Kinda like Provo. Haha
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Actually, that place is in the world, but not of the world.
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Going to the NIT is progress but still not exciting. This team had potential. Won at St. Mary’s, beat BYU, beat WSU, Colorado, and Oregon at home. Annihilated UCLA and beat them on the road. Took Arizona to triple overtime. But also lost twice to ASU, lost to OSU, and got blown out a few times. I’m not sure what needs to happen to develop more consistency and mental toughness. But a lot needs to change. Next year could be brutal.
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It’d be nice to see Smith do a Coach Prime house-cleaning and portal search.
That worked out so well for Colorad9.
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It sure did.
I’d love to see our team get three additional wins next season, as well.
He will have at least 5 scholarships to work with—assuming Ben Carlson leaves & Tarlac is shown the door.
It would be nice to have a full roster for a change—that way when Rollie gets his annual injury they will have options. There is enough talent out there that they can/should use all 13 instead of 12 like last 2 years.
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Tough landscape.
Tompkins out at UW, Jarod Haase fired at Stanford, grumblings at other schools, including Arizona State.
But Hurley just signed an extension, probably because of this: Hurley lands top-20 recruiting class with talented big men - The Arizona State Press
I don’t know where the money comes from… but the money needs to come!
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Speaking of the NIT, Utah is a lock. And they look like they’re going to be one of the seeded teams, which means an opening round home game. Anybody want to go? Utah obviously plays really well at home and they could make a deep run.
Yes. Some of us (cough) thought making the NIT would be a sign of (cough)measurable progress. We (cough) justifiably (cough) got a bit over-excited about the team’s early successes and we had no idea, perhaps (cough) justifiably, that they’d be so awful on the road. Turns out those of us who thought the NIT was a (cough) decent milestone were probably (cough-cough) ri(cough)-right. Maybe we should actually feel o-cough-kay about this season…[turns the light out and goes to sleep]
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I’m happy to see that the MBBall team made it to the NIT and be UC-Irvine. I haven’t followed the program closely enough in years to see how much progress was made by Coach Smith. My view from 2000 miles away is that he did make at least some progress. Hopefully that means he’s got a good foundation and can continue the growth.
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The program is better off than it was in Krysko’s last year. We are in the post-season, albeit the NIT. That is progress. We’ll see how Smith recruits in this off-season. (I also think all returning players should be expected to be in the gym daily and to shoot 1,000 free throws and make 700 of them before they leave. 
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It’s interesting. With another missed NCAA tourney I’ve been thinking about this very thing. Like, are we better off? I wonder.
Things were pretty bad that last year with LK. Admittedly, I was probably the last guy onto the “Fire LK” bus. While I was super frustrated with where things were going and how Hill had locked the U into a way-too-generous contract with LK, I was thinking the other day that it feels like we’re literally in the same place: NOT in the Big Dance, and f*** all on the horizon in regard to recruiting.
Just like LK’s last year, we’re going to lose our best player. This time BC compared to Timmy Allen who the whole world knew was going to leave Utah after that season.
Frustratingly, I feel like we’re in the same place, BUT at least I had some confidence in the recruiting of Larry. He brought in a TON of talent in his decade, produced 3 NBA players and a Sweet 16. All of that was in his first five years. With Smith, I think a lot of fans were panicking early at his recruiting dearth. But now? Since the failed recruitment of Chandler, Smith hasn’t locked in a lot of players to get Ute fans hopeful. Getting Burgess back on the Hill felt like a win…that’s maybe not produced a lot of dudes yet.
What’s happening!?? Are we better off? IDK. All I know is March Madness is here, once again, without the Utes. And I HATE how regular this has become.
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I think getting into the NIT and at least winning a game in that tournament is a measurable sign of progress. Am I excited about the future? Too early to say. What I can say is that the program’s trajectory seems positive. We’ve gotten a little better in each one of the three years Smith has been HC. We’ll just have to wait and see if that continues. We have no choice, really.
I hate it too, BTW.
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