huzzah

I think Lindenwood College has a tennis program. Like Harris it is a 4 yr school.

I think we went one on one because we do not have a pg of competitive Div 1 calibur. The only guard who can bring the ball up court against pressure is Kevin Lisch. I think the question should be: Why did this coach not recruit a pg to replace AD? The lack of a pg is more important the the lack of a good pf. The lack of a pg will prevent us from pulling off a "miracle" in Atlantic City. The bottom line is that the game was fun to watch. You wonder why IV seemly just got motivated toward the end of the season. Is this another coaching problem; that is; inability to motivate. Does this help explain the St. Bonnie loss?

Roy I am sorry to be the proverbial straw that broke your back. I think you expressed your opinion on coach in a cogent manner. I have never met you, but I always respected your opinion and the discussions we have had on the board have always been objective and not personal. I root for SLU and want them to do the best, to emulate Marquette and Gonzaga. My opinions are value judgments and not absolutes. I apoligize for upsetting you. I know we agree on the following: Many Huzzahs to our beloved Billikens

I went to a ladies bb game last night @ EB Center. It was really fun and I recommend the games to everyone. Two games are left, Sun 2/11; 1PM vs Fordham and Sun 2/18; 1PM vs GW. What we did was go down to Laclede Station prior to the game and got in on happy hour which is buy 1 and get 2. It is an easy walk up to the game. I think most of the restuarants in the area feature happy hour, but check first. On Sundays you can try Nadoz or Laclede Station for a Sun Brunch. Nadoz is $22, while the station is much less. Other restuarants in the area are equally fine and I visit Humpreys, Barcardis and Vitos frequently. Check on Sunday hours. The game itself was attended by about 300, so the setting was intimate. They threw out balls to the crowd,and the cheer leaders and baby blues did some nice routines. The band is downsized, but sounded fabulous. One criticism; clothe the baby blues in the school colors, not black and blue. They were outfitted the same as at the men's games. If the dowager does not like baby blues can we go to something less generic than "dance team" Maybe Billiken Felines. The baby blues may even have some good ideas. Back to the game, Theresa did a fabulous behind the back dribble, better than I can recall the men doing. Also we had people bringing the ball up court and switching from the left hand to the right hand on the dribble. Overall the game was very entertaining.

I think Brad is a Div 2 coach. In Div 2 he had a 2-1 win record. At Wisconsin Brad became head coach of a final 4 team and lead them to a 16-10 record and 5th place in the Big 10. Wisconsin lost in the first round of the NCAA and Brad was dismissed. Wisconsin has been on fire since. Brad's win loss record at Div 1 is considerably less than at Div 2. Recently the Post Dispatch asked people what sport they would persue in the interim between the Super Bowl and baseball spring training. Hockey came in first at 40%. SLU came in last at 2%. In a poll on local sportscasters, also by the Post, Bob Ramsey came in last. This is not because of his talent level, but rather reflects the lack of interest in SLU basketball. Thus Brad has had no media impact here as also evidenced by his absence in local commercials. He became head coach because of affordability. However, this may change. The school is building a new arena and needs to sell tickets and raise donations. The tickets will be sold with preferred seating demanding an annual premium and encouraging membership in the Billiken Club, which, with donations to the Billiken Club, will further increase ticket prices. This is fine and will work, but you must have a product. NCAA appearances are lucrative and will help with all of the above. To make the whole thing work we have to get results, so I think the school, if it has common sense, will upgrade the coaching. If it does not the new arena will become a financial burden. The new arena per se is not the panacea; an attractive product is. We have received good coverage from the Post, the best ever, so lack of interest in Billiken bb falls on court results or the lack there of. I don't know if Brad will ever be terminated. I cannot predict the future. My bottom line wish is that things get turned around and Brad succeeds.

