Blue Man wrote: ↑3 years ago
Rhody72 wrote: ↑3 years ago
SGreenwell wrote: ↑3 years ago
Fans hate losing, and that's what about 99.9 percent of this forum's registered users are. I mean, I doubt "casual" fans are happy about the team's play either, but losing teams don't usually have casual fans anyway.
Many posters here are fans with a rational perspective about the team while some others are fanatics with an irrational perspective. Both groups want the team to be successful. I didn't "hate" losing to Wisconsin, Dayton or VCU for that matter. Admittedly, the losses to UMASS were tough to take. Everyone expected more from Carey, Betrand and Harris; and the injuries to Fatts and Makhi have hurt the team. Those with a rational perspective don't want to blow up the program because of what has happened this year.
So "fan" is literally the short form of "fanatic" - if you care about a sports team you do not play on enough to spend your free time posting your opinions on it on a message board, you're a fanatic too. We're all in the same boat. You are right that everyone on here wants the team to be successful.
I would point out that the biggest divide is what we all deem "success" to mean.
A lot of this programs fans are people from south county who do not care about sports outside of Kingston. They are happy to watch the team and think that a win against a "name brand" program is good - no matter how good that team actually is. They think that because we've never been a feature in March that an NCAA tournament birth is frosting on top of the cake that is watching the basketball team in the middle of winter, no matter how they are playing.
Then there are those of us who are also from the same area, but also care about sports outside of Kingston. They understand what "success" actually looks like in the context of college basketball and see no reason why with the proper investments and people that we could be a part of it.
They saw where Xavier, Temple, and Dayton have all gone since the late 1990's, and remember that we were contemporaries with all 3 of those programs. We made two awful decisions (Jerry D and a 10 year baseless contract extension for JB), and took different roads than the other former A-10 powers.
You also don't need to go too far back in history (3-5 years) to see a time when URI was once again a perennial top-of-the-conference power. Again, a lack of investments signaled a lack of a commitment to winning, and their star coach went to a place that tangibly valued winning on the same level he did. Mainly because their fan base had bigger expectations than what they were currently seeing. They fired a head coach who had literally won them a national championship - but they also understood basketball and knew what they were seeing wasn't sustainable under that coach.
So while I understand your perspective of not "hating" losing to certain teams - I remember the games and the context of how/why we lost those games, which is frustrating.
For example you talk about an injury to Fatts as hurting the team. That's obvious - but
why he's hurting the team is the problem. He's being played 20-30 minutes a night INJURED. In the Dayton loss, the team was working fine with Ish running the point and being on the floor instead of Fatts. In fact, Ish was the only player to register a positive +/- that night. a +9. Fatts Russell? -13. Plus with Ish in the lineup we had a lead. Cox put in Fatts and the lead evaporated.
That's one of a series of similar examples. Fatts' injury is hurting the team because of how the coach is handling it. Instead of letting his star player get rest (or forcing him to get rest for his own good) he is playing him to the detriment of the team and the player, helping no one.
It's the same argument for the VCU loss.
Losing is part of basketball, it comes with the territory. But it's on the coach to put the players in a position to win, and then the teams duke it out to see who was better on that given night.
The coach has pushed far more of the wrong buttons than the right buttons for the past 3 years, with obvious errors that were pointed out at the time and not just armchair point guards.
For the "everyone expected more from Carey and Betrand" argument - you're right, we did. This statement is apparent that you agree that they have fallen way short of expectations. So why then are they 5th and 7th in minutes on a team that plays 10 players a night?
Anyone who expected more of Harris simply hasn't watched basketball or has this weird complex where you can't point out that he sucks because he actually sucks - but why is he getting minutes in high leverage situations if there isn't foul trouble?
These are a few of a myriad of questions that hopefully the "casual" fan will start to ask of their coach after reading Morey's article.
But to say that those with a "rational perspective don't want to blow up the program because of what has happened this year" is a complete misrepresentation of what people are saying.
It has less to do with this individual year, as much as it does the development of the team, players, program, and coaches over a linear 3 year period.
It goes all the way back to taking Jeff Dowtin off the ball and letting Fatts do literally whatever he wants - calling his own plays at the end of games, forcing shots, literally shooting 18% for MONTHS that cost us 7 of 8 games in Jan/Feb and a chance at an NCAA birth.
It has less to do with wins and losses and more to do with HOW and WHY we are losing.
Hurley's year 2 team had a long losing streak and finished below .500 - no one was sounding alarm bells. We had a young team, our "leaders" were a senior transfer and a senior glue guy, and depended on freshmen EC and Hassan. Hurley's year 3 team took a huge step forward, beat a ranked team, almost made the NCAA, and went to the NIT. There was a linear progression in EVERYTHING - coaching staff changes, Hurley's substitution patterns and rotations changed - less playing time for guys like Biggie Minnis with the emergence of Jarvis, and burying guys like Jerelle Reischel who couldn't contribute. We didn't have an exodus of key pieces year over year.
It's such a wild oversimplification to say that people are angry because we're losing games this year and doesn't give this fan base enough credit. You don't need to be a pilot to recognize a plane crash. We recognize what good basketball looks like, we recognize what a functioning program looks like. It's obvious we're not seeing that regardless of our record.
