15% of our D1 games we can expect to win 25% or maybe even double our performance all the way up to 30% next year. What a turnaround.

I can’t believe I read up above someone mention top third. Sometimes I feel I’m the only one actually paying attention to what’s happening within the program. Well maybe me, FR, and JT.

SMDH.
Your main problem is you interpret things wrong. Top 3rd is not the overall goal, but being a top 4 team in the conference next year would be a hell of a turn around. Why would we not be happy with that for next year? We all obviously want better.
 
Your main problem is you interpret things wrong. Top 3rd is not the overall goal, but being a top 4 team in the conference next year would be a hell of a turn around. Why would we not be happy with that for next year? We all obviously want better.

I would be happy with that. Ecstatic actually but I have a better chance of stealing Gisele from Tom Brady than we do of seeing MT in the top four next year. It’s funny that you say I interpret things wrong given I’m one of the few people who has been correct about the problems, downward trajectory, and outcomes while most folks here have continued to talk rainbows and unicorns. We can go back to the first month of the season where people were talking about a .500 or better season. I could see then we wouldn’t be close. And here we are so how can I be accused of interpreting anything wrong? My interpretation is that a majority here have continued act like there is a good chance this is going to be turned around when there isn’t a single piece of viable evidence to support that. Saying the redshirts are better than everything else we have is grasping at straws.

So, let me put this in context one last time.

1. The thing that matters more than anything else is coaching. People say recruiting is the lifeblood and that’s true to an extent, but good players not coached well at the higher end of the mid level won’t get it done. As I have said before it can work at lower levels to just out athlete your conference foes who don’t recruit as well but not here. And what we have seen out of this staff is an inability to truly develop any of the players or enhance team progress development.

2. Philosophy matters too. I have said this many times. I’ve said this since the day he was hired. Defense must be played at this level to win championships. CNM does not have the tenacity nor the background as a coach to deliver the type of defenses that will get us back on top. Similarly to what I said above you can use this style in low major where your conference opponents don’t play a lot of good defense either so with his better quality of offensive players at Asheville than his opponents he was able to win there. But if you really want to look at this issue go back and look at how Asheville faired when they played up to high majors or even higher mids and see how they did. The bottom line is - and again I have also said this repeatedly- this style can work at lower levels (at least in conference) and at the highest levels like Duke/Kentucky where the elite offensive players also play defense at a high level just because they are the best of the best. But we aren’t going to get those types of players here. The bottom line is C-USA already gets the caliber of players he was getting at Asheville, so if he’s recruiting the same caliber then he’s going to have to coach them and develop them to be better than the rest of the league. And what I have pointed out is he doesn’t have it. Or IMO he hasn’t demonstrated that at any point.
 
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I would be happy with that. Ecstatic actually but I have a better chance of stealing Gisele from Tom Brady than we do of seeing MT in the top four next year. It’s funny that you say I interpret things wrong given I’m one of the few people who has been correct about the problems, downward trajectory, and outcomes while most folks here have continued to talk rainbows and unicorns. We can go back to the first month of the season where people were talking about a .500 or better season. I could see then we wouldn’t be close. And here we are so how can I be accused of interpreting anything wrong? My interpretation is that a majority here have continued act like there is a good chance this is going to be turned around when there isn’t a single piece of viable evidence to support that. Saying the redshirts are better than everything else we have is grasping at straws.

So, let me put this in context one last time.

1. The thing that matters more than anything else is coaching. People say recruiting is the lifeblood and that’s true to an extent, but good players not coached well at the higher end of the mid level won’t get it done. As I have said before it can work at lower levels to just out athlete your conference foes who don’t recruit as well but not here. And what we have seen out of this staff is an inability to truly develop any of the players or enhance team progress development.

2. Philosophy matters too. I have said this many times. I’ve said this since the day he was hired. Defense must be played at this level to win championships. CNM does not have the tenacity nor the background as a coach to deliver the type of defenses that will get us back on top. Similarly to what I said above you can use this style in low major where your conference opponents don’t play a lot of good defense either so with his better quality of offensive players at Asheville than his opponents he was able to win there. But if you really want to look at this issue go back and look at how Asheville faired when they played up to high majors or even higher mids and see how they did. The bottom line is - and again I have also said this repeatedly- this style can work at lower levels (at least in conference) and at the highest levels like Duke/Kentucky where the elite offensive players also play defense at a high level just because they are the best of the best. But we aren’t going to get those types of players here. The bottom line is C-USA already gets the caliber of players he was getting at Asheville, so if he’s recruiting the same caliber then he’s going to have to coach them and develop them to be better than the rest of the league. And what I have pointed out is he doesn’t have it. Or IMO he hasn’t demonstrated that at any point.

What you describe in this post is what I have been seeing unfold over this nightmare of a season.

After witnessing this utter failure of a season, I'm beyond hoping based on potential. While I would consider it great progress to finish 3rd in conference next year, I would have to see it to believe it at this point. Currently, I'm seeing players regress. The team has no identity other than losing. I'm not happy about having to say it, but it is reality.
 
This dude and his staff can't coach. That's the bottom line. After watching belmont win the OVC today, you could just see the difference in coaching between them and us. Night and day. You could give CMD a team of 5 stars and he'd still run it in the ground. No attack strategy, no fundamentals being stressed, no discipline, hardly any defense, and no real shot selection. The players just jack up 3's with no one under the damn basket. That's coaching or lack thereof. We'll see if I'm wrong next year but I'm thinking 7-10 wins. I would have won 2k this season if CMD's buddy would have taken my bet. :) I'm no basketball expert but it ain't hard to know what a dumpster fire looks like.
 
if you don’t have the Jimmies & Joes then it doesn’t matter about the X’s & O’s..
Bullsh!t. If Jimmy and Joe can't pass the damn ball inbounds without committing turnovers, it's the coaches fault for not drilling them properly and teaching basic fundamentals and discipline. It's been 2 years. If we don't have the Jimmies and Joes, this dude ain't ever getting them here which means he can't recruit or coach.

