Vs. American

[Dr. FLK]

Recruiting isn't about results. It's about who is brought in.

I'm not sure I agree with you here. If you routinely bring in underachieving "talent", I'd say you need some help in the recruiting department. Recruiting is about evaluating talent. Any fool can go to Rivals.com and say "give me the guys they think are good." But, a real talent evaluator should say which will fit, which won't, and give reasons why. It's all about results. If you bring in the wrong guys, you get crummy results.

[Dracula]

As much as it pains me to say it, I agree with accinfo. How can you say he's ignoring facts? All his stats were legit.

I also, don't get how you can say "recruiting isn't about results". Wow, I'm sorry but that is THE WHOLE POINT. The whole idea is to win with your recruits, so if you're not winning, then you're not recruiting good enough, simple as that.

We can't recruit dumb premadonnas (sp?) like Gilchrist, Mccray, (hopefully not GV). This is poor recruiting.

This team has just been going backwards recently. How have GV, Gist, Hayes shown no improvement this year? You can say what you want, but in the end its on Gary's shoulders.

I've always loved UMD basketball, just graduated from UMD a few months ago. However, I was never that big a fan of Gary before the Dixon/Baxter/Blake run, but I do respect him. I do feel that he got somewhat "lucky" with that group of guys in that Dixon/Baxter/Blake/Wilcox were some of the best to ever play for UMD and they happened to come out at the same time.

[BaltimoreTerp]

As much as it pains me to say it, I agree with accinfo. How can you say he's ignoring facts? All his stats were legit.

You must not have read what I said.

I also, don't get how you can say "recruiting isn't about results". Wow, I'm sorry but that is THE WHOLE POINT. The whole idea is to win with your recruits, so if you're not winning, then you're not recruiting good enough, simple as that.

The games you play are about results. The recruiting is about bringing in the guys you THINK are going to give you the results you want.

We can't recruit dumb premadonnas (sp?) like Gilchrist, Mccray, (hopefully not GV). This is poor recruiting.

Gilchrist lead us to an ACC Championship. His problem was his attitude, but he was really good for us.

This team has just been going backwards recently. How have GV, Gist, Hayes shown no improvement this year? You can say what you want, but in the end its on Gary's shoulders.

But you can't ignore all the other players that have improved under him.

How much of it is the coaching, and how much is the players?

I've always loved UMD basketball, just graduated from UMD a few months ago. However, I was never that big a fan of Gary before the Dixon/Baxter/Blake run, but I do respect him. I do feel that he got somewhat "lucky" with that group of guys in that Dixon/Baxter/Blake/Wilcox were some of the best to ever play for UMD and they happened to come out at the same time.

You make your own luck.

[Sports Guy]

You must not have read what I said.

The games you play are about results. The recruiting is about bringing in the guys you THINK are going to give you the results you want.

Gilchrist lead us to an ACC Championship. His problem was his attitude, but he was really good for us.

But you can't ignore all the other players that have improved under him.

How much of it is the coaching, and how much is the players?

You make your own luck.

Guys get hurt...That happens...But if you keep bringing in guys that you think are very good but end up being flops, that says something about who you are recruiting.

[accinfo]

Personally, I would like to suggest that you not call 99% of the fanbase "lemmings" and completely ignore things like the NCAA death penalty under Wade, who has since spent 20 years telling Baltimore recruits NOT to go to Maryland. You might actually get people to listen that way.

I am not suggesting all Maryland fans are lemmings. Since I know many boosters I know this isn't the fact. I was more addressing to tsand72 and others like him that when you merely suggest that Gary Williams isn't the greatest coach ever to parole the sidelines, you are attacked with being a Gary "hater".

Who in DC has been telling recruits not to go to Maryland? Again there always has to be a boogey man out there thwarting Gary's efforts or he would get everyone and win every game.

[BaltimoreTerp]

I am not suggesting all Maryland fans are lemmings. Since I know many boosters I know this isn't the fact. I was more addressing to tsand72 and others like him that when you merely suggest that Gary Williams isn't the greatest coach ever to parole the sidelines, you are attacked with being a Gary "hater".

Who in DC has been telling recruits not to go to Maryland? Again there always has to be a boogey man out there thwarting Gary's efforts or he would get everyone and win every game.

That would be Bob Wade. If you don't know about that (and since I'VE heard of it it has to be somewhat common knowledge), the I have to question your knowledge on the subject at hand.

