Nimreitz

He has coached at 2 of the 6 elite schools and that's it. Never proved himself when the onus was on coaching instead of merely accepting elite recruits and rolling out basketballs. He recruits well, but is not a good coach and never has been. He runs a system that maximizes his talent advantage (more possessions means more time for true ability to regress to the mean), but has shown very little else. I would even say he doesn't help guys get to the NBA that well considering how many McD's All Americans he's had flame out. And now this

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketb...sas_win_032512

Diable

And this is newsworthy? I assumed that everyone knew this. I can't even get Carolina fans to argue the point any more.

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Nimreitz

I've been saying it for years and very few others will admit it. Especially HB.

Diable

eh at one point I got a soberminded UNC grad to admit that he was no better than the fifth best coach in the state. That was when Sendek was at State, McKillop was at Davidson and Coach K at Duke. Think the other was Prosser he copped to, but all of those guys are easily better than Roy.

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Nimreitz

He's really outdoing himself this year. Meanwhile, in Wisconsin...

El Shaqtus

I'm still mad at Wisconsin for Brad Soderberg.

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Mom, thanks for everything.

RIP Coach Rick Majerus 12/1/12. You were the one that said it was OK to think big at SLU. You were right.

KVBL Lexington Kings

Nimreitz

There is a reason he was only an interim after Dick Bennett quit 3 games into the 00/01 season.

croco

Nim, Tom Izzo is still the best coach in the Big Ten.

Nimreitz

I think they are very close. Izzo gets much better talent and not coincidentally finds himself in the Final Four. There are plenty of exceptions to the rule, but generally it takes top level talent to make the Final Four. There have been only 2 teams that I thought were genuine contenders for Bo Ryan. The 2007 team that lost to UNLV in the second round when Alando Tucker was a First Team All American (although you can argue that their fate was sealed when Butch broke his arm at Ohio State late in the year) and the 2008 team (IMO, his best team by far) that lost to stupid ****ing Davidson. If Devin Harris returned for his senior year, then the 2005 team (that actually got to the Elite 8) would also qualify. Izzo has had a LOT of teams that were good enough to make a big run like that.

With that said, Bo is the winningest coach in Big Ten history, and he's done it at Wisconsin. Not Indiana, not Michigan, not Ohio State, not Michigan State. Wisconsin. And just for the record, Bo is 13-9 against Izzo.

croco

Well, yeah, but Izzo isn't exactly known as a top recruiter either. Not compared to other perennial powerhouses in college basketball anyway. And I think Ryan should be able to do better in that department, I mean Wisconsin isn't North Dakota State.

Nimreitz

Everyone underestimates 1) the style of play and 2) the geography. Wisconsin isn't recruiting nationally, and lots of guys won't even think about Wisconsin. Not to mention that Bo only takes guys that fit his system. The geography is tough even without Marquette right there in Milwaukee. Kids out of Chicago look to Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Purdue, Notre Dame, Michigan State, and Ohio State before Wisconsin comes into play at all. Michigan is close in distance, but it's a long ass drive around that lake for families. Wisconsin mostly recruits Wisconsin and Minnesota, and they compete with Buzz Williams and Tubby Smith. The kids we get out of Illinois and other Midwest states are mostly kids that aren't getting recruited by the other schools I mentioned.

Bo's recruiting has fallen off too, just FYI. He got really lucky with the emergence of Sam Dekker, but just compare the talent on this team up and down with the 2008 team: Marcus Landry, Brian Butch, Greg Steimsma, John Leuer, Trevon Hughes, Joe Krabbenhoft. Not even close.