After what seems to be a lot of hoopla and disappointment over this year's current performance and the way the basketball season has been going I figured I would look at what I have been viewing as the three year plan of this basketball team. Coach Crean has been catching some flak from some IU fans and tons of Purdue fans (probably cause they're bored) but I'm going to go back and look at Crean's career at IU and what to expect going forth. Crean has had two years of utter failure and another of meh basketball but that is somewhat to be expected. I want to cover what IU fans should expect for the future.
This is going to be a two part series, as I tend to ramble. The first part is going to be a little bit of a recap of the last two years of IU basketball and recruiting. Part II will be a full analysis of my opinion on the future of the IU basketball squad. Follow the jump to get started.
Crean came into Bloomington with two, count 'em TWO, returning players from the previous year's roster. He was able to bring in Matt Roth, Tom Pritchard, Verdell Jones III and transfer Jeremiah Rivers in his first class. All great role players but none that were much more than that. There were some other players that were a part of that class but none of them are left with the team so I'm going to leave them out. Those players were recruited but none of them were really expected to contribute well at a Big Ten level, hence their transfers. With a team consisting of freshmen and walk ons the following 6 win season was no surprise to anyone.
The next recruiting class is/was a very talented one if it remained healthy but still the team would be playing a majority freshmen. Tom Pritchard looked solid as a primary target in the previous year. Matt Roth and Verdell Jones were expected to be very solid players after a year under their belts. However, Matt Roth broke and Pritchard regressed. Christian Watford and Maurice Creek headed the freshman class as the only 4 star recruits and the others were more less 1-2 dimensional role players. Although they are high quality role players, Jordan Hulls, Derek Elston and Bobby Capobianco are not players that can carry a team. Mo Creek fell over dead in the first half of the season and the scoring dried up. 10 wins was what the team mustered. Again to be expected in context.
The Three Year Plan begins with this current season. WHICH.... I will be covering in the next post. I've always been a sucker for a good cliff hanger and now is as good a time as any. Tune in next time for part II of this series when we explore the current season and what to expect with the future.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This is John. If you smell the hint of manure in the air, that's because a healthy number of Purdue fans have decided to take a break from slopping the hogs to vote in our poll. I wish they had the decency to hose off their boots before they came in here, but ain't nobody learned 'em no manners. I had no idea that Purdue fans were so adept at stuffing the ballot box. Perhaps this explains how they "won" their Helms Foundation "championship." We will conduct the poll again in a few days when things return to normal around here and after we have the carpet cleaned.