WHAT JUST HAPPENED…..
I don’t speak much on this board, but I feel compelled to rant about this. The answer lies with our Board of Fakies and not our very bright and very talented young AD. What we all just endured for the last 12 or 13 years was nothing more than our BOF’s continued efforts to maintain Temple’s enduring status as a Mid-Major. This is different than just plain old incompetence or lack of desire to be a win. Temple University under Patrick O’Conner has intentionally suppressed Temple Universities profile in an effort to maintain Mid-Major U, for obvious reasons I won’t discuss here.
I once asked Kevin Clark if he could imagine a situation in which Indiana would hire a Head Coach from the Ivy League and then proceed to let aforementioned Coach bring his entire Ivy Staff, none of which had ever offered a scholarship in their entire career. His response,…..”that situation would never happen at Indiana”. I explained; non only did it happen here, but it was embraced. He looked at me with raised eyes.
ANYONE WHO KNOWS…..
The writing was on the wall almost immediately after Fran was hired. Temple wasn’t landing any real recruits. Ryan Brooks, TJ Dileo, Kyle Green just to name a few. Sure, all those kids are nice players to compliment a roster, but when you aren’t getting a single top 150 players, these kids inadvertently become your main contributors. We watched this happen year after year and yet ZERO was done about it. Our own John Di Carlo once asked Fran about the “recruiting deficiency”, to which he replied, “What recruiting deficiency?” Five years in, it was so blatantly obvious what was going on, but with Temple’s Mid-Major Mentality, absolutely nothing was done about it. Recruiting horror story after horror story eventually turned into a genuine nightmare. Recruiting players with no other D1 offers, losing to Ivy’s in the tournament, not making the tournament, and finally, poetic justice of losing to Belmont in a play-in game?!?
NO EXCUSES…..
Fran and his staff have no excuses. They took over a program that had a proud history with incredible facilities. The practice facility and arena are state of the art. Let’s compare to Football where Matt Rhule inherited a Division II roster, no stadium and Division III level practice facilities. With relentless effort, smart talent evaluation and an absolute desire to succeed at all costs, he took our program into the top 25 twice after decades of being the worst program in the country. We didn’t get excuses out of Matt Rhule. JW (I can’t even write it without getting angry) doesn’t complain about his shitty practice facility or High School Gym. He just wins National Championships with the tools in his tool box. 3 Final 4’s and 2 National Championships all within the same time Franny was recruiting TJ Dileo. Think JW had a recruiter or two on staff??
NOT VERY OPTIMISTIC……
We will all know very soon if we have anything to look forward to when we see who AMc hires. Unless he goes out and makes a few key hires that actually have a recruiting pedigree, I doubt we’ll have anything to get exited about for another contract period. AMc is a Temple legend and I’m hoping he succeeds, but in this day and age without a killer on staff recruiting, you won’t get very far. Recruiting 24 hrs., 7 days a week is the only way it gets done, and from what we have all learned about this staff, that just isn’t the case.
OUR AD….
In case you don’t know it, we have one of the brightest and talented young AD’s in the country. This guys not only wants to win but understands how to do it. If not for Kevin Clark trying to play AD and Patrick O handcuffing him, OUR program would look and feel drastically different. We would be in a whole different place if it were actually left up to Doctor K.
WHO’S TO BLAME?
WE ARE! Nobody else. As apathetic alum and fans and donors of the program we simply have not done enough to ensure the University puts a winner on the field. Most of us sat on our hands year after year talking about how Fran is a classy guy and rationalizing why we just lost to Cornell in the tournament. That kind of irrational rationalization does nothing more than prolong the inevitable which is exactly what we all just watched last night. Last night was a beautiful symphony nationally televising the prolonged mediocrity that has been shoved down our throats for the last decade. The same pile of shit we have been forced to watch and accept as our own, was on display in all its glory last night. A loss to Belmont in the play-in game?!? Who could have ever predicted this? I COULD. I DID. I HAVE BEEN A VOCAL CRITIC FOR THE LAST DECADE. The inevitable outcome was so blatantly obvious after the first 2 years of recruiting and staff selections. We simply cannot allow this to happen again. OUR program has already been set back years from the last decade plus of mediocre, below average everything. We must demand more and make noise when the University is showing ZERO commitment to win. These people are nothing more than stewards of OUR program. Here today, gone tomorrow. We all need to ensure the GONE TOMORROW part if we even sniff this level of mediocrity again.
