Porter Moser

[Old guy]

On 3/21/2021 at 3:59 PM, HoosierPal said:

 

I wonder how many days was Loyola Chicago sidelined because of Covid. We know that Illinois and particularly Chicago ar very strict in their rules about Covid. How did this translate in lost play time during the regular 20-21 season? Anyone knows?

[Taj79]

@Clock Tower --- I wholeheartedly agree with your three premises.  

Coming off that high water mark (wow, we agree!), I have a little problem with deciphering your answers but as best as I can tell, and correct me if I'm wrong, you are saying May could have/should have got the vibe from the team that Crews was no good, investigated his Army dismissal for student abuse, and then announced we were going after a young, passionate and enthusiastic coach to replace Majerus.  Correct?  Well, hindsight is indeed 20/20 and I cannot argue against you.  I just have a slight problem with telling people after the fact what to do.  Given the national acclaim the program was under, given the tragic death of a beloved coaching figure, given [dead] coming in for free to help out a friend, given a National Coach of the Year award, and given all the talking heads calling for it, I and others refer to the decision as May having "his hands tied."  I understand why it happened and hated it all the same.  Three years later and the reclamation project goes back under new man Ford.

This I don't know or recall but was there a national search panel created to fill the Majerus vacancy?  Didn't we do one for Ford?  If I were in charge, I'd do one every time unless we were a program like Butler or Xavier who seem to promote from within.  Of course, we are not a program like that because we never have enough sustainability or success foe our staffs to take credit.  We've had two coaches move on to success elsewhere --- Bennett and Moser --- but both just didn't happen.  They took a while to get it going at St. Mary's and Loyola.  

In a different time, the firing of [dead], we seem to have done it the right way.  At least so far in a better way.  Wasn't Ford the result of a panel?  Again, I don't recall.  I do believe that the atmosphere and circumstances surrounding each were vastly different and don't fit a cookie cutter solution example.

I agree Chris May blundered (if was all him) but he has recovered nicely from that blunder with teams and facilities at SLU the best ever collectively.  It would have been a ballsy effort by May to do as you suggest.  I'm not sure there are any more than a handful of folks in the country who would have done it.  

The [dead] hiring decision to me again is one of those missteps this University seems famous for.  

[Clock_Tower]

4 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

clock, rickma got pretty much whatever he wanted when here.   biondi may have fought with him, but i dont think he was denied.  so what would be the point of "investigating" him?

All I meant by “investigating” was that Chris May performed the normal due diligence any good AD would do when presented with a new hire recommendation and was aware of the prior allegations which led to Jim Crews being terminated by Army.

Agreed. Chris May does not override RM or deny RM his proposed new assistant coaches but he most certainly reviews who they are and what they did and did not do prior to us. 
My only real point is that Chris May cannot have it both ways. Either he was a good AD, who vetted new hires and had his finger on the pulse of the program and knew things the rest of us did not know because Crews was a well-known commodity and had been on campus a full season or he did not.  Either way Chris May should have been fired.
 

Chris May had time and knew in August that RM was not coming back for the entire season  when RM stepped down in August and then knew RM would never come back in that RM died in early December.  What was Chris May’s plan in December?  Wait the year out and see if Crews can win with that loaded bc that would be a true test of whether Crews was the right man for the job?  Brilliant plan. 
Not his plan after the season was over when Chris May knew we would win - which we did, made the Tourney and Crews received the National COY honor - which I contend was more of a tribute to RM than Crews.  Leaders lead from the front, not the rear. Leaders make tough choices and don’t get led.  

BTW, I believe this Friday is payroll day - another paycheck. 

[Taj79]

@old guy --- Looking at Loyola's schedule as it exists now, they played nine OOC games from Dec. 5 through Jan. 2.  Two of those were MVC games against Illinois State.  Seven games does no a full OOC season make.  But there were no long interruptions in there.

At the turn of the new year, the MVC had moved to their schedule fix of playing two games at one site on back-to-back nights.  Loyola's first contests, atBradley, were postponed but after that Loyola played the entirety of its MVC schedule, including making up the postponed Bradley games and splitting up their Valpo games so they were consecutive nights.  They got all 18 league games in this way.  

I am unaware of any extraordinary pauses the LIC program was subjected to.  They missed some OOC games, but that is all.

[Taj79]

@Clock Tower ---- not a May fan, eh?  That's fine.  Everyone has their opinion.  Right or wrong, your argument is five or nine years in the rear view mirror.  What's the point?  You are absolutely right, May should have been fired.  He wasn't.  Can we move on now?

On a sid enote, remember when the players petitioned to keep Brad Soderberg after Romar up and left?  Leading to the moniker 'Uncle Brad.'  All I'm saying is sometimes, players wants and desires are not exactly spot on either.  In [dead] case, however, they likely were.  Not only a dinosaur, but a dinosaur from the Booby Knight tree.

(Some blue font is needed here).

[billiken_roy]

9 minutes ago, Clock_Tower said:

All I meant by “investigating” was that Chris May performed the normal due diligence any good AD would do when presented with a new hire recommendation and was aware of the prior allegations which led to Jim Crews being terminated by Army.

Agreed. Chris May does not override RM or deny RM his proposed new assistant coaches but he most certainly reviews who they are and what they did and did not do prior to us. 
My only real point is that Chris May cannot have it both ways. Either he was a good AD, who vetted new hires and had his finger on the pulse of the program and knew things the rest of us did not know because Crews was a well-known commodity and had been on campus a full season or he did not.  Either way Chris May should have been fired.
 

