Where does TEXAS rank as all time dissapointment?

[Dizzle-2k7]

Heres a team with great veterans AND a top 5 recruiting class. .>WTF happened?

Ive never seen a #1 team turn so sour so quick

[TheGame414]

Pretty disappointing, but it's hard to say where exactly they'd stack up among all-time disappointments. I never thought they had that great of a shot to win it all because even when I had them ranked as high as everyone else in the preseason it wasn't hard to see they had four specific issues that would come up:

1. Three-point shooting. They lost nearly all of it from Abrams and were depending on two freshmen- one (Bradley) who's more effective in the midrange and the other (Hamilton) who didn't play his senior year of high school- to replace it.

2. Point guard play. They had several guys who each had decent parts of a point guard but not one true, high-level floor general.

3. Chemistry. Kentucky had the benefit of starting almost from scratch with their talented youngsters, whereas Texas' youngsters had to blend in with accomplished veterans. You never know how that's going to mix. UNC's 1994 team lost almost nothing from their '93 championship team, added Jerry Stackhouse and Rasheed Wallace, and got worse: went 28-7 after being 34-4 the previous year and lost in the second round.

4. Dexter Pittman's stamina/foul troubles. When you have that unstoppable of a low-post scorer, but you don't know how much you're going to be able to get from him any given night, it's almost a detriment. He had the talent to be as much of a factor as recent championship big men- Hansbrough, Horford, May, Okafor- but not one ounce of the dependability those guys had.

So even though they're clearly a disappointment based on their talent and 17-0 start, you don't have to use hindsight to see that these were issues they were going to have to deal with. Injuries to two of their three point guards didn't help, of course. None of the issues they had were surprising. And it isn't totally surprising that they sunk when forced to deal with all of those issues at once.

[A.M.G.]

Where does Rick Barnes rank all-time as a good recruiter who can't coach for shyt?

[TheGame414]

Barnes has made it clear that he prioritizes getting guys ready for professional careers and I'd say he's done a better job of that than many coaches who are/were considered better college coaches. But that discussion has been had at length in the past and I don't particularly want to do it again.

He's no strategic genius but it's hard to argue with his success over the last decade, however you want to define it in terms of coaching v. recruiting.

[A.M.G.]

Originally Posted by TheGame414

Barnes has made it clear that he prioritizes getting guys ready for professional careers and I'd say he's done a better job of that than many coaches who are/were considered better college coaches. But that discussion has been had at length in the past and I don't particularly want to do it again.

He's no strategic genius but it's hard to argue with his success over the last decade, however you want to define it in terms of coaching v. recruiting.

Fair enough. This season's meltdown was pathetic, but I guess that would make Roy Williams and Ben Howland "bad coaches" too.