Respectfully,
Kenny Mayo
I don’t speak much on this board, but I feel compelled to rant about this. The answer lies with our Board of Fakies and not our very bright and very talented young AD. What we all just endured for the last 12 or 13 years was nothing more than our BOF’s continued efforts to maintain Temple’s enduring status as a Mid-Major. This is different than just plain old incompetence or lack of desire to be a win. Temple University under Patrick O’Conner has intentionally suppressed Temple Universities profile in an effort to maintain Mid-Major U, for obvious reasons I won’t discuss here.
I once asked Kevin Clark if he could imagine a situation in which Indiana would hire a Head Coach from the Ivy League and then proceed to let aforementioned Coach bring his entire Ivy Staff, none of which had ever offered a scholarship in their entire career. His response,…..”that situation would never happen at Indiana”. I explained; non only did it happen here, but it was embraced. He looked at me with raised eyes.
ANYONE WHO KNOWS…..
The writing was on the wall almost immediately after Fran was hired. Temple wasn’t landing any real recruits. Ryan Brooks, TJ Dileo, Kyle Green just to name a few. Sure, all those kids are nice players to compliment a roster, but when you aren’t getting a single top 150 players, these kids inadvertently become your main contributors. We watched this happen year after year and yet ZERO was done about it. Our own John Di Carlo once asked Fran about the “recruiting deficiency”, to which he replied, “What recruiting deficiency?” Five years in, it was so blatantly obvious what was going on, but with Temple’s Mid-Major Mentality, absolutely nothing was done about it. Recruiting horror story after horror story eventually turned into a genuine nightmare. Recruiting players with no other D1 offers, losing to Ivy’s in the tournament, not making the tournament, and finally, poetic justice of losing to Belmont in a play-in game?!?
NO EXCUSES…..
Fran and his staff have no excuses. They took over a program that had a proud history with incredible facilities. The practice facility and arena are state of the art. Let’s compare to Football where Matt Rhule inherited a Division II roster, no stadium and Division III level practice facilities. With relentless effort, smart talent evaluation and an absolute desire to succeed at all costs, he took our program into the top 25 twice after decades of being the worst program in the country. We didn’t get excuses out of Matt Rhule. JW (I can’t even write it without getting angry) doesn’t complain about his shitty practice facility or High School Gym. He just wins National Championships with the tools in his tool box. 3 Final 4’s and 2 National Championships all within the same time Franny was recruiting TJ Dileo. Think JW had a recruiter or two on staff??
NOT VERY OPTIMISTIC……
We will all know very soon if we have anything to look forward to when we see who AMc hires. Unless he goes out and makes a few key hires that actually have a recruiting pedigree, I doubt we’ll have anything to get exited about for another contract period. AMc is a Temple legend and I’m hoping he succeeds, but in this day and age without a killer on staff recruiting, you won’t get very far. Recruiting 24 hrs., 7 days a week is the only way it gets done, and from what we have all learned about this staff, that just isn’t the case.
OUR AD….
In case you don’t know it, we have one of the brightest and talented young AD’s in the country. This guys not only wants to win but understands how to do it. If not for Kevin Clark trying to play AD and Patrick O handcuffing him, OUR program would look and feel drastically different. We would be in a whole different place if it were actually left up to Doctor K.
WHO’S TO BLAME?
WE ARE! Nobody else. As apathetic alum and fans and donors of the program we simply have not done enough to ensure the University puts a winner on the field. Most of us sat on our hands year after year talking about how Fran is a classy guy and rationalizing why we just lost to Cornell in the tournament. That kind of irrational rationalization does nothing more than prolong the inevitable which is exactly what we all just watched last night. Last night was a beautiful symphony nationally televising the prolonged mediocrity that has been shoved down our throats for the last decade. The same pile of shit we have been forced to watch and accept as our own, was on display in all its glory last night. A loss to Belmont in the play-in game?!? Who could have ever predicted this? I COULD. I DID. I HAVE BEEN A VOCAL CRITIC FOR THE LAST DECADE. The inevitable outcome was so blatantly obvious after the first 2 years of recruiting and staff selections. We simply cannot allow this to happen again. OUR program has already been set back years from the last decade plus of mediocre, below average everything. We must demand more and make noise when the University is showing ZERO commitment to win. These people are nothing more than stewards of OUR program. Here today, gone tomorrow. We all need to ensure the GONE TOMORROW part if we even sniff this level of mediocrity again.
Respectfully,
Kenny Mayo