10 wins is my call next year and that's being optimistic.
 
I want to believe McDevitt is the answer. I want McDevitt to be the answer. They say first impressions are important.....Year 1 went about as expected, but Year 2 was just a disaster. Not much on the roster changed other than graduating a few of Kermits players and Farquhar leaving who didn't contribute much anyway. There was no excuse for Year 2 to be so bad. I don't have the answers as to why it was. Everyone across the board seemed to regress. It was not encouraging. Effort was poor, defense was poor, shooting was usually poor. We had good halves but could never seem to put it together for a full game.

It's all about Year 3 and moving forward at this point. I'm convinced next year will be better because quite frankly, it cannot get much worse. So we will see improvement in Year 3, which will be enough for him to earn a Year 4. I'm convinced Massaro will not fire McDevitt unless we win single digit games again in Year 3. Look for a powder puff schedule next season. So we are going to have at least 2 more seasons with Nick.

Moving forward, we've just got to get better talent on our roster. The transfers and a healthy Dishman will be a nice injection....but we have to find some serious starter material players with this signing class.

I'm not throwing in the towel with McDevitt yet. Year 2 was obviously very discouraging, but I'm hopeful McDevitt will take the off-season to really reflect, learn, and continue to improve as a coach himself along while trying to upgrade our talent. I would implore him to consider what was successful here before, maybe watch some of our old games, and to look at other successful G5 programs and draw on some of their strengths to implement here. I really want Nick to succeed here. He seems like a smart, well intentioned dude who understands basketball. He is still very young though and has plenty of room to grow. I hope he realizes that.
 
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I watched most of the game last night. Honestly, it was horrible basketball. Both teams were bad. The two worst teams in CUSA played practically to a draw.

I’m not gonna pay hard earned money to watch that in person next year.
 
An interesting stat that I saw this weekend and I think most folks recognize it anecdotally is that the Top 5 teams in CUSA had the lowest percentage of minutes played by freshmen and was respective of their finishing order.. the lowest 4 teams had the most minutes of play by freshmen, also in that respective order..
 
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An interesting stat that I saw this weekend and I think most folks recognize it anecdotally is that the Top 5 teams in CUSA had the lowest percentage of minutes played by freshmen and was respective of their finishing order.. the lowest 4 teams had the most minutes of play by freshmen, also in that respective order..

Link please?

I really don't think that is indicative of as much as you think. If you look at CUSA standings over time, there's a top half and bottom half in this league. You typically always find these teams finishing in their respective areas. ie. southern miss, rice, florida atlantic, utep, etc. are never any good. UTEP used to be a powerhouse obviously, but hot trash for a long time now.

Then there's the top half of the league. WKU, Marshall, UAB, La. Tech, ODU, and MT used to be there.........

Of course there are some exceptions. ODU had a down year this year, FIU and Charlotte were better than expected. North Texas has been pretty erratic, some years being terrible and others being quite good. But the league as a whole has been pretty consistent and predictable, regardless of which classmen are playing which minutes.
 
Link please?

I really don't think that is indicative of as much as you think. If you look at CUSA standings over time, there's a top half and bottom half in this league. You typically always find these teams finishing in their respective areas. ie. southern miss, rice, florida atlantic, utep, etc. are never any good. UTEP used to be a powerhouse obviously, but hot trash for a long time now.

Then there's the top half of the league. WKU, Marshall, UAB, La. Tech, ODU, and MT used to be there.........

Of course there are some exceptions. ODU had a down year this year, FIU and Charlotte were better than expected. North Texas has been pretty erratic, some years being terrible and others being quite good. But the league as a whole has been pretty consistent and predictable, regardless of which classmen are playing which minutes.

Can't send you a usable link as I doubt you have access to Synergy Sports Tech stats.. let me see if I can do a screenshot without violating any terms of use conditions.. not sure if any of the public stats databases keep that type of info..

I found it interesting is really all- not sure it's the end all be all of stats and isn't necessarily indicative year in/year out but in this years case it was if nothing else a weird coincidence
 
There is only one stat that matters. This is the worst C-USA has been since we entered the league and yet we weren’t much more than squished bugs except against one team. I guess the one good thing we can say is we weren’t the worst team since that honor seems to go to USM.
 
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How long will it be before we have comments from Massaro that the state of the program is strong and that this rebuilding phase is taking shape and how he expects great things going forward? I will leave this thread with something that sounds a little familiar...

“The two years that Mike was our head coach, the winning percentage over those two years is the worst by any Western Kentucky head coach since 1922,” Stewart said. “You look at where we have been as a program and where we are now, we need to get back to where we were. … It's my responsibility to get us going back in the direction that we have been at. Two years is a short time frame, but I think that ultimately you have to do what's right by your players. I had reached a conclusion that we weren't going to turn this around. There's no guarantees in life. I mean, there's a scenario out there where we would have. Mike certainly believes we would have, and I understand and I respect that.”

-Todd Stewart

“As we continue to elevate WKU’s instructional and inquiry missions, the same expectation for excellence extends to our athletics programs as well,” President Timothy Caboni said in a press release. “In consulting with Director of Athletics Stewart, I agree that for us to achieve the success we expect in WKU football, it is time to make a leadership change. Mike Sanford is a man of character, and we appreciate his service to our community.”
 
Firing Stockstill and McDevitt is only treating the symptom. A short term fix. Until the two headed virus of McPhee and Masarro are fired, they will continue to infect the university. No real change at the university can happen until they are gone.
 
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