The Official Fire Dave Paulsen Thread

[GSII]

If Mason is content on finishing 5th, why did they leave the CAA where they were in position to be a champion every year.

We did it for money. The Media deal nets each a10 school like 400k per year I think. Also, you have a better chance to get into the dance which you will see next year. A10 is gonna get minimum 3 schools in next year. My guess is 4. vcu, Davidson, Dayton, Bonnies/slu.

 

[Falco]

We did it for money. The Media deal nets each a10 school like 400k per year I think. Also, you have a better chance to get into the dance which you will see next year. A10 is gonna get minimum 3 schools in next year. My guess is 4. vcu, Davidson, Dayton, Bonnies/slu.

I hope you are right with bettering your chances. It just seems like Mason is on the outside looking in. I would have to imagine that this current team would have a real shot at a CAA championship.

Perhaps Mason wouldn’t get these players if they were still in the CAA, but looking at their offers I would expect most of them to sign with Mason still.

 

[gmubrian]

I don't doubt that the staff is trying to bring in elite A10-level recruits. But recruits look around and compare us with others in the conference and probably say "meh". So, you get what you paid for. If the below budget list is accurate and we are 10th in spending, our ROI is where we'd expect it to be- in the 6 conference tournaments we've played in, our average seed is 9th. Money doesn't buy titles, but we don't have a former player in the league (like Davidson), don't have a great following (like vcu), don't have a great arena (like Dayton) and don't have an elite coach (like Davidson and SBU. side note- I don't know how you recruit in Olean. I've been there in the winter months and its brutal. yet he's bringing in recruits). So if you don't have any of those, you better be willing to spend extra to help close the gap. Otherwise, expect 6-9 seeds each year.

A-10 Average Budget $4.72M
1. Dayton $7.25M
2. SLU $6.9M
3. vcu $6.15M
4. URI $5.45M
5. Duquesne $5.2M
6. Richmond $4.75M
7. Fordham $4.55M
8. UMass $4.35
9. St Joe's $4.2M
10. George Mason $4.0M
11. St Bonaventure $3.8M
12. Davidson $3.35M
13. La Salle $3.27M
14. GW $3.2M

I took this information and added tournament appearances over the last 10 years and then created a scoring system, 10 points for NCAA appearance, 5 per game played, 2 for NIT appearance and 1 for NIT game to somewhat objectively assess performance.

Analysis:
We are 10th in spending and 12th in our results scoring. Granted this is in our Virus and recovery period so that brought our score down. One could argue, though, that, so far, Larranaga was the outlier and our performance with the rest of the coaches has been more of our norm.

Outliers
Davidson: Elite, long-term coach and Steph Curry effect.
Duquesne and Fordham: They are wasting their money. Need new ADs?

I think this just helps to reaffirm the case that if we want to be an elite A10 program, we will have to get/spend more money. As soon as we say that, though, we get the "more money doesn't necessarily mean better performance" brigade. That is true, You could waste it like Fordham and Duquesne appear to be doing. But Mason (and UMASS) are wasting almost as much as they are based on our performance... I think it does back up the argument that we are not going to see a huge jump unless we do see some more spending as we don't have any of the benefits of a Davidson.

Some ask where we would spend it. I don't know the specifics as I am not the AD or coach. It is conceivable that had our locker room been finished already, we might have gotten one more commit that we missed on. If we had a dedicated practice facility, it might have gotten us one of the recruits that got away. Maybe we could have had some more arena improvements, better assistant coaches, more charters, more buy games, better game atmosphere, etc. all of which might have helped our situation.

 

[GSII]

Not knowing how each school claims their expenses for mens bball, these numbers don't mean anything. For example, vcu could be charging rent to its mens team for use of practice facility. And that number could be 1 million bucks. Our profit and loss shows that our mens program breaks even to the penny. cmon on now.

 

[GMUgemini]

I think Duquesne just hired an AD and Dambrot looks like a good coach. They are also finally putting money into their facilities again.

If I had to guess, being in Pittsburgh is putting a strain on their travel budget (I would guess the same is true for SLU and the Bonnies — although they at least have UMass and URI who are fairly close to them).

Davidson, I suspect, must have an entirely different accounting system than everyone else.

 

[Herndon]

I think Duquesne just hired an AD and Dambrot looks like a good coach. They are also finally putting money into their facilities again.

If I had to guess, being in Pittsburgh is putting a strain on their travel budget (I would guess the same is true for SLU and the Bonnies — although they at least have UMass and URI who are fairly close to them).

Davidson, I suspect, must have an entirely different accounting system than everyone else.

