BobcatAttack.com - For Fans of Ohio University Sports

Welcome Guest!
Create an Account

site search

where to watch

about us

advertise with us

help

BobcatAttack.com Message Board

Ohio Basketball

Topic: RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Topic: RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Author

Message

Andrew Ruck
General User

Member Since: 12/22/2004
Location: Columbus, OH
Post Count: 4,695

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 10:21:16 AM

This is right up there with one of the stupidest posts I've ever seen.

I can't even wrap my mind around what you're saying. So what does Groce do that makes him so magical in March in your mind? Does he hold back and not tinker as well during the regular season only to really turn up the heat in the postseason? Are his halftime speeches so poetic in March that in inspires youth to suddenly do things they didn't do all season? You make no sense.

So Groce led a team to a 1 point win against a .500 team thanks to 2 free throws in the last second in a completely insignificant game. Boy this clearly proves your point and helps push your agenda, better get on the internet and prove my opponents wrong! Then his team has one of the more epic collapses that I can remember in MAC tourney history and it is shrug oh well he didn't have a good team.

Are we supposed to not care that his Illini lost by 20 in the 1st round last year in the 8/9 seed game? What happened to the Groce magic? Their season ended with a 31 point loss the previous year, though he did get a tourney win before that. The year before that, an 18 point 1st round loss. All told he was 3-5 in the big ten tourney with no appearances in even the semifinals.

Even at Ohio, he was 2-2 in the years we did not win the MAC. In 2010 it took I think 3 missed shots in the final minute by BSU to even force overtime...an inch on any of those shots and Georgetown never happens and we instead have a first round exit, and we had a million chances to lose the MAC championship in 2012 or the sweet 16 never happens. Sure coaches matter in those moments but so do a crapload of other things like players and refs and luck.

You can say all you want about him just having that March edge but it is all garbage. The narrative could easily be DJ Cooper was an elite March player that carrier his team when it mattered most. John Groce now has a 10 year head coaching career and the only thing you give a crap about is 2 weeks 24 months apart. Give me a break.

Your crusade against coach Phillips is one thing, but holding coach Groce as the gold standard is just ignorant. At what point did you switch to rooting against Ohio and for Akron just to push your agenda?

Andrew Ruck
B.B.A. 2003

100%Cat
General User

Member Since: 1/17/2013
Post Count: 2,491

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 10:45:11 AM

Andrew Ruck wrote:

^^^This X1000.

OU_Country
General User

Member Since: 12/6/2005
Location: On the road between Athens and Madison County
Post Count: 8,320

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 11:48:31 AM

I can't wait for the reply to Andrew's post above.

OhioCatFan
General User

Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 12:24:42 PM

bornacatfan wrote:

FearLeon wrote:

OhioCatFan wrote:

Perhaps, Groce's "March Magic" only works in Athens. Didn't work tonight when coaching Akron. Never seemed to work at Illinois. Left his basketball karma in the Convo? ;-)

Might want to bookmark this post. I have a feeling in the coming years you'll regret this one.

Thinking the same thing. Casual drive by comment. The winking emoji implies it may be sarcasm but it comes off as someone knowing very little about hoops/rebuilding and not being informed about how he is setting up a culture and getting them ready. Not that there are not fans there that are not happy with him on the Zip board

" This is what we get with Groce ball

Hope yall are satisfied "

"F You and anyone else who defends any coach allowing a 39-10 run on basically their home floor
Grow a pair "

Yes, it was said with a wink and a little light humor. Sort of an attempt to get under the skin, in a light-heart, funny kind of way of those who hold him up as Saint John and have decided that Saul is Judas the Betrayer of OHIO basketball legacy. I suspect he'll do much better next year at Akron; now whether he'll be able to repeat what he did at OHIO is another story altogether. Time will tell.

The only BLSS Certified Hypocrite on BA

"It is better to be an optimist and be proven a fool than to be a pessimist and be proven right."

Note: My avatar is the national colors of the 78th Ohio Veteran Volunteer Infantry, which are now preserved in a climate controlled vault at the Ohio History Connection. Learn more about the old 78th at: http://www.78ohio.org

Mark Lembright '85
General User

Member Since: 8/22/2010
Location: Highland Heights, OH
Post Count: 2,447

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 12:59:52 PM

OU_Country wrote:

I can't wait for the reply to Andrew's post above.

I'll give it a shot.

