Dear Josh Whitman, The Time for Change is Now
Heading into the 2016–17 season, John Groce has worn out his welcome in Champaign
As anyone who has followed my writing knows, I have not had as much time to dedicate to my blog as last season. Partially due to life changes, partially due to apathy, the Illini have had to take a few steps down in precedence. However, I’ve stayed very close to the season and have watched any game I have been able to. It’s always more fun to watch live, to interact with the Twittersphere, but even games where I haven’t been able to watch, I’ve recorded. There are some games I haven’t gotten back to, but it’s gotten to the point where I know I won’t like what I will be seeing.
I sent this tweet out yesterday after the game and this piece will do just that.
I hope you all can read this with openness. Even though I’ve been writing less this season, my interaction on Twitter has grown as has my following. I do not have the most followers of any blogger out there, but I got a fun group to converse with. There are Groce-lovers and Groce-haters and few in between. The vitriol sometimes between the two parties is a little bit too much as the blindness towards the other side gets extreme. I’m hoping to relay a balanced opinion in my upcoming words. I promote a discussion afterwards and am willing to hear my points argued for or against. I hope you all can get the release from reading this as I will from writing it. It very well may be my last piece until after the season, unless something ridiculous changes.
I don’t see anything changing all that much, positively or negatively, to alter my current opinion. I want to make sure I’m also displaying one more tweet I sent out from last night so you all know where I’m coming from.
My hopes took a big punch this season after the Nebraska loss, which I expressed in an earlier article. The Indiana beatdown certainly didn’t help my belief this team would be reaching the postseason. I still hung on to the belief the four game stretch of: at Minnesota, home for Ohio State and Wisconsin, and at Rutgers could be a turning point. The road games were against the teams I felt we still were (hopefully) better than and Ohio State and Wisconsin were beatable, especially in front of your home crowd.
The team did win both road games, albeit needing overtime in each. Neither provided me much excitement nor built faith. The home losses would have negated any of those feelings, if they existed, anyway. Neither Ohio State nor Wisconsin had an amazing game, yet home court was not defended. The season’s goals changed at that point and even though Coach Groce may have different personal goals, there was hope the team’s would out-rank his.
I admittedly did not watch the Iowa game. I let my wife control the television as I knew that evening I would want full domain over what was being viewed, and it was Super Bowl Sunday. I followed along on Twitter and the game went just as expected. The one change I did take note of was that DJ Williams’ minutes grew and I wondered if Coach Groce was starting to change his focus toward the future.
Signs of Improvement
The ironic part about this article, not to spoil the ending, is I have actually been encouraged the last three games. I found the Northwestern game very exciting, despite the result. And I am not a huge fan of Malcolm Hill as a point guard, but it at least showed creativity. No offense to Alex Austin, but he’s a walk-on; he shouldn’t be playing for a Power 6 conference team. I was glad to see his minutes limited. Jaylon Tate probably isn’t either. This was the first game where his minutes were drastically reduced, of course related to Hill playing a lot at point.
My cynical question was what took so long for the change? Groce replied to this question with that he needed the bye week to see the changes in practice. Hill played point guard in the non-conference portion of the schedule, to varying degrees of success. Did it really require a week of practice to go back to something being done two months ago? Were any Illini fans excited to see year two of Jaylon Tate as point guard? How about transfer Khalid Lewis ? Tracy Abrams was hurt before the European trip so why wasn’t Hill for point guard looked into at an an earlier time? Hell, it may have been nice to see Hill try some point guard last year with Tate and Ahmad Starks not providing much at the position.
Hill was good, not great, at point but there were some nice looks from him which were encouraging to see how it played out the rest of the year. Besides, it was nice to be complaining about the referees instead of our team for a game.
The team beat Rutgers, at home, by a significant margin (even covered!) but there was still some room for complaining. It did get a little tighter than it should at any point during the game. Lewis’s minutes were back up, as he went back to the primary point guard; however this may have been related to Hill hurting his hand during practice. Even more minutes for DJ was great to see and he may have even been the most valuable player for the Illini in the game. Aaron Jordan also saw an increase in minutes. We were starting to see good signs for the future.
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Last night against Wisconsin we saw more good signs. The first half built on the excitement of the Northwestern and Rutgers games. Of course we all know what happened in the second half, and I think we may have won if the officiating was more balanced.
