Now What?
I titled my last article “What Next” so I’m going with “Now What” for this one since nothing I laid down for how this team can succeed happened in the proceeding eighty minutes of basketball. I was ready to write a scathing article after the Nebraska game but I decided to cool down first. I’ve gotten away from writing an article after every game this season (thankfully) anyway, so I thought it wasn’t worth it to write an article filled with emotion when that isn’t what I am going for with this site.
And then last night happened — I’m less angry and more saddened after being thoroughly embarrassed by of all teams, Indiana Basketball, with Dan Dakich providing the background ambiance. I theorized last article on there being a possibility that the Purdue game said more about Purdue than it did about the Illini. That seems like it’s more likely the case for our team, but Purdue dismantled Ohio State by 50 the other night, so maybe it was just an off night for the Boilermakers.
Now what? I am going to switch my focus to more on the remainder of the season as a whole, contrasting my previous article. My previous article’s points were on how do they keep building success this season to possibly surprise us all but we know that is not very likely to happen anymore. The rest of this article will be focusing on how we can avoid ever having to go through a drubbing like Tuesday night anymore.
John Groce
Have to start here. I don’t have to take it where I am going, but follow me even though you don’t want to. Bruce Weber. The similarities between these two are starting to tally up. In 2011–12, Bruce’s last year, he seemingly lost the team along the way. The team had a fairly decent non-conference portion of the schedule, even reaching as high as #19 in the national rankings. They had two tough losses including a very frustrating Braggin’ Rights loss which really started the fan base calling for Weber’s head (curious how loud things would be around here if this team lost this season’s game to Missouri). The Big Ten season did not start promising as the Illini barely scraped by a bad Minnesota team in double OT, got crushed by Purdue, won a one point game over Northwestern and a five point game over Nebraska. The Ohio State game was that year’s Purdue game of this year — the Brandon Paul 43 point game, in which he single-handedly carried the Illini to victory. The fan base got curious at that point, brought back in, much like I did after the Purdue game a week ago. Then they lost to Penn State of all teams, lost to Wisconsin and then lost the rematch to that below-average Minnesota. After Tom Izzo let his buddy Bruce win a game (allegedly, mostly by me), the team completely threw in the towel, losing 10 of their last 11 which included the famous press conference after the Purdue loss where Weber essentially said he had lost the team. We’re not quite there yet, but the path is laid out for Groce.
It’s very hard to be sympathetic towards either Weber or Groce saying they’ve lost the team because they built said team. Sure they’re not paid to be psychiatrists but coaches recruit personalities as much as talent. Both coaches said multiple times they had no on-court leaders but were they expecting leadership to appear out of nowhere? Neither of these coaches were necessarily awful at recruiting but it seems like any of the “big” recruits they got had baggage. I was a fan of Weber longer than most were and I was the biggest fan of Groce fans until the final five halves of last season. But at some point, the forest becomes clearer through the trees.
It may seem mean to compare Groce to Weber as the latter took the program from a national title game to almost irrelevant in seven years. The heights weren’t as high when Groce took over for him to even compare to that. The question is has Groce done anything else to separate himself from Weber? In that infamous speech, Weber admitted, “in the last three years, I only worried about winning instead of building a culture”. This season Groce has done neither.
2012–13 was Groce’s best year by far here. None of us expected much after Weber’s swan song but Groce took — Bruce’s players, mind you — six four star recruits and made the tournament, even winning a game and coming very close to knocking out a two seed. This is more of what Weber should have been doing, and Groce certainly deserves credit, but how much can really be given. In 2013–14, the Weber group was mostly gone (Bertrand, Abrams and Egwu remained) but Rayvonte Rice became the surprise and brought the team farther than what was predicted. Last year was supposed to be the year we saw something. Only one freshman and the team having plenty of experience, but the team went backwards. We all know what’s happening this year.
Injuries are Groce’s excuse for the last two seasons. Injuries have become Schrodinger’s cat for Groce defenders. “Of course the team wouldn’t be this bad if Groce had his point guard, Tracy Abrams, the last two seasons”. Really? I understand the leadership thing and that may all be true. Going back to that speech, Weber stated that Tracy was the only leader on the team (also saying that was the biggest problem, presumably because he was a freshman). There are intangibles that Abrams would provide this team but tangibly, I do not think Groce is missing a 33.3% shooting percentage from the field and 27% from 3 out of his point guard. Hell, Tate shot 36.8% last year and is shooting 44.1% this year (of course on many less attempts). We’re not exactly missing Melo Trimble. The other aspect is that Abrams shouldn’t be on this team in 2016 so if things went as planned last year, what would the excuse be? Groce was brought in as this “point guard whisperer” and we still haven’t seen any success from the position.
