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I just lurk now. Used to be a regular. Invented the I Hate Kent Haiku more years ago than I care to consider at the moment. I love The University of Akron. I am a Zip. My first game at Memorial, the coach was Laturza. Listened on the radio when Earl the Pearl dropped a 50-spot on Akron with possibly our best team ever. You idiots questioning KD? I hate to call people idiots, but that is what you are if you want a new coach. Just stop. Please. We are in the MAC. That is who we are. It is not the best conference, but winning it's conference tournament is never easy, especially when your best player ways 290 pounds and has to play three games in three days. I am still all in with this program. Shout-out to those who are all-in with me.

I just saw this and wanted to pay my respects. I'm a VCU fan who used to be on here more often when VCU and Akron were paired in Bracketbusters several years ago. I and GoZips butted heads quite a bit to start, but it was always evident he was highly passionate about the Zips. To hear of his passing is very saddening. I pray for peace that passes understanding to rest with his loved ones. He was clearly a great fan of this program and fiercely rooted for it. My condolences to his family and to all of Zips Nation.

A 7 seed in the NIT for the regular season champ of the MAC is a strong sign of the respect the college basketball world has for the Tuesday night football playing, poorly officiated, ESPN kowtowing, Mid-American Conference. Rant over.

KD should be on the phone with Illinois State yesterday. There are more of those teams in the same boat as us

https://mobile.twitter.com/RossBjorkAD/status/841352257622929409 Illinois State head coach tweeted out that he was looking for a home and home next season against a P6 team. Ole Miss AD responded that he'd love to work something out. Edit: Looks like a done deal. https://mobile.twitter.com/DanMuller/status/841366488791552000

Buried in the last line. Not sure who's even gonna make it that far into his article other than the people that are at the JAR every game

I feel we have been rattling the cage. We've moved to being a team that focuses on creating looks from 3 or near the basket while minimizing mid-range attempts, which is what advanced metrics says we should do. We've expanded our recruiting footprint, perhaps at the expense of losing some local guys we wanted to schools like Buffalo. People, including myself, have complained about the sub par OOC schedule, but we're going to be playing in a very stacked Diamond Head Classic next season. It's certainly not because we haven't tried new things that we haven't made it over the hump. The MAC is a very competitive league and even in our best years we aren't above dropping games in conference to teams that have a comparable level of talent as us. Dambrot does a great job of getting the most out of his players and putting them in a position to succeed, but it's not like we are landing 3* and 4* players. We're landing guys who have flaws that made it so they trickled down to Akron whether it be TDM or Antino being "too short" or E being "too raw or Big Dog putting on a lot of weight after suffering a leg injury. I feel our problem is more Jack and Joe related and less X's and O's.

Dambrot will NOT and should NOT get fired. let's put that to rest. We can't afford eating the rest of his 10 year contract, we can't afford upsetting Lebron, and great coaches are not dying to come coach at Akron. That being said, we need to stop worshiping him and he needs to feel some pressure. Here are a few starting points: 1 - He can't keep scheduling his way to get an inflated number of wins every year. We can't celebrate having x 21 win seasons when we all know it is fool's gold. The AD needs to step in and make him schedule better. 2 - He needs to hire better staff members, it is not Akron's problem to make sure that all his ex-players have good paying jobs. All his assistants are his ex-players and all what they know about college basketball is what they learned from him. Who is going to draw a new play when you need one? 3 - Hire an assistant coach who can coach post players. We don't have one. 4 - Practice free throws...it is EMBARRASSING! year after year after year. 5 - Stop this nonsense of being loyal to upperclassmen and playing them no matter how terrible they are. You play the best players on your roster. (Utomi over Kwan will be a good example).

And those of us who are critical of Akron's current circumstance aren't die-hard fans? Again, I'd like to emphasize that there aren't many voices here calling for Dambrot to be fired. However, there are some critical voices of displeasure. Are you guys seriously happy with a four year drought? What the hell is the point to being the "best program in the MAC" if you can't get to the finish line? There's obviously something that's got to change with the Zips program or it will continue to be stagnant.

As it is now you have to be a Zips basketball purist/diehard to go to a game. Neither the venue nor the opponents are a draw.

I'm with you, dude. But apparently it's been a long time since those English classes at UA for you.

