If You Still Need Reasons to Trust in Todd...

Taoist principal. Can't copy the gifts of another. Must be true to one's own gifts.

 

There are a LOT of older coaches out there that trust their eyes more than anything else. I think of Calipari who seemingly aggregates talent with less thought of the whole and little thought of the individuals willingness to play for a team (hell, he brags of 1 and done).

Todd does run by the numbers. I was thrilled when Todd fouled late in a game and just spouted the odds of them making both ends of a 1 and 1 versus us being forced to huck up a 3 with 6 seconds left if no foul stopped the clock. He KNOWS the data and trusts it.

In addition to the above, and probably more importantly, I think TG is a leader with vision. He seems to build guys up to play both freely and within the system. They play FOR the team knowing that success of the whole will bring individual success. Achieving THAT is really hard. To gather talent based on specific talent and mentality to create a team surely relies upon data, and so much more. Being able to do all that is very rare.

Many rivals say last years success was the result of a generational player or a group of mercenaries developed by others. That team, though, sure looked like they played for each other so however they came in, somebody got them to gel. And, yes, Clayton saved our bacon more than once, but no team wins the title without a star. I leave room for the possibility that last year was lightning in a bottle, but watching TG operate belies that notion in my (admittedly biased) opinion. Gonna enjoy TG as long as possible!!!

 

Watched the TT E8 game last night on the NCAA Channel - so it's like watching "live" - no pauses, no rewind - and it really struck me of the confluence of skilled coaching and superb player execution. Many hands on the rope, but doubtless Walter was the one, in this game, who pulled the most weight. Still love seeing Alijah's side-of-the-mouth "Ballgame" comment to the TT player.