Illinois basketball fans

[IlliniFan]

I've noticed that in all of our games. We can't get any easy buckets. Our offense isn't smooth and isn't getting anyone any open looks. It's really just not being run the way it should be.

[JordanPippenRodman]

there just isn't any talent to run it properly. it's the same system that we saw in the Championship game except Illinois has zero offensive threat whatsoever this year.

[ThaKing]

Looks like Weber got a kid from Compton. 6-3 shooting guard, 3 star rating per scout.com. http://basketballrecruiting.rivals.c...=43131&Sport=2

[wang4three]

Kid went to the same school as Tyson Chandler. Cool.

[ThaKing]

This is a serious question, and I mean no dis-respect by it. Is Weber just settling for whoever he can get? You guys have a pretty decent program and It wouldn't take much of a coach at all to be able to get good players to your university. I mean look at your football team, a decent coach can turn a program around fast. If you can get good football players, to come to a basketball school, shouldn't the basketball team be getting good recruits? It seems like Weber is hurting your program more than helping it.

[wang4three]

Honestly I've gone back and forth over whether I believe the "Weber not recruting well is hurting the team more than his brilliant coaching" opinion. I honestly have no idea, but I still stand behind him. This is the first time he's stepping in with his recruits and this team is totally new and it did take awhile for Deron, Dee, Luther, Roger, and James to learn the system, so I think I'm going to stick that it will be another year before I make my final decision.

[ThaKing]

When is this "Brilliant" coaching going to occur? The NIT? I know it's hard to get down on a coach your so heavily relying on, but he has just been awful.

[wang4three]

I blame the players more than I blame Bruce. I don't think Bruce tells Chester Frazier to dribble into traps. I don't think he tells Shaun Pruitt to pop to the three point line. I don't think he tells Brian Randle to play unmotivated and asks him not to be a leader out on the court.

At the same time though, we see a guy like Warren Carter, the man I thought was a scrub have a great season and even on some draft websites he's being penciled in as a late 2nd rounder. That's amazing for a man who didn't start till his senior year and playing with as much heart and desire as I've ever seen a basketball player play. Jamar Smith too.

So it's give and take, but with a 38-2 season, you can't say it was all because of the players. I don't believe that. It has to be the coach and the adjustments/preparations they make for the game. Or how well we played last year, despite a short tourney run.

Bruce is a good person with a good mind. His defense held Conley and Oden to what? 12 points? Can't ask for much better than that. The players had plenty of open shots on offense, just didn't make them.

[ThaKing]

I didn't watch thew OSU game to know how well his gameplan was, Im basing my opinion on, you know, facts. Like wins and losses. It seems to me that he can coach and have success with good players, he just can't convince them to come to Illinois. Ive heard many people say recruiting is more important than coaching is. I don't klnow if I agree with that but no matter what you say about Bruce, I'm sure everyone expected a little more, after going to the championship game with Bill's boys. In terms of recruiting

[IlliniFan]

Yeah, what's been up with Randle? He's not the same player that he was last year. Is he still not at 100%? Is he just not putting forth the effort? Is it both?

[wang4three]

I didn't watch thew OSU game to know how well his gameplan was, Im basing my opinion on, you know, facts. Like wins and losses. It seems to me that he can coach and have success with good players, he just can't convince them to come to Illinois. Ive heard many people say recruiting is more important than coaching is. I don't klnow if I agree with that but no matter what you say about Bruce, I'm sure everyone expected a little more, after going to the championship game with Bill's boys. In terms of recruiting

It's hard for anyone to follow-up a 38-2 season, even if we didn't win the championship. Right now we're at the bottom of the Big Ten, and Weber has seen the worst luck with recruits, but because of the 38-2 season I have patience with him. This years recruits may be unsalvagable, but the 2008 class should be marred with no error. I think he knows that, and I hope to see him come through.

Yeah, what's been up with Randle? He's not the same player that he was last year. Is he still not at 100%? Is he just not putting forth the effort? Is it both?

If he's hurt then he should sit. Cause right now he isn't playing like the NBA player he wants to become. So he should figure out if he wants to lead this team, or watch from the sidelines cause I can't stand to see him decide for maybe 5 minutes every game to play tough and look like a star than just be mediocre for the rest.

[TheGame414]

I'm sure everyone expected a little more, after going to the championship game with Bill's boys. In terms of recruiting

And if "Bill's Boys" had been coached by Bill, we would've seen much the same we saw from Kansas that season: 23-24 wins, 7 or 8 losses, an early tournament exit, and much dimmer NBA futures for Deron, James and Luther, and probably no NBA future for Dee or Roger.

Don't revise history; the '05 guys were not a fleet of high school All-Americans that were a ready-made title contender. Dee was the only McDonald's All-American of the bunch. Not only that, he was the only Top 50 prep prospect on the team, aside from McBride, who was overrated coming out of high school. He didn't leave a team full of Top 10 guys, like Roy Williams inherited at UNC. (And before you bring up Charlie Villanueva's commit that he backed out of when Self left, I'll say this once and once only: Charlie Villanueva was never coming to Illinois no matter who was here. The coaching change simply gave him an easy out.)

So quit with the condescending bull****. We're not good this year. We get it. Weber, for multiple reasons, has had struggles in recruiting. Got it. Thanks for the hot news tip, sport.

As far as this class goes, I hardly see how Weber "settled for whatever he could get." I'm personally not a huge fan of Bill Cole, but like Jamar Smith, who's turning out pretty well, he was an early offer. He could've held one of the two scholarships for Cole or Mike Tisdale and gotten Alex Tyus instead. He chose not to. I'm willing to wait and see them as college players before I judge. As far as Tisdale goes, he may not be a Top 100 player- and he actually might be before this year's over because he's having an outstanding season- but everyone who's watched him this year has raved about his potential. I've read several writers say that Derrick Rose is the only senior in the state this year with more NBA potential than Tisdale. Again, we'll see.