If you read the article, especially the last paragraph "Work To Do" Soderberg thinks Liddell needs to do more work on his shot. "And Liddell knows he needs to work on his ball skills, that some-times he's overconfident and that leads to turnovers." The article concludes that this may well be the work that is ahead this summer for Liddell, and judging by the work he is parepared to put in, that may well be the headache that awaits A-10 coaches next fall. I don't see anything here that indicates Liddell is prepared to opt for the NBA draft at this time.

I think TL was reacting to a play that occurred a few minutes prior to his sky dunk. If you recall TL was fouled hard and ended up on the floor. He made the 2 free throws and caught fire. On ending the sky dunk he presided over the GW player who was laying on the court on his backside. However, I don't know if this was the same player that gave TL the hard foul that decked him, but I think it was. In any event I got the impression he answered back via making the two free throws and the dunk. On a different note I thought the Post did a good job covering the Bills over the week-end. We had a good pre game article and two post game articles. Coverage was quite ample compared to other area teams.

My guess is the scouts came to look primarily @ Alexander, who was good in the Big 12 and is good in the A-10. Iv's game has went south this year for whatever reasons. Liddell needs to improve his ball handling skills to make it in the NBA. I can see how they got excited about Lisch. He is our one player who aggresively brings the ball upcourt against a press. Both Poke and Liddell stop when they see an opposing player and look to pass. However, Liddell is improving so rapidly it is hard to pin an evaluation on him and against Charlotte he did aggresively bring the ball up and handled the ball better than on other occasions. My guess is he is still a year away from NBA.

We can go with a coach of the likes of Romar or Spoon, but we do not have to. Lets look at the Wisconsin situation, where Brad came from. He inherited the team two games into the season. Brad was an ass't under Bennet after coaching Div 2 and winning at a ratio of about 2-1. He did not win any league championships, but was a winning coach. Wisconsin had just come off of a final 4 appearance and expectations were high. Brad ended the season at 16-10, good for fifth in the Big 10. The team got to the NCAA, but was eliminated in the first round. Brad did not meet fan expectations and was replaced by a coach, not widely known from a small Wisconsin school. The University of Wisconsin did much better the very next year and has excelled ever since. I think this year they have but 1 loss. Therefore, you do not necessarily need a big name and you do not necessarily need a long transition period. Spoon and Romar got us to post season in short order. What you need is an AD that can judge talent and goes out and gets that person.

On Hwy 64, just west of the armory, there is a nice billboard advertising Billiken basketball. In the Bush Student Center there is a very large and very visibal poster. It states free tickets and transportation will be given to students showing proper ID for several upcoming games, I think about 5 or 6, including Sat and Sat nite games. At the bottome of the poster it says "sponsered by Blue Crew". I don't know if Blue Crew is paying for the tickets and then distributing them or if the school is giving tickets to the Blue Crew and then letting them handle publicity and distribution. I am not defending promotions as I think overall it is lame, but these two items indicate promotions is not 100% dead. Maybe the polster Blue Crew Pres can enlighten us more.

Leland Stanford financed the Central Pacific RR based out of Sacremento. They had a subsidiary, the Southern Pacific, a name they eventually used in lieu of Central Pacific. Central Pacific connected w/ Union Pacific in Utah and thus opened the west. You could go from CHI to SAC in 2 days instead of 2 months. Central Pacific is where the money came from. Programs w/ both football and bb can pay AD's more than bb only schools because of the difference in revenue. Therefore losing AD's to Maryland , etc is understandable and does not reflect adversly on SLU. Females don't seem to be as readily accepted as AD's yet. We can hire real good females and they may eventually move on, but our program comes out ahead by giving talented females the chance. I am proud of SLU giving these two talented females, DY and CL. a chance to lead. If they move on to a fb and bb school more power to them.

