Proof of Our Blue Blood Status

I was reacting to your statement that Billy should have moved on after year 18. I probably misinterpreted it.

 

Just felt like if Billy was gonna leave, he shoulda left after the final four appearance. That's all.

 

From 2000-2014 Florida was not just a "Blue Blood", they were the by most measures, at least a Top 3 Program in all of College Basketball, and some/many would say Florida was THE #1 Team over the given time period.

After losing a Hall of Fame Coach, following it up with a mediocre hire, and making 4 of 6 possible Tournaments, with one Elite Eight is not Blue Blood Status. But it is far from falling to national irrelevance.

Let's only consider the Top 100 Programs in the Country Relevant. Florida's tournament success Post Billy D certainly puts it in the top 30 Programs Nationwide. This was not a meltdown of Epic Proportions. One could almost say it was expected in trying to follow a legend.

Let's remember, Mike White was never even fired, for "failing" at his job. He was smart- and left town-to get paid again.

One man's five year run of mediocrity-is actually an overwhelming statistical probability.

Good to see you cautiously becoming more bullish on Todd Golden.

 

When u go to the dance as many times as MW you didn’t fail at the job . That was a bs post .

 

Read my lips- I didn't say he failed at the job.

 

He failed at the job. That’s why he’s gone. As we already are seeing, you can bring top talent to Gainesville, then you have to coach them. White didn’t coach them plus Golden looks like he can bring in better talent.

 

One good season in 7 years with Billy’s players, and he mismanaged that team. Total chaos on offense. Misuse of players. Way too many transfers out of the program. No player development to speak of. I could go on. About the only argument that can be made on White’s behalf is that he made the NCAA tournament 4 times and would have made it a fifth if that event wasn’t cancelled. However, he only made it into the 2nd week once and that was courtesy of miracles from Chiozza and Barry.

 

#1 rule of coaching success: Do not immediately follow a legendary coach at the school in question.

 

He obviously didn't keep us up to the level of the prior administration, but his primary failure was just the comparison to that regime. SEC titles and advancing past the round of 16 in the tourney were as rare as hen's teeth at UF until BD showed up.

 

That’s true, but not many fans should be satisfied with settling in as a top-40 team.

 

Same thing goes for football. We were not a national factor before Spurrier. No one wants to go back to the pre-Spurrier days.

 

Mike White lucked into the Elite 8 with that team. My guess is that Billy would have been in the Final 4.

 

Somebody has to take the job

 

Right now, I agree with tampajack Murph. Emphasis on "right now". The season must be played. What I think I am seeing is an upgrade in talent level. I will reserve judgement on "coaching" pending Goldens results after year 1, but right now, I'm seeing tampa as being more "correct".

And for the record I am not trashing CMW, he brought success albeit "low-level". I like CMW and was dissapointed he could do no better than win at a 65% clip and 2nd round exit. That does not make Gator fans whom wanted to see better results as being "bad fans".

 

Maybe compared to Billy Donovan? Or disappointing considering where the fans expectations were, of our team as a program, after several great years of Billy D.. The inconsistency was too much for an established basketball program by the time Billy left us for the NBA.

The fact that other teams started beating us on a regular basis was hard to watch, even though we were widely considered the first or second best basketball team in the conference during Billy's time here. And MW seemed to dull that Gator basketball team's edge, an edge that all of Billy's teams seemed to have.

That Gator basketball prestige dropped like a rock compared to Auburn... LSU... Bama... Tennessee.. and Kentucky. All of whose teams seemed to get better coaches... better players... better results than we did with MW...

So, relative to the other teams in the SEC? Yeah MW was a huge disappointment.

He seemed to be a nice guy with a clean program, but he didn't have the "it" factor as a coach to take us to the top tier of teams, even in our own conference, let alone of the national stage. In the end his teams never got back to that top tier of the SEC basketball programs. And the Gators in basketball were looked at as an afterthought on all the fan sites... a shell of our former selves.

Let's hope we have the right coaching change. I hope so.