I take back most of the bad stuff I've said about him...

Wish you were an active member these days. We need more logical minds such as yourself around here.

I think I had a kneejerk rejection to what I thought was the premise of this thread but I can sympathize with what you are saying and now that I think about it, perhaps you are right. Maybe even if it's not an audit from the top-down, perhaps Keith Dambrot himself needs to re-evaluate the nature of his organizational approach, strategy, and philosophy, perhaps by seeking outside consult. Like I said before, the fear is that we go backwards by rattling the cage, but surely this is an irrational fear and there is no need to get defensive, and something seems to be needed to get over the hump to the next level

What does that matter when we lose whenever it really matters? Again, I'm going to stress that I AM NOT CALLING FOR DAMBROT TO BE FIRED. I am calling for The Zips to give a damn about changing the culture of meh. Because honestly, I'm personally getting more and more bored with following the Zips. Win 20 games a year and lose in the MAC C is boring to me. Win 20 games and lose to any team worth a damn is boring to me. Sorry, it is. Maybe I was spoiled because we went to the NCAA every-other-year when I was in college...but the program to me has lost a lot of spunk.

Hey, you keep your eyes off my neighbors daughter!

I do when I see a certain dance team member...

I think the successor is the current Director of Basketball Operations.

I doubt that's the case, but it isn't totally out of the realm of possibilty. This might answer your last question: "It's good for us,'' Akron coach Keith Dambrot said. "Thank God it's Houston because we have a lot of Houston kids on our team. This will help us get motivated to play. They're all disappointed but we're getting over it."

KD turned our program around in 2003-2005 and I am immensely grateful for that. But we already thanked him enough for that. He got raises and extensions and he has had a very comfortable and very rewarding job (not only for him but also a handful of others that he chooses to hire) for 13 years now. How much longer are we going to milk this cow? If you want to keep reminding me that we had Hipsher and KD turned the program around, I will remind you that he had CMU and we turned his career around too. It is a win-win situation. It is a great partnership. We appreciate him and want him to REMAIN the head coach at Akron and be more successful. He has to change his ways about a few things. There is nothing wrong with that... I have a boss and I get pressured to do certain things in a different way. Is that too much to ask?

I don't think scheduling had nearly as much to do with a 7 seed as not being a "major conference" team did. This is the NIT committee we are talking about.

So they looked at the resume and picked the best teams like I said they do. Great, thanks for answering.

Or, maybe we envisioned a Phi Slamma Zippa marketing campaign to promote the game. Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot that someone already tried to copy a Houston football ad earlier this year. So, that wouldn't be advised.

7 seed. Had one of the highest win totals in the NIT, and that gets us a 7 seed. There's your participation trophy for the weak, WEAK out-of-conference scheduling. Happy for our Houston/Texas Zips.

Selection show 830 on espnu for those interested.

Akron has been to the dance in 1986, 2009, 2011, 2013. This is the first NCAA Tournament appearance for Northwestern. http://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-men/article/2017-03-12/northwestern-joins-march-madness-party-heres-what-you-need

We didn't lose Jackson because of our style of play. Or because we didn't tell him he could be a focal point. There were other factors that we couldn't match that had nothing to do with basketball.

The definition of insanity? People on this thread that are apologists for Dambrot. It's great that we make it and yes he's built this program...but we lose the same way in big games every year. He needs better staff around him or needs to reevaluate his predictable game plans.

I can see it happening for a lot of reasons: 1. Where should an AAC progrum look first for a HC? Probably the ranks of successful, proven "non-P6" head coaches. 2. As someone posted earlier, USF needs some basketball stability in the near term. 4-8 years is a sufficient timeframe for now. He wouldn't be in the AAC Final year in year out as with the MAC but then again there would be the possibility of at-large NCAA bids. 3. The window for KD to recruit & coach with a nicer facility is starting to close. I think we are all seeing UA's ceiling by now and if we find it frustrating, imagine how he feels. The USF Sun Dome is a magnificent college arena (their facilities issue is on the football side). 4. Metro area of 3-4 million, #11-ish national media market so the potential for a large following and great attendance is there. 5. What is the AAC average salary? IDK, but probably more than the MAC. Look at the bright side: if the AAC ever gets raided and has to bring in some new members, he would be a great ambassador for us

I'm just not sure where this thought comes from. The coaching staff has gone to great lengths to elevate the program - trying guys like Tree and Harney, grabbing transfers like Walsh and Gilliam, looking to build recruiting hotbeds across the country (Texas). It hasn't all worked, but some of it has, and we've had the best program in the MAC over the past ten years. Of course we want more, and so do the leaders of this program. Could someone other than KD and his staff do better? Maybe, but I think chances are stronger that a replacement would do worse. Be careful what you wish for.