He just got a commit from the Rivals.com No. 83 player in the nation. No. 57, No. 83 and No. 148 may not have been ideal, but considering what he's gone through with the Rose and Gordon sagas, it isn't bad either. Quinton Watkins is far from "taking whatever you can get." He's fairly comparable player to E'Twaun Moore who just hasn't been as exposed. It isn't like Weber hasn't tried to get the best players in the nation. But if you don't get them, you have to get something. McCamey was more than simply a backup plan for Rose; he was a priority, and we got him.

He had the best player in the nation committed to him for nearly a year. Had IDKWTI and his dad not stabbed Weber in the back, we'd have one of the top 5 or 10 classes in the nation this year. If you can find a way to fault Weber for the way things went down with IDKWTI, you're high.

He had a silent commit from Sherron Collins before Longstreet got his chubby palms greased.

Derrick Rose liked Illinois more than any other school before the adidas deal was made.

This isn't to say that he's had problems closing the deal. Maybe he needs to find an assistant to deal with shady characters like Reggie Rose and Anthony Longstreet, and should swallow his pride and just look the other way.

[ThaKing]

Wow Game is back, and he's not in a good mood. I'm sure Bruce will make everything better. But seriously since this is an Illinois thread lets not start with Self vs. Weber. Self = #6 team in the country, Weber = unranked team, that will have to turn things around to make the NCAA tournament. Its not even worth arguing over. Maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way but it seems like coaches have taken the Illini job as a stepping stone to a major program. At least this way with Weber, you won't have to worry about him taking another job, I just can't see anyone offering him one.

[TheGame414]

I'm in a fine mood. When you come into the thread and say "I mean no disrespect" and then do nothing but trash our coach and our program, it's mildly annoying.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't upset with our recruiting misses.

But it would be equally untruthful to deny that Weber has had a massive amount of terrible luck.

The whole Gordon saga; Rose being sold to adidas; Collins being swayed by Longstreet; Patrick Beverley's coach refusing to have his transcripts sent here; the admissions holdup with Brandon Rush (still not sure how Kansas got him in); and so on.

Every great program in the nation has had down times in the last 10-15 years. We've been on a major high for seven years. If it's our turn to be down, it sucks, but so be it. UCLA, Indiana, Duke, UNC...they've all had sub-.500 seasons in the last 15 years. Arizona's been a No. 8 seed and a first-weekend exit two times the last three years. Kansas did the same in '99 and '00, I think. Kentucky lost 13 games last year. Michigan State has lost 11 or more games three times in the last four years, and was a first-round exit in '02, '04 and '06.

Peaks and valleys. That's sports. No one, not even the elite, stays this good for this long without some sort of downturn eventually. You just hope it's temporary. Even Duke, with the only streak of 25-win seasons longer than ours, has been bounced from the Sweet 16 as a No. 1 seed four times this decade.

The great thing about college basketball- or football- is how quickly things can turn around, on the field or in recruiting (which generally leads to on-field success, of course). Illinois loses 45 football games in five years, yet follows up a Top 25 recruiting class with a Top 10 class and all of a sudden things look promising.

We lose the No. 2 player in the nation, and the chance to get several other outstanding players at his position that very well may have come here (Moore, Tucker- though his recruitment may have been even dirtier than Derrick Rose's or Sherron Collins', from what I've read), and we get a Top 100 player from Compton, CA, who's never even visited the campus who fits the exact need we had for our last '07 scholarship. We have one of the 5-10 best freshmen in the nation committed, and the No. 2 freshman in the state is Demetri McCamey's little brother. We're on better footing for the 2009 kids, like D.J. Richardson, than we have been for any class since Weber's been here. We've got a chance for a very good 2008 class with guys like Suggs, Liggins, Jones, Jackson and Dunigan.

Will all the pieces fall into place? I think recent history would say it'd be foolish to think they will.

We'll see.

[TheGame414]

Self = #6 team in the country, Weber = unranked team, that will have to turn things around to make the NCAA tournament. Its not even worth arguing over. Maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way but it seems like coaches have taken the Illini job as a stepping stone to a major program

Yawn.

And Kansas and Illinois are equal programs, right?

If all things- players, resources, exposure, tradition- were equal, Weber is a much better coach than Self. That's not really too debatable. You can wave the No. 6 ranking around. That's fine. Let's see how he finishes. Hasn't finished too well so far in his Kansas career.

He's having tremendous recruiting success at a program that anyone could recruit well at.

No one's making the case that Weber is Self's equal as a recruiter, but again, the RSCI rankings of the 2005 starters: No. 56, No. 19, unranked, No. 62, No. 78. It was a good- perhaps very good- group of players Self recruited. Not great. It wasn't Felton, McCants and May.

At least this way with Weber, you won't have to worry about him taking another job, I just can't see anyone offering him one

Good.
Because the recruiting doldrums will end sooner rather than later, and we have one of the best coaches in the country for as long as we want to keep him. I'd rather not have every season end wondering if the coach is going to leave.

But if Tubby Smith gets canned any time soon, Weber is going to be one of Kentucky's top choices. I will guarantee you that.

Even if other schools did come calling, I wouldn't be all that worried. Different people define "dream job" in different ways. Weber grew up in Wisconsin, and coached at Purdue for 18 years. For him, coaching at one of the Big Ten's premier programs was his dream job. He has that.