Let me preface this by saying I'm in Coach Phillips' corner and I hope his contract gets extended. I think he's a good coach and deserves another chance. Maybe I'm wrong but I tend to be polyannish on these types of things-I give coaches miles of rope. So long as they run a clean and above board program I am lenient. So I'm all for Coach Phillips coming back. He's a class person.

Now on to Groce. Let's not minimize what the guy did. Against the then No.1 ranked team in the country he came within a point of taking Ohio to the Elite 8. Let me repeat-within a point of the Elite 8, not the quarterfinals of the MAC Tournament.

I could care less if he was lucky. BFD. I don't care if a coach is lucky; I don't care if the other team is snowed out and we win by forfeit (if you live in Cleveland like I do and got a foot of snow like I did last night you get the reference); I don't care if the opposing team's players get injured and Ohio wins by playing the other teams' scrubs. I don't care!

So long as Ohio's teams are above board, are recruited ethically and play clean, if they get to within a hair of an Elite 8 appearance, put me down as being VERY VERY VERY HAPPY!!! Geez, I hope Coach Phillips, Coach Bolton, Solich and all of Ohio's current and future coaches are just as lucky! If they are, we will all be very happy.

I love Coach Phillps but dang let's not forget 2010 and 2012 for Heaven's sake.

P.S. Groce must have had some sort of March mojo while in Athens-a 9-2 MAC Tournament record and 3-2 Big Dance record in only 4 years is more than just luck, and if it is luck I wish Ohio (and my damn Cleveland Browns) had more of it!

Last Edited: 3/9/2018 1:20:26 PM by Mark Lembright '85

Ohio69
General User

Member Since: 12/20/2004
Post Count: 2,992

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 1:32:08 PM

OU_Country wrote:

I can't wait for the reply to Andrew's post above.

LOL. I'll make the popcorn....

Can somebody hit a pull up jumper for me?.....

Alan Swank
General User

Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 7,022

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 1:50:08 PM

Mark Lembright '85 wrote:

OU_Country wrote:

I can't wait for the reply to Andrew's post above.

One of the best posts on any topic in recent memory.

D.A.
General User

Member Since: 8/6/2010
Location: Georgetown, ME
Post Count: 1,174

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/9/2018 6:45:34 PM

I like John Groce a lot, as a person and a coach. The '10 and 12 runs are some of my more cherished memories as a sports fan. I'm not going to root against the guy because he is coaching at a rival. The only OHIO coach that I have ever had a random opportunity to enjoy a beer with, and aside from his support of tOSU due to his time there, I'll always want good things to happen for him...except for when he coaches against us. Similar to my feelings regarding Simmons, and I would hate to cogitate on Saul's record had he not had that guy on the team for a couple of years. But hey, people are funny.

Last Edited: 3/9/2018 6:46:33 PM by D.A.

The Few, The Proud, The Bobcats!

And for the record, I hate tOSU, and Ricordati and Torgerson are DB's.

"This isn't just another walkover from the MAC." Kirk Herbstreit, another DB, on College Football Gameday

Andrew Ruck
General User

Member Since: 12/22/2004
Location: Columbus, OH
Post Count: 4,695

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/12/2018 8:44:50 AM

Mark Lembright '85 wrote:

Now on to Groce. Let's not minimize what the guy did. Against the then No.1 ranked team in the country he came within a point of taking Ohio to the Elite 8. Let me repeat-within a point of the Elite 8, not the quarterfinals of the MAC Tournament.

I could care less if he was lucky. BFD. I don't care if a coach is lucky; I don't care if the other team is snowed out and we win by forfeit (if you live in Cleveland like I do and got a foot of snow like I did last night you get the reference); I don't care if the opposing team's players get injured and Ohio wins by playing the other teams' scrubs. I don't care!

So long as Ohio's teams are above board, are recruited ethically and play clean, if they get to within a hair of an Elite 8 appearance, put me down as being VERY VERY VERY HAPPY!!! Geez, I hope Coach Phillips, Coach Bolton, Solich and all of Ohio's current and future coaches are just as lucky! If they are, we will all be very happy.

I love Coach Phillps but dang let's not forget 2010 and 2012 for Heaven's sake.

Mark - I am not trying to minimize what Groce did but I also refuse to let it be the entire story. 2012 was amazing but it was just a run in the middle of a lot of mediocrity. The bottom line is Groce was a couple bounces away from having no March success and hated by FearLeon, but instead he is revered as a God. Crusade against Saul if you want but I don't understand why we have to pair it with elevating coach Groce, who has failed miserably since he left Athens.