Welcome to the family! Thanks for posting!

Easy Skip. It was a joke and an expression of disappointment.

1) You don't follow college basketball very well if you believe that the NIT Champ is the 69th best team in the nation. 2) An NIT Championship would be absolutely incredible for this program. Unlikely, but incredible.

Bound to happen? It's a reality for many schools in our league right now, and we've been there ourselves. We went from 1992 to 2004 with ONE MAC tournament win. No, not a title win. Winning ONE SINGLE game....total...in all of those MAC Tourney appearances. So, for all of the schools who have done nothing in the MAC Tournament over the period where we've had the most title game appearances (9) and most titles (3), we can only feel so fortunate that we're not in their shoes.

Scrolling through this thread I see several Bowden apologists being critical of Dambrot... I'm disappointed as anyone with how this season turned out. I'm losing faith that we will ever see Dambrot win a NCAAT game, which is a damn shame because there have been lesser coaches that have achieved that feat. Regardless, of how the final x-number of years of his career play out, he's going to go down as Akron's greatest basketball coach. Looking down the road 10, 20, 30 years from now when the Zips have trouble making it past the 1st round of the MAC tournament, which is bound to happen at some point, that's when we'll realize how good we had it under Dambrot.

To expand: L, 53-52 to Miami L, 74-55 to Kent W, 65-53 over Buffalo L, 81-75 to Ohio W, 66-65 over Kent L, 64-63 to Ohio W, 65-46 over Ohio L, 64-61 to Buffalo L,70-65 to Kent You can look at that a few ways: 1-We are 3-6 in MACC games, which is not good and should be better. 2-As skip-zip pointed out, we've won more MAC Titles in the last 10 years than anyone else. Combined with our number of Finals appearances, we're the best program - on paper - over the last 10 years. 3-The 9 title game appearances and 3 titles have been great, but damn, it would have been nice to win 1 or 2 more of those, at least. I'm in group #3. I'm proud of our accomplishments and wouldn't trade our results with anyone else in the MAC, but I also want more now.

1-Not going to even get into this debate again, but it's been shown in the past that scheduling has improved over the years. 2-Shaka Smart did pretty well for himself. Jeff Boals moved on to OSU. Rick McFadden is currently being looked at as a head coach by several schools. Couldn't disagree more on the quality of assistants. 3-I'm not at practice (and I know you aren't either) so who knows, but Zeke Marshall, Big Dog, and Pat Forsythe had pretty nice careers. 4-I'm sure they practice free throws. 5-Ivey (Soph), Williams (Soph), TDM (Fresh), Utomi (Fresh), and Olojakpoke (Fresh) all played significant minutes throughout the season and last night in the championship game.

100% Agree. It should be a chance to beat someone of some significance, and this program needs that more than anything else right now. We earned that opportunity by winning the conference by 3 games this year.

You're right. Lets at least remind everyone of this... MAC Tournament Titles in last 10 years. Akron - 3 OU - 2 Kent - 2 Buffalo - 2 WMU - 1 Miami - 1 And nobody is even remotely close to our number of Tournament Final appearances.

This is like a family reunion tonight. Good to see some ZNO family members that I haven't seen in a while. I hope that I don't see you again until the next one. ps, no, you aren't getting invited to the wedding

Well, K.ent played a very good game. Big Dog was great. Hall's almost as good as Dog. Jaylin Walker had a great game, big props to him. I wish them well; they're representing the conference. The Q was packed; looked great on tv. Zips played like crap... again. We should have lost way more often than we did this year, but we won by the skin of our teeth on a number of occasions. Won't beat good teams that way, though, and K.e.nt is a good team. Again, I'm disappointed, yeah. To be sure. But K.e.nt deserved to win and we did't.

Still waiting for an intelligent, insightful post from you. Still hung up on Forsythe eh?