Alternatively, they have one of the very best coaches in the country.

Like, outliers exist. You can have an non-duplicable asset like McKillop, and you can waste money as well, but according to GMUBrien's numbers above, there's a correlation coefficient of .44, which is moderately strong.

Yes, it's only one data piece, and yes, @GSII is right that you'd need to normalize the data for accounting practices, but it's a pretty telling data.

Spending isn't the ONLY thing, but it's certainly an important thing.

 

[GMUgemini]

Alternatively, they have one of the very best coaches in the country.

Like, outliers exist. You can have an non-duplicable asset like McKillop, and you can waste money as well, but according to GMUBrien's numbers above, there's a correlation coefficient of .44, which is moderately strong.

Yes, it's only one data piece, and yes, @GSII is right that you'd need to normalize the data for accounting practices, but it's a pretty telling data.

Spending isn't the ONLY thing, but it's certainly an important thing.

MCKillops is making about 400k a year at Davidson, which seems insane to me that they were able to hold to him that long (he was making 381k in 2008, according to the Charlotte overs server). He is in his mid-60s now so at some point Davidson is going to have to move on. It’ll be interesting to see what that AD does when McKillops retires from coaching.

 

[GSII]

Carolina pays Roy extra thru some fund. I'm sure Davidson does the same. You may never know bc it's a private school. What we do know is McKillop can coach. He recruits kids that are rated to unrated. He knew what caliber player he needed right away upon entering the A10. They didnt miss a beat with the conf upgrade. Even The Virus couldn't recruit well enough. So maybe it is the team mom scaring recruits away?

 

[GMUgemini]

Carolina pays Roy extra thru some fund. I'm sure Davidson does the same. You may never know bc it's a private school. What we do know is McKillop can coach. He recruits kids that are rated to unrated. He knew what caliber player he needed right away upon entering the A10. They didnt miss a beat with the conf upgrade. Even The Virus couldn't recruit well enough. So maybe it is the team mom scaring recruits away?

I don’t know about not recruiting well enough. He just sucked as a coach. Think of who all jumps ship after Paulsen was hired and add them in to those who stayed (Eric Lockett, Isaiah Jackson, Trey Porter, CJ Jackson) and give that roster to a person who could actually coach?

 

[GSII]

I don’t know about not recruiting well enough. He just sucked as a coach. Think of who all jumps ship after Paulsen was hired and add them in to those who stayed (Eric Lockett, Isaiah Jackson, Trey Porter, CJ Jackson) and give that roster to a person who could actually coach?

To have that many horses leave is telling.

 

[GMUgemini]

To have that money horses leave is telling.

To be fair to Paulsen, most of them went to P5 schools...CJ to Ohio State, Isaiah to Providence, Gilbert to Minnesota (although, he has since transferred out of there to Rider), and even Trey Porter and Lockett wound up at Nevada and NC State respectively. Hard to keep guys around when they can upgrade their situation as much as they did.

 

[GSII]

Some double transferred. Lockett and Gilbert. Interesting.

 

[GMUgemini]

Some double transferred. Lockett and Gilbert. Interesting.

Porter, too, ODU and then Nevada.

 

[gmutom]

To be fair to Paulsen, most of them went to P5 schools...

Fair point but it's also important to point out that all of those players initially committed to an A10 team that was struggling under Hewitt. If he can draw that kind of talent without a practice facility and a lesser budget, surely Coach Dave should be able to do so with the facility upgrades and our program hopefully trending upward. Maybe we can get Hewitt to recruit and DP to coach.

One thing I'm curious about is whether it's a given Greene will start next year. He definitely had some great games and showed his talent on both ends of the court, but he also only scored 8 combined points in Brooklyn and rendered himself a non-factor with two quick fouls in the first half of both games. (It should be noted he also only scored 2 points each in our most recent losses to vcu and St. Louis despite playing 25 minutes in both.) If his defense is touted as a major reason he starts, he needs to avoid the ticky-tack fouls and stay on the court.

I'm a Javon fan and hope he takes his game to the next level, because we can't afford our starting wing to disappear in so many big games. I will also go on record as saying I'm not sure who we have now or coming in who would be an upgrade. My hunch is that Douglas-Stanley could average 9 points a game if given the same amount of minutes as Greene, but there would almost definitely be a decline in defense at that position.

 

[GSII]

Everyone needs to know their role. Sammy Hernandez left and he went to a final four with us. But he had a role. Currently it seems like everyone wants a role and everyone has to play right away. Nah bruh, you ain't that good yet. DP needs to lock down some horses. There is no other way about it.