[accinfo]

First off, my comments are not directed to you. They were directed at accinfo, who took time to make up a ridiculous post of Williams' coaching W-L records to prove that he is nothing but an "ordinary" coach. Direct quote.

It is just silly... that's why I am pointing out that his criticism is completely ludicris, unwarranted, and stupid.

It is not silly. I said if you take out ONE great era he was and is now an ordinary coach. I was trying to make the point that you need great players to be a great coach. He found a guy in Juan Dixon who no one wanted recruiting wise, but ended up being the leading scorer of ALL time at the University of Maryland. The way he recruits that isn't very likely to happened twice in anyones lifetime. Looking at his body of work including the Dixon years then yes his accomplishments are not ordinary, but IMO don't make him a HOF coach. There are others coaches in the HOF that don't belong there also like John Cheney, Al McGwire to name a couple.

[Miller192]

That would be Bob Wade. If you don't know about that (and since I'VE heard of it it has to be somewhat common knowledge), the I have to question your knowledge on the subject at hand.

It's not really Bob Wade who discouraged players to come to Maryland, it's guys like Pete Pompey at Dunbar. Many Baltimore schools had a good relationship with Wade because he was so visible and always gave the local kids a look. When he was fired, many locally were upset by that. Particularly with how Gary wasn't as visible as Wade was and some thought Wade was given a bad deal. In fact, Pete Pompey encouraged Keith Booth to go to Duke.

There's a book on this somewhere

[Todd-O]

I was more addressing to tsand72 and others like him that when you merely suggest that Gary Williams isn't the greatest coach ever to parole the sidelines, you are attacked with being a Gary "hater".

So you are going to go to extremes to try and make your argument look sound?

Please.

No one here thinks Gary Williams is the "greatest coach ever."

But you suggest that Gary is an "ordinary" coach that just happened to stumble upon a diamond in the rough that took him to the promise land. You are ignoring all of the other great players that Gary has recruited... all of the other great seasons he's pulled off... and you simply are hating on the guy.

You are suggesting his 585 career wins are a fluke?

The fact that he's the sixth ACC coach EVER to achieve 300 wins? Fluke?

The fact that he has won the Third most ACC games EVER is all due to the fact that he recruited Juan Dixon.

His 27-14 tournament record... Fluke?

The fact that he's beaten more number ones than any coach ever. TOTAL LUCK.

His "ordinary" achievement of reaching the Sweet 16 seven different times... an embarrassment? Not good enough for you?

Say what you want... you don't have to like him. But I certainly see no reason what gives you the credibility and achievements to turn around a breakdown a really great coach. But you - like some other folks - get irate and, quite frankly, on a hating rampage when everything isn't just absolutely perfect.

[Dracula]

Bterp, no sorry I didn't read what you wrote earlier because I didn't feel like reading every post in this thread.

I'm not a Gary "hater" by any means. I just think his time has come to an end at maryland. Sort of like Gibbs with the skins. Yea they had some great past success, but now they need to step down.

You say other players have improved. Who else has significantly improved on the current team? Osby, ok he's slightly improved but nothing special. Who else that's not a freshman? Gist, no hes taken a step backward, same with with GV. Hayes, no significant improvement. Milbourne, nothing special.

Face it, hardly any of these guys would be starting on a solid ACC team.

We're not even the best team in the area anymore. Georgetown, ok I'll accept them being better. But anyone else in the area that beats us is unacceptable no matter the circumstance. VCU, American, GW why are these teams beating us?? It looks horrible locally.

[Mackus]

The bottom line is that Gary has earned the right to leave on his own terms. I don't think he'd be the type to stay if he's clearly not capable of getting the job done.

And there is a major difference of having been struggling the past few years and not being capable of doing the job going forward. One thing does not neccesarily imply the other. Sure we've hit a rough patch that we shouldn't have following our Final 4 trips, but there isn't much reason to think Gary is incapable of rebuilding what he himself built up.

[accinfo]

That would be Bob Wade. If you don't know about that (and since I'VE heard of it it has to be somewhat common knowledge), the I have to question your knowledge on the subject at hand.

Bob Wade has ZERO influence within Washington DC.

[inmn]

TS,

I tend to agree with you more than the other poster but your continual parsing of phrases and calling names does nothing to help your case-and using the phrase "hating on the guy" is abhorant grammar.