Andrew Ruck
B.B.A. 2003

OhioStunter
General User

Member Since: 2/18/2005
Location: Chicago
Post Count: 2,516

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/12/2018 12:22:39 PM

Groce was gone from the MAC for four years, yet he almost has as many MAC tourney wins (1) as Saul (2), who has been in the MAC for four years.

BobcatSports
General User

Member Since: 2/2/2006
Post Count: 1,068

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/12/2018 4:42:32 PM

Agree with your take Andrew and I held NO animosity towards Groce for leaving for greener pastures, the iron might never again been hotter for him when he left.

I find it somewhat ironic though that what precipitated Groce�s fall from grace from the Illini faithful is much the same that is bringing out the pitchforks against Saul. INJURIES! and SUB-PAR recruiting! Could it be that Groce while in Champaign purposely recruited injury prone prospects, had sub-par conditioning programs, didn�t have the proper nutritional programs that would have helped to prevent said injuries in the first place? And even though having the greater Chicagoland recruiting hothead at his fingertips he for whatever reason failed miserably to cultivate and develop such a �home-field advantage. And as the Illini injuries mounted he surely could have easily overcome that with D1 ready � athletes� just a mere few seats down the bench to keep the ship afloat and not skip a beat.

Recovering Journalist
General User

Member Since: 8/17/2010
Location: Cleveland, OH
Post Count: 1,839

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 8:24:48 AM

BobcatSports wrote:

I find it somewhat ironic though that what precipitated Groce�s fall from grace from the Illini faithful is much the same that is bringing out the pitchforks against Saul. INJURIES! and SUB-PAR recruiting!

I don't think anyone here has a pitchfork in their hand with respect to SP. Even the most vociferous critics recognize that he has the 2018-2019 season to figure it out. I'd say the bigger commonalities between Groce at Illinois and Phillips here are that they both arrived with great fanfare at the peak of their success, they both got big five-year contracts, and they both failed to produce enough wins to justify the expense and optimism despite being personally liked by the fan bases and genuinely good people.

Results count, and ours are not even close to adequate given the fact that we spend more than anyone else in the MAC.

OU_Country
General User

Member Since: 12/6/2005
Location: On the road between Athens and Madison County
Post Count: 8,320

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 10:03:17 AM

Recovering Journalist wrote:

BobcatSports wrote:

I was curious about this "we spend more than anyone in the MAC" theme, and decided to do a quick look at how much more we spend. If we do, it's not by very much at all based on what I've quickly searched out:

RECRUITING SPENDING per the Des Moines Register - Ohio not the top spending team in the MAC, though quite close:

http://db.desmoinesregister.com/college-basketball-recrui...

D1 BUDGETS as of 2015-16 according to this site. Ohio: 3,101,150; Arkon: 3,088,920.
http://www.csnbbs.com/thread-813807.html

USA TODAY total Athletic Dept spending in 2015-16, where Ohio is 6th in the MAC on the list:
http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances /

Is there another source I'm missing? Particularly one more recent than '15-16?

Recovering Journalist
General User

Member Since: 8/17/2010
Location: Cleveland, OH
Post Count: 1,839

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 10:23:29 AM

OU_Country wrote:

Does it matter if we're barely the highest or the second-highest? Would a 10 seed and our MAC tournament record feel better if we were second-highest? C'mon.

OU_Country
General User

Member Since: 12/6/2005
Location: On the road between Athens and Madison County
Post Count: 8,320

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 10:51:13 AM

Recovering Journalist wrote:

OU_Country wrote:

Does it matter if we're barely the highest or the second-highest? Would a 10 seed and our MAC tournament record feel better if we were second-highest? C'mon.

C'mon what? You've brought up the highest budget, and the ROI on it, for 3 months as it pertains to your feelings on Saul's situation and our basketball program in general. I thought I'd ask if someone had differnt information, particularly more current information, that I wasn't finding.

OhioStunter
General User

Member Since: 2/18/2005
Location: Chicago
Post Count: 2,516

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 11:08:34 AM

I think if the conversation is about Saul's performance based on his salary, we need to focus on that vs. other figures like overall athletics department budgets. Saul is the highest paid employee at OU at $572,000. Up until last week, I believe that was the highest salary in the MAC (https://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/news/2018/03/12/ub-ba... ).

I think it is fair in any industry to have an expectation that if you are among the highest paid among your peers, that your performance reflect that.