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The other injuries? Leron Black is a bigger loss than Abrams, but it didn’t look like he had righted his issues from last year early on this season. Nunn missed a few games which could have saved a loss, nothing more. Mike Thorne is my most notable loss as I do believe that Groce changed the offense to revolve around him once the Abrams injury happened, and possibly earlier. However, that pickup was a fairly lucky circumstance a la Rayvonte Rice. We’ve seen the good and the bad (Cosby, Starks) with transfers and we’re still not sure how good Mike Thorne will be in the Big Ten. If Thorne wouldn’t have appeared out of thin air, we still would have been looking at Finke and Morgan playing all of the minutes (and possibly Colbert not transferring).
The item that bothers me as much as anything is something that even Weber didn’t deal with this much. The suspensions, or disciplinary actions, that have been given out by Groce are startling. We still have no idea what happened to this team last year but my predictions have always revolved around the Rice/Cosby suspension and them being reintegrated into the team. When it was announced that Kendrick Nunn was not starting for the Nebraska game, after having such a great game against Purdue, my blood boiled. On a small picture level, why does the punishment have to be not starting the game? I understand he has to be consistent but whatever happened to running laps? On a grander picture, it just bothers me that these players, after dealing with all that happened last year, and the Darius Paul fiasco from Europe, still are breaking team rules. If it’s a lack of respect for the coach then perhaps he lost these guys a long time ago. Guys he recruited — to be a part of his program.
Am I advocating the firing of John Groce? As of this moment, I am. The Nebraska game really made everything hit home and the light struck on how little this coach has done with this program. This was before the game at Indiana. That has just made me realize how this all feels so similar to Weber’s demise. Yes, this year’s freshman class has a ton of potential but so did Weber’s the year he was let go. Some of those players did transfer and it’s possible that some of the current ones would as well if Groce goes.
The 2017 recruitment is the most important class for this program in some time — possibly since 2013, when in his second year, Groce brought in three four stars. A new coach will be given the exact same opportunity. The possibility of losing commitment Javon Pickett and with him the shot at Jordan Goodwin and Jeremiah Tillmon scare me, of course. I am hoping (banking) that these guys are looking at the state school (or close enough for Tillmon) and wanting to build something here together. Maybe the coach or recent history does not matter to these kids, but the possibility of making their own history does. The only reason why I’m even hesitating on wanting to part ways with Groce is that 2017 class — it’s that important. But what if they brought in a coach with an actually successful résumé to recruit these guys?
Looking forward
I would be doing a disservice if I only pointed out things that were wrong and not at least coming up with an idea how to right those things. I have a few things I want to lay out here that I’m hoping the team looks at, and this blog will take a look at, for the remainder of the season.
- Coach possibilities — I can’t say fire the coach without having a list of potential replacements. I will be scouting who is out there and writing a piece in the short term on why certain guys would look great in the orange blazer. My current list is headlined by Chris Mack, Archie Miller and let’s set our sights high — Gregg Marshall.
- Play Finke at the 4 — If you’re a Bulls fan, this will make more sense but I’d like to see the Illini try to do what Hoiberg is doing with Mirotic. Hopefully, they’ll have more success but having a big man who can shoot the three will drive teams crazy. With the return of Mike Thorne, Finke won’t be asked to rebound as much, and can spend more time on the perimeter. I’m focusing most of these moves towards next season and obviously Thorne won’t be here then. The team will have to be more creative with lineups with no true big, but at least knowing this is a possibility will allow more lineup choices.
- Play JCL at the 1 — When Coleman-Lands was recruited, he was listed as a “combo guard” meaning he can handle the ball as well as shoot it. We know he can shoot it but we’ve seen seldom attempts at handling it. After 17 turnovers in his first nine games, JCL has had only five in his last ten including five in a row without one. He only has 16 assists on the season but now is the time to see if he can run an offense. I don’t think anyone will be missing Jaylon Tate on the floor and Khalid Lewis won’t be here next year. A starting lineup that’s a must see for me is JCL, Nunn, Hill, Finke, Thorne. (Side note — I know it’s bad to say this but I really hope Abrams doesn’t return. Next season will most likely not be successful and there is not a lot of insight a sixth year player is going to provide for this program).
- Prepare for everything — My oddball comment that didn’t receive much support on twitter was is it possible that Malcolm Hill declares for the draft? On that matter, what if Nunn did? Hill is currently listed as #48 on CBS’s big board, which is smack in the middle of the second round. This year’s draft class is reportedly very weak and next year’s is supposed to be very strong. Hill may have some whispers in his ear that it’s time to go, especially if Groce is around another year. As for Nunn, he just became a family man and take it from a new father — money becomes way more important when that happens. He’s not on any big boards but if he’s the top scorer in the Big Ten, he has to at least get a sniff from the NBA or at least find something overseas. With those both being possible, replacements would have to be found. Aaron Jordan and DJ Williams will be next up and start to be given more time as the season continues.
As you can tell, I’m very focused on the freshman class. If the dream 2017 recruiting class is landed, these freshmen will then be juniors when that class takes the floor, and there is some light if you squint hard through that tunnel. Part of me wishes I could just ignore the rest of the season but there is plenty to keep an eye on. I’ll be here to do just that.