 

[GMUgemini]

From the sounds of it, Paulsen wants to start Miller and Mar together, so Greene starts if Kier is the point guard. If Hartwell starts, Greene doesn’t start over Kier.

 

[Herndon]

Fair point but it's also important to point out that all of those players initially committed to an A10 team that was struggling under Hewitt. If he can draw that kind of talent without a practice facility and a lesser budget, surely Coach Dave should be able to do so with the facility upgrades and our program hopefully trending upward. Maybe we can get Hewitt to recruit and DP to coach.

One thing I'm curious about is whether it's a given Greene will start next year. He definitely had some great games and showed his talent on both ends of the court, but he also only scored 8 combined points in Brooklyn and rendered himself a non-factor with two quick fouls in the first half of both games. (It should be noted he also only scored 2 points each in our most recent losses to vcu and St. Louis despite playing 25 minutes in both.) If his defense is touted as a major reason he starts, he needs to avoid the ticky-tack fouls and stay on the court.

I'm a Javon fan and hope he takes his game to the next level, because we can't afford our starting wing to disappear in so many big games. I will also go on record as saying I'm not sure who we have now or coming in who would be an upgrade. My hunch is that Douglas-Stanley could average 9 points a game if given the same amount of minutes as Greene, but there would almost definitely be a decline in defense at that position.

I like Greene as the anti-Lou Williams. I think he's a KILLER first guard off the bench. My early rotation next year is:

Hartwell
Kier
Miller
Mar
Calixte (unless Reuter loses 30 lbs)

Bench Contributors:
Greene
Boyd
JDS
Reuter (unless he loses 30 lbs)

Spot Minutes:
X. Johnson
Wilson

Redshirt:
Oduro

 

[sleeperpick]

I like Greene as the anti-Lou Williams. I think he's a KILLER first guard off the bench. My early rotation next year is:

Hartwell
Kier
Miller
Mar
Calixte (unless Reuter loses 30 lbs)

Bench Contributors:
Greene
Boyd
JDS
Reuter (unless he loses 30 lbs)

Spot Minutes:
X. Johnson
Wilson

Redshirt:
Oduro

YIKES we might score 40 per game if you're right

 

[GMUgemini]

YIKES we might score 40 per game if you're right

You think Mar is going to be as bad as last year, don’t you? If he is, he won’t play 30 minutes per game. I think we are all being optimistic that he can shake off whatever was going on with him at the start of the year.

I don’t know about starting Hartwell yet. He showed he can shoot and dish, but as for needing to create his own shot or get inside and finish we haven’t seen that yet. I’m not penciling him in for starters minutes just yet. Although, if Mar still can’t score, we might go like for like and have Hartwell, Kier, Greene, Miller, Calixte starting, which is essentially the lineup we had this year size for size.

I don’t know. I just hope Paulsen doesn’t have his blinders on about Mar. if he’s not there next year he’s not there. Let him come off the bench to play defense until he can show he can make some shots.

 

[sleeperpick]

You think Mar is going to be as bad as last year, don’t you? If he is, he won’t play 30 minutes per game. I think we are all being optimistic that he can shake off whatever was going on with him at the start of the year.

I don’t know about starting Hartwell yet. He showed he can shoot and dish, but as for needing to create his own shot or get inside and finish we haven’t seen that yet. I’m not penciling him in for starters minutes just yet. Although, if Mar still can’t score, we might go like for like and have Hartwell, Kier, Greene, Miller, Calixte starting.

I don’t know. I just hope Paulsen doesn’t have his blinders on about Mar. if he’s not there next year he’s not there. Let him come off the bench to play defense until he can show he can make some shots.

I am hopeful Mar will figure his issues out... he has a whole offseason to. If he wants to legitimately help his team he needs to be shooting corner threes and dribbling a basketball low with both hands every day this summer... The kid flat out cannot dribble and that is troubling to me. I like his jump shot even if it didn't fall barely at all (like JDS)

I just don't see any situation where Paulsen would start both Miller and Mar for how we run our offense. The spacing just doesn't work. I would rather have Miller at the 4 in Paulsen's offense and Mar absolutely cannot play the 3 with how he currently is. I really hope Paulsen just hits the reset button on our terrible offensive strategy (won't hold my breath). I do like this group as a defensive unit (subbing Javon for Hartwell would probably have our best 5 defenders on at once).

PS. I agree with your suggested lineup... Javon needs to be playing 30 + per game next season unless JDS comes in like I hope he does or Xavier is a lot better than I think he is.