But let’s be real here, this isn’t last year’s Wisconsin team and Northwestern and Rutgers are not anywhere near the Big Dance this year. There has been improvement and the team is a little more fun to watch, but it’s been a lot of “way too little and way too late”. I’m still excited to see if we can pull off upsets of Indiana or at Maryland. Heck, at Penn State would be a fairly big upset.
However, we’ve had a lost season — that yes — there are plenty of excuses to go around. But, it feels like a missed opportunity with the easy schedule, a weaker Big Ten, and just a weaker bubble overall. Tournament appearances are the report cards for college basketball coaches and this is a third straight fail for Coach Groce.
In the minutes before the Rutgers game, we got the biggest news of the season with Josh Whitman being leaked as the new Athletic Director. His press conference was motivating for anyone in Illini Nation and you couldn’t listen to his introductory statement and not be excited about the hire. Naturally, he spoke of Coach Groce, and I respected his response that the program would be under review. We were all excited to be Illini fans again, for about 20 hours.
Disciplinary Actions
I understand as much as anyone, as an 18–22 year old, it’s really easy to put yourself in bad situations. I did a whole lot of stupid things during my time in Champaign, so I am not the one to hurl judgement. However, I wasn’t brought in to the University of Illinois to represent them publicly. Sure, every student does represent their school, but when I threw up in a Kam’s bathroom, it wasn’t making the Daily Illini.
With that said, it’s not John Groce’s job to supervise all of his players around the clock. They are of the age they may doing some stupid stuff and most of the time there isn’t anything any coach can do about it. However, Groce is a mentor of sorts and should be doing all he can to make sure it doesn’t happen. He interviewed and recruited all members of the Illini basketball team, so anything they do still comes back to him.
I was a really good kid in high school — top of my class, great test scores, never got in trouble — all of that jazz. I went into college without any direction. Classes were more difficult than high school so my studies slipped and the “extra-curriculars” grew. It wasn’t until as an upperclassman I found a mentor who pointed me in the right direction, and somehow, someway got me out of there in four years with a degree.
Coach Groce should be these players’ mentor from day one in Champaign. He’s not recruiting (at least successfully) one-and-done players. These young men are all coming to the University of Illinois for an education as well as hope to get to the next level in their basketball career. There have been far too many times the last two seasons, and really the only times reaching relevance, University of Illinois basketball has made headlines for negative news.
Aaron Cosby and Rayvonte Rice last season, more than a couple occurrences of small violations this season, and now this: Coach Groce’s prize recruit Leron Black, possibly done at the University of Illinois, just mere hours after the new athletic director is announced. Just as Bruce Weber before him, Groce has not only had his players not get it done on the court, but they aren’t getting it done off the court, either.
I posted this tweet a few hours after the Rutgers win.
I guess I was proven wrong.
2016 and Beyond
So Mr. Whitman, your work is in front of you. Illinois basketball is the key entity to the athletic department you now head up. I believe 2017 is the most important recruiting class possibly since 2002. Right now, the program is perhaps even lower, with the Black news, than it was when Bruce Weber was let go four years ago. It’s ultimately your decision on how to handle the turning around of this program it desperately needs. The recruiting class within the state of Illinois hasn’t been this good in a long time and within it lies a legacy recruit, who may be able to bring in the best of the bunch. To make matters worse, if he doesn’t come to Champaign, he may be headed to Indiana. That would be an almighty insult — one again — Bruce Weber experienced.
With everything, I know the cost will be great. A reported $1.2 million buyout will probably take a whole lot of convincing of your bosses. Being a finance degree holder, I’m sure you can understand a sunk cost when you see it.
The program needs a new leader to bring in the 2017 class that has the potential to instantly change the face of Illinois athletics. There are fantastic candidates all over the country: Gregg Marshall, Archie Miller and Bryce Drew to name a few. These names bring a résumé these high schoolers know; one they would be excited to play for. Their teams have had success and they will be watching them next month when all eyes are on college basketball.
I understand you’re a football player, and that program needs a lot of help too, but Illinois basketball is the staple of the university’s athletics and it needs the right move done now. One more year of not meeting expectations will be too many. In order for #WeWillWin, there needs to be change now.