Everything in life is not black and white. GW is a HOF coach and Md is very fortunate to have him but this will be 3 of 4 years without going to the NCAA's and by GW's own standards that is unacceptable. He has been a somewhat "ordinary" coach over that period and I like others am concerned about the future. Maybe the team will come together next year-they will continue to get better as they learn but maybe they really aren't that talented (a lot of "experts" feel that is the case)-either way I don't know and you don't know!! Gilchrist, Maze, and Mosley will certainly help, let's wait and see. GW isn't going anywhere but questions about recruiting and strategy (so many FR and SO) are relevant as it relates to this year's poor performance.

So you are going to go to extremes to try and make your argument look sound?

Please.

No one here thinks Gary Williams is the "greatest coach ever."

But you suggest that Gary is an "ordinary" coach that just happened to stumble upon a diamond in the rough that took him to the promise land. You are ignoring all of the other great players that Gary has recruited... all of the other great seasons he's pulled off... and you simply are hating on the guy.

You are suggesting his 585 career wins are a fluke?

The fact that he's the sixth ACC coach EVER to achieve 300 wins? Fluke?

The fact that he has won the Third most ACC games EVER is all due to the fact that he recruited Juan Dixon.

His 27-14 tournament record... Fluke?

The fact that he's beaten more number ones than any coach ever. TOTAL LUCK.

His "ordinary" achievement of reaching the Sweet 16 seven different times... an embarrassment? Not good enough for you?

Say what you want... you don't have to like him. But I certainly see no reason what gives you the credibility and achievements to turn around a breakdown a really great coach. But you - like some other folks - get irate and, quite frankly, on a hating rampage when everything isn't just absolutely perfect.

[inmn]

That would be Bob Wade. If you don't know about that (and since I'VE heard of it it has to be somewhat common knowledge), the I have to question your knowledge on the subject at hand.

Terp, I hope you ment Baltimore not Washington??

Bob Wade is from Baltimore and has exactly no sway over DC recruits. He did discourage Baltimore kids from attending Md after he was fired but is currently working for the city and mostly irrelevent (sp) by now.

[accinfo]

You are suggesting his 585 career wins are a fluke?

No you coach for thirty years and the wins will somewhat pile up or you won't be coaching at all. Again he has 591 career wins and 334 career losses for a very good (not ordinary) .639 winning percentage. Not clearly in the winning percentage of Kryzewzski, Smith, Roy Williams, Bobby Knight, Rick Pitino but still decent. Again these are guys who had multiple great teams with multiple eras of players. Gary had ONE Great era and I am calling it the Dixon era though there were other great players on that team. During those years his record was 110-31 .780 winning percentage, 49-15 in the ACC or .766 winning percentage. 13-3 in the NCAA tournament. ALL GREAT numbers, but again ONE time in his WHOLE 30 year coaching career.

The fact that he's the sixth ACC coach EVER to achieve 300 wins? Fluke?

19 years at an ACC school you better get 300 wins or you get fired. HE has 384 to be exact or just 20.21 per year. Again 110 of them all came during 4 of the 19 years. Again in the other years he has averaged 18 per year.

The fact that he has won the Third most ACC games EVER is all due to the fact that he recruited Juan Dixon.

See above

His 27-14 tournament record... Fluke?

As I stated above 13-3 during one great run of great players. 14-11 before and after.

The fact that he's beaten more number ones than any coach ever. TOTAL LUCK.

Not luck but coaching an ACC team you get many more chances to play #1 teams then anyone else. I would suspect Dean Smith and Mike Kryzezewski might have this record if their teams weren't themselves #1 many times.

His "ordinary" achievement of reaching the Sweet 16 seven different times... an embarrassment? Not good enough for you?

It is really 8 times, he did it once at Boston College. Again 4 out of those years were with one great team. 4 times over 26 years of coaching besides that is real ordinary. 8 times is not bad. Coach K has done it 16 times at one school. Dean Smith did it 21 times.

Say what you want... you don't have to like him. But I certainly see no reason what gives you the credibility and achievements to turn around a breakdown a really great coach. But you - like some other folks - get irate and, quite frankly, on a hating rampage when everything isn't just absolutely perfect.

It isn't about likeing him or not. Where in any of my posts did I say he should be fired? However he shouldn't have a lifetime pass. 3 years in a row not in the NCAA tournament and he should be shown the door. That is two more after this year and that would make 4 out of 5.