KeaneyBlue - The URI Basketball Forum

On January 30, 2008, URI beat Richmond at home to go to 18-3. Rhody would actually beat Dayton its next time out to get to 19-3 before the most painful and complete collapse of my life as a sports fan, losing nine of our final eleven games - including unceremonious first round exits out of the A-10 and NIT tournaments.

That was one of the most talented rosters URI has had in my lifetime - it belonged in the group with the teams that have risen every ten years or so at URI over the last several decades: 78, 88, 98, and now this 2018 team looks poised to join that group. Will Daniels, Jimmy, Parfait, Seawright, Cothran, Ulmer, and a young Delroy James making some cameos. That team deserved better.

Anyways, I raise this a little as a cautionary tale - to not get too far ahead of ourselves, etc., but mostly just to tip my cap to and remember a team that meant a lot to me at the time and still does. They did all the things you would have asked through this point in the season we are entering now - they beat PC, they won at Syracuse, they were two possessions against Al Skinner's BC Eagles from going unbeaten in OOC. Just a damn shame what happened to that team.

That team was not quite as good as this team, and the A-10 is not as good now as it was then. But still, seeing 18-3 and a national ranking jars some memories.

It was a nightmare.
It should have never happened.
Baron showed how inept he was as a leader if he couldn't get a roster filled with guys who would go on to star on professional teams overseas.
I remember us killing Temple at Temple by like 16 in the second half and then the great collapse begun.
The Creighton NIT game was a grotesque microchosm of the entire season. The first half we were destroying them 50-33. A competent talented team.
Then being up 12 with 3 minutes left and finding a way to lose.....I think I literally screamed and cried.

This won't happen to this year team though for one simple reason.

Dan Hurley.

Thank you Dan for saving us.

Always good to reflect on the massive mountain that was traversed in order to get here. Different times, different coach, different attitude, and oh yea, we broke the streak so that helps, but WOW what a tragedy that was.

Just compare the coaches CFL and DH we are in much better hands

I think the collapse of the 2008 team can be tied to ego-management.....I don't think that will be a problem this year....

I remember Baron sitting Daniels for the last 12 minutes of that Creighton NIT game....with 3 fouls...and never to return......what a blow job....

even worse, they were sitting at 20-4 on Feb 10th that year.

they proceeded to finish 1-6 and get bounced in their 1st A10 tourney game to finish 21-11

I wonder what out BRacketology status was then?

I think we were in the "should be in" category at that point.....

rambone 78 wrote:I think we were in the "should be in" category at that point.....

Correct. Unlike this year, we didn't have a tough SOS or marquee win to hang our hat on. We also had a bad loss on our schedule already.

Bad loss to BC (14-17). Bad loss to St Louis (16-15).

Best wins were over a bad PC team (15-16), and our "marquee" win was over NIT quarterfinalist Syracuse.

Baron did an awful job of scheduling OOC (per usual), and gave us ZERO opportunities for a marquee win, or even really a good win.

When you look back, no matter how excited we were - the writing was on the wall that we were not a battle-tested team, nor did we have the basis for an NCAA resume. We were a paper top 25 team, and we had 3 conference opportunities for a "quality" win.

@#17 Dayton, vs Temple, and vs #10 Xavier.

Loss, loss, and loss.

Short of that type of meltdown - (which is hard to foresee based on a litany of factors including but not limited to; how good we are, how bad the conference is, the winning mentality this team has, their defense, their senior leadership, the team understanding what it takes to win at a high level, who their coach is) - we have "done enough" to warrant an at-large invite/lock status in bubble watch, though obviously we are playing for seeding right now.

What a difference a decade makes.

Will Daniels perhaps the most misused player in Ram history.

Ugh. My heart aches.

It is a shame that players like Will Daniels, Will Martel, Jimmy Baron, Keith Cothran, Lamont Ulmer, and Parfait Bitee never got to experience the NCAA tournament....

Sad era for URI Basketball between Harrick and Hurley

Fla. Atlantic W, 90-63
at Brown W, 75-61
at USF W, 74-67
Stetson W, 80-65
at UAB W, 74-69
at Boston College L, 76-70
Toledo W, 83-57
Northeastern W, 92-72
New Hampshire W, 87-76
Providence W, 77-60
at Syracuse W, 91-89
Hofstra W, 88-69
Eastern Mich W, 92-75
at Ga. Southern W, 85-80
Fairleigh Dickinson W, 94-63

Weak OOC Schedule which was 100% Baron strategy, not just this year but every year. His focus was on getting wins first and foremost. Even in his last year or two when the pressure was on him and Thor was making him change coaches and putting pressure on him to recruit better, etc Baron kept referring to his number of wins over the 5 year period. He would say this often and to whoever would listen, a broken record.

It was all about wins.

He got everyone all excited with the wins this year - 10 years ago. But the team failed miserably.

Inexcusable to have such a long gap between NCAA Tournaments between Harrick and Hurley. We never went so song - and most frustrating was the new Ryan Center was a Gift - but Baron never leveraged that Gift anywhere near to what a good Head Coach would have. Imagine Dan Hurley with the new Ryan Center?????

I am pretty sure it was the relationship between Will D and Baron that derailed that season.