Given that his performance has resulted in an overall record ranking of 7th in the MAC, 8th in conference play and 7th in the MAC tournament*, I don't think the level of criticism is that unwarranted.

(*Source: GraffZ06's post)

Recovering Journalist
General User

Member Since: 8/17/2010
Location: Cleveland, OH
Post Count: 1,839

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 11:16:40 AM

OhioStunter wrote:

Yup. That's my point. I know we spend less as a whole athletic department because we run lean in terms of total sports and spend less on football, but we don't skimp on basketball and our record does not reflect the lavish spending we're doing versus our peers.

OhioCatFan
General User

Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 11:32:52 AM

In this great debate on Saul I think one thing that should be mentioned, and that may account for one not so stellar recruiting year, was that his wife was treated for breast cancer in, I believe, his second year here, and that certainly had a detrimental effect on his ability to concentrate on his job for a period of time. Some people can compartmentalize these kinds of things, but others cannot. Saul strikes me as the kind of person who probably can't compartmentalize this type of "family crisis" and that his worry and concern probably did spill over into his ability to concentrate on this job for a period of time. Just thought I'd mention this to try and put the "Saul question" into a little different perspective. I'm not saying that this explains everything that anyone might object to with Saul Ball, but I also think it's unfair not to include this family situation in the mix when analyzing his performance to date.

GoCats105
General User

Member Since: 1/31/2006
Location: Seattle, WA
Post Count: 6,912

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 12:05:58 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

I was actually going to bring this up, but declined because I didn't want to hear the "no more excuses" arguments. This had to have a huge effect on the psyche. Really, like what more else can this guy go through during his time in Athens?

OhioStunter
General User

Member Since: 2/18/2005
Location: Chicago
Post Count: 2,516

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 12:10:37 PM

GoCats105 wrote:

OhioCatFan wrote:

Good points. I think we all need to (and I think the board does a good job of this) remember that coaches and players are people with families too.

Recovering Journalist
General User

Member Since: 8/17/2010
Location: Cleveland, OH
Post Count: 1,839

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 12:34:47 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

I'll just leave this here.

https://www.midmajormadness.com/2017/12/12/16759688/nate-...

bn9
General User

Member Since: 12/20/2004
Post Count: 422

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 12:44:43 PM

Recovering Journalist wrote:

OhioStunter wrote:

I am enamored with this conversation. I think some great points have been made on each side. However, I think that we should be looking at total compensation, not base salary when we talk about ROI. I could not find what Saul's bonuses and other compensations are, but, for instance, Keno Davis gets $100k/year for his radio show that has to be included when you calculate this mysterious ROI.

I still think that Saul has to have a really good to great year (I am thinking no less than a top four seed and a trip to the MAC semi-finals or finals) to keep his job. I also think that he has the players to have that really good/great year next year. I enjoy watching his style of play, plus he is exactly the kind of guy that I would want my son to play for.

OhioStunter
General User

Member Since: 2/18/2005
Location: Chicago
Post Count: 2,516

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/13/2018 1:34:10 PM

bn9 wrote:

Recovering Journalist wrote:

OhioStunter wrote:

Even with Keno's "other compensation", he is still below Saul's compensation.

SBH
General User

Member Since: 12/20/2004
Post Count: 3,748

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/14/2018 9:52:03 PM

Groce just lost one of his first Akron recruits, Virshon Cotton, who has announced he is leaving.

Last Edited: 3/14/2018 9:53:16 PM by SBH

bornacatfan
General User

Member Since: 8/3/2006
Post Count: 5,706

Status: Offline

RE: Chalk Up Another March Win For John Groce

Posted: 3/14/2018 10:43:18 PM

SBH wrote:

Groce just lost one of his first Akron recruits, Virshon Cotton, who has announced he is leaving.

Quite an exodus going on 2 from Western, 1 from Kron, 4 from BG. That's attrition.

http://verbalcommits.com/transfers/2018

Last Edited: 3/14/2018 10:44:03 PM by bornacatfan

never argue with idiots, they bring you down to their level and beat you with experience.

Winter comes and asks how you spent your summer.....

The game loves and rewards those who love and reward the game

Showing Replies:	51 - 75 of 79 Posts
Jump to Page:	< Previous 1 \| 2 \| 3 \| 4 Next >

View Other 'Ohio Basketball' Topics

There are 129 Active Visitors on BobcatAttack.com

127 Guests
2 Registered Users:
	MonroeClassmate, RufusCat09

There are no other users looking at this page.