I don't believe the budget is a big issue in our recruiting. If we can afford to send Romar to LAX to recruit a center, than we can afford to send Brad to CHI, to Peoria, to KC, and to other points in the midwest to recruit. And very good players come out of this area. KC has one player going to Stanford and is somewhat under recruited since Kansas recruits a lot out of California and is a national player. You can drive Peoria and CHI and KC can be flown to for about $100, well within the SLU budget. Peoria, KC, and CHI have produced a lot of talent as a group over the past 4 years. How many of these players do we have. The floor coaching is a problem, but so is recruiting, and so is team conditioning. I don't see the budget as a problem, unless we are denying this coach access to the midwest.

I don't know if the team has quit on Brad. However, I do think this is not a well conditioned team. The Bills started out the game on fire, but I thought they ran out of energy in the 2nd half. IV, in particular, looks in less condition this year than last year. Our conservative coaching makes us very predictable and thus easy to defend. Some of the intercepts were on plays it seemed the Dukes knew about from tape. However, our main problem, I think, is lack of a point guard. We bring the ball up by passing not by dribbling past defenders. We apparantly are not recruiting CHI, but I don't know if this is because of budget restrictions or something else. Charlie Newberry would look great on this team. This was one of the most depressing Bill's game I have watched. Because we don't have a PG I don't look for miracles to happen. Nark made one of the earliest calls on Brad and it looks like he was right. I opted for the five years, giving him the first year because of his late hire, and I think he earned the five year tenure, but now it looks like Wisconsin and Nark had it right. Now I wish I had stayed at home. Even the Rolling Rock, the one AB just bought, tasted like crap. And I bought it at Kiel..er Savis..er Scott and it cost $6.

Our 2 guard was DP, @ 5'7" and TL is the pg. Why? I think DP makes bad decisions and cannot drive to the basket and score. TL's drive to the hoop in the 2nd half w/ a slam dunk was very exciting. However, I wonder how many teams win w/ our guard set up. This is a credit to Soderburg because DP brings things to the floor including speed and incredible jumping ability and Brad has figured out how best to utilize his talents. Our defense in the first half was a tad below horrible. However, I give credit to Soderburg for turning things around in the second half. We not only began defending the perimiter, but we passed to the open man, LM, when IV was double teamed. Mississippi did not react to this quick enough and as a consequence we got back into the game. Husak needs to get into the weight room. He looks as weak as I am. IV also needs conditioning work. He does not seem as well conditioned as last year and may be too slow for the NBA. JJ needs to stay on the bench. While the refs were poor I thought it was honest incompetency and evened itself out. I was hoping for a bigger crowd as Mississippi was 11-2. Brad indicated he is recruiting primarily STL, but I nociticed Mississippi had a player from CHI. I think Miss. is in Oxford. If they can recruit CHI, so can we. CHI is more of a bb hotbed than STL. I wish Brad would play zone once in a while. IV's hook shot is fun to watch. Happy New Year.

Rammer said if there was not any TV there would not have been a monitor.

I really enjoyed the evening. The band was lively, the cheerleaders did some nice routines, the Baby Blues look great, and it was a fun night. I wish it would have went on longer. If we start winning the crowds will increase. Two value judgments: I thought the place was approx. 70% full and I thought students outnumbered oldsters, but then again Roy may be right.

Thank you for the info.

Is Julius Hunter w/ SLU? What role does he play regarding the media? Is he part of the SID?

Per the Post bb coaches are advocating expansion of the tournament to 128 teams. The expansion is facilitated by the NCAA buy out of the NIT. This should lessen the controversy over selection. SLU has a better chance now to see tournament action. I would also like to see Billy Packard retire. He was very vocal in his comments on the unworthiness of the likes of the MVC getting in last year. However, tourney results and now expansion prove his being out of touch. We also now need a .500 rule in conference play or this will be just a ploy to ensure the large conferences of maintaining their "quota" of participants.

I am not kidding. I will bet you whatever that time proves me correct.