Chris May had time and knew in August that RM was not coming back for the entire season  when RM stepped down in August and then knew RM would never come back in that RM died in early December.  What was Chris May’s plan in December?  Wait the year out and see if Crews can win with that loaded bc that would be a true test of whether Crews was the right man for the job?  Brilliant plan. 
Not his plan after the season was over when Chris May knew we would win - which we did, made the Tourney and Crews received the National COY honor - which I contend was more of a tribute to RM than Crews.  Leaders lead from the front, not the rear. Leaders make tough choices and don’t get led.  

BTW, I believe this Friday is payroll day - another paycheck. 

as taj stated, there probably arent a handful of AD's in the world that would have the guts to have did what you hindsight wish. 

[Clock_Tower]

6 hours ago, billiken_roy said:

as taj stated, there probably arent a handful of AD's in the world that would have the guts to have did what you hindsight wish. 

Not true.  Yes, only a handful of AD's would not hire Crews after being silent all year and then watching Crews take us to the Tourney and win National COY but many good AD's would have (and should have) stepped in early, controlled the narrative, said Crews was our Interim Coach, is the perfect Interim Coach but that he won't be our permanent coach, that SLU is forming a blue ribbon national committee, that our next coach would be young, enthusiastic, would be our coach for the next 10 years, that after RM and Crews we would be returning to a youthful coaches such as Romar when hired by SLU, examples could have been given, leaks of possible names could have been given....  this is not that unusual.  But because Chris May was silent, did nothing, took no leadership, then yes, only a few AD's with a sack of stones would have not hired Crews after he won National COY.  And that is not Chris May.

[Compton]

5 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

Not true.  Yes, only a handful of AD's would not hire Crews after being silent all year and then watching Crews take us to the Tourney and win National COY but many good AD's would have (and should have) stepped in early, controlled the narrative, said Crews was our Interim Coach, is the perfect Interim Coach but that he won't be our permanent coach, that SLU is forming a blue ribbon national committee, that our next coach would be young, enthusiastic, would be our coach for the next 10 years, that after RM and Crews we would be returning to a youthful coaches such as Romar when hired by SLU, examples could have been given, leaks of possible names could have been given....  this is not that unusual.  But because Chris May was silent, did nothing, took no leadership, then yes, only a few AD's with a sack of stones would have not hired Crews after he won National COY.  And that is not Chris May.

Because the Romar era was such a resounding success for SLU? I wouldn't rank youth or charisma as good indicators of future coaching success. Enthusiasm is certainly important, but a coach can be enthusiastic at any age. 

We've have more NCAA Tournament bids, have played in more NCAA Tournament games, and have more NCAA Tournament wins under Chris May than any other AD in school history.

[Clock_Tower]

22 hours ago, Compton said:

Because the Romar era was such a resounding success for SLU? I wouldn't rank youth or charisma as good indicators of future coaching success. Enthusiasm is certainly important, but a coach can be enthusiastic at any age. 

We've have more NCAA Tournament bids, have played in more NCAA Tournament games, and have more NCAA Tournament wins under Chris May than any other AD in school history.

I fully agree that Romar was NOT one of our better coaches and I don't subscribe to him being close to some great West Coast pipeline for us.   Romar lacked the contacts, and I suggest experience, and did exactly what RM said was the worst thing you can do -- come in second place on recruits.   At the same time, Romar had been a young charismatic coach who had some good years and good teams at Washington in his backyard - the West Coast and PAC 10.  

At the same time, are you saying that Romar was not good for us so therefore all young coaches are bad?  I hope not.  And no, young, charismatic coaches does not mean greater success but also does not mean worse.   At the same time, Chris May knew that he had an old school, abusive coach stuck in the 1980's who had never won much as a coach.  Are you disagreeing with this statement?   Chris May knew the players did not relate to him or respect him.  Are you disagreeing with this statement?   And Chris May kept quiet while the team won despite Crews and underperformed b/c of him.  Are you disagreeing with this?  And Chris May used the success of being the Interim head coach for RM's stacked team as the criteria to hire Jim Crews as our permanent head coach.  Do you think that was a good test?  Maybe a better test would have been how Crews could teach and recruit his own players:  Lancona, Agbeko, Crawford... 

Yes, before Ford, our better coaches have been older guys at the end of their careers:  Spoon and RM as opposed to Brad and Romar. And yes, best man for the job of any age, any race, etc.; however, when faced with a guy like Crews - yes, I would have gone with anything I could in a different direction.  I remember rumors or our players and recruits (J Love and Marquee Perry) re-thinking SLU after Charlie left but they stayed b/c of Romar.  And then the players wanted Brad when Romar left, and they stayed.   And no one left when Brad was fired.   And likewise, I doubt our team would have broke up and the guys left for different directions before their Senior had we named someone other than the National Coach of the Year. 

And as to the winning success under Chris May, RM and Travis Ford can make an AD look good but longevity may be just as big of a factor.   And you do know that many of the best AD's leave basketball only schools for those with basketball AND football.  Debbie Yow was great and Cheryl Levick would have been really good too... but for Fr. Biondi.  

[Compton]

1 hour ago, Clock_Tower said:

And likewise, I doubt our team would have broke up and the guys left for different directions before their Senior had we named someone other than the National Coach of the Year.

Which guys decided to leave before their senior year because Crews was hired?

[Clock_Tower]

12 minutes ago, Compton said:

Which guys decided to leave before their senior year because Crews was hired?

None.  The argument was we needed to hire Crews to keep the team together.  We did hire Crews, the team stayed together but my point is that the team would have stayed together with someone else as well.   Then, maybe we win more... and we don't have the subsequent disaster years.