I think Sampson's move to Indiana will turn out to be a great move for both the coach and the school. Indiana remains one of the premier programs and it has control of the program as witnessed by the termination of Knight. Sampson's problems reflect on OK. This is a football school first and besting Texas is the foremost priority. The bb program is overlooked and Sampson got carried away. I am sure Indiana already had a discussion w/ him and infractions will not occur. You will also see a different Bob Huggins at K State. Mike Davis can coach, but cannot handle the media. Sampson can. Because so many students are from Chicago, Indiana gets media attention, so this is a necessary skill. Do you ever wonder how a coach from a lilly white program can go to another school as a head coach and do so much bad. Snyder gets blamed, but as in the cases w/ Sampson and Huggins the coach becomes the fall guy. OK and Mizzou programs are not controlled. Cinci had a change of philosophy and became controlled, but was out of control previously. The coaches earn bad reps and the schools seem to escape w/ reputations in place or not seriously damaged. How many times do you think Biondi has invited a SLU bb player over to Banister House for a party? One on probation? How many times has SLU accepted a player who earned 24 credits in one summer from 3 schools? The coaches get fired, or have to move on, while the school presidents and administrators stay on.

I read in the Terre Haute paper several days ago about Stephanie quitting the team. She is not transferring to another school. She felt her level of play had detriorated in this program, so was quitting.

In Conf USA here was the problem w/ the football schools vs the bb schools. The bb schools did not share in the football revenue, but they shared in all promotional expenses. Everyone shared promotional expenses, but only football schools shared football revenue. I don't know if the Big East has a similar set up, but usually these conferences follow form.

Previously the NIT was a separate entity controlled by eastern schools. Therefore, it could not be eliminated. However, now the NCAA has control, so it can be eliminated. My suggestion: Eliminate the NIT and expand the NCAA tournament to 128 teams. The NCAA already has a play in day, so that day the 128 teams play and you get down to 64. Any school w/ a .500 record or below stays at home regardless of conference. This seems like a silly rule, but w/ people like Packard, Nance, and Vitalle you need this type of rule. Nance and Packard appear to be on the ACC payroll and Vitalle is on Duke's payroll. The way CBS cut off the NCAA spokesman Sunday was embarrassing. The person wanted to offer congrats to the 64 teams making the tournament and Packard and Nantz cut him off, still lamenting how the BCS schools got short changed. In the Duke vs BC game Vitalle kept talking Duke even while BC players were making great plays. The 3 of them need to retire. Digger Phelps needs to go to. On ESPN they put up Diggers tournament picks. He immediately claims they are not his picks, then back tracks and assumes his dutiful talking head role, talking about the picks that he did not recognize as his picks. However, here is a bigger question: Why was I listening and watching these guys? Next year I won't.

I went to Joe B's restuarant last night, watched and listened. Coach indicated he had 3 scholarships he can award and I gained the impression he will commit the 3 if the right prospects agree to come to SLU. He knows he needs a PF, but so does everyone else, so it will be a tough competitive fight to get one. Brad wants the current players to practice their shots over the summer. Lack of a consistent perimeter game killed us. He does not coach a slow down game, but does insist the players take good shots. Coach likes TL @ point. He sees the court well, has a good assist to TO ratio and is a good passer. He said we set screens in the St. Joseph game, but they switched off on defense, so that reduced effectiveness of the screens. Brad thought St. Joseph was a very good team. Coach thought scheduling along the lines of Missouri Valley was a goal. He congradulated the Valley on the work they did. It was not seen as manipulative, but as smart and led by an excellent commisioner. He thought the A-10 was remiss in this area and will try to make this a number 1 objective at league meetings. Brad thought Conf USA did a better job in this area last year than the A-10 did this year. Our non conference schedule is not determined because of this. Therefore, we can look for a fewer bought games. They are expensive from a money view point and costly to the RPI. He thinks the team will improve next year as he knows the players and they know him. His goal appears to be a NCAA appearance. Brad seemed excited by the prospects he is recruiting, and hopes they will commit. Coach is commited to the man to man defense, but will use some zone. Coach thought TL could have fast breaked more, but did not and attributed this to being a freshman. It was not a coaching dictum. SLU was second in the league in defense, third in free throws.