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George Thomas interviews Larry Williams, Jeff Boals, Anthony Stewart and Lamont Paris about UA opening. GT has kicked it up a notch!

Guys, I sure hope we aren't slipping into the idiotic mentality that is so prevalent in Cleveland. Akron is better than that. But when I see posts like this (and I've seen others), it reminds me of all the irrational people who were claiming that LeBron tanked in the playoffs for the Cavs about a decade ago because he already knew he was headed to Miami. I sure hope I don't see people yelling in the streets and burning Zips jerseys too. This is embarrassing.

Enlighten us as to the "1 other".

"Best returning big man-Hughes"?! i remember those 4 minutes and 12 seconds he played in 2017. He was freaking awesome. How will we survive without him?

Compared to pretty much any other coaching vacancy outside the power conferences, we're one of the most desirable landing spots out there.

What? I think coming into a program that has won at least 21 games for 12 straight years, with 9 title game appearances, 3 titles, and coming off of back-to-back 26 and 27 win seasons would be a pretty damn good situation to walk into, regardless of whether a couple of guys transfer. Right now, the transfers situation is not a disaster at all. It's rare that they do become a disaster. When a couple of guys leave, others find a renewed opportunity. I hope and pray that this is how the situation will conclude for us. We now have one thing we've been lacking forever.....Tradition and Reputation. That hopefully will carry us through this uncertain period.

So, if we were looking for a coach a few years from now, and Stony Brook was already established and doing well, he'd be more willing to come to Akron at that time, rather than now?

From what I have heard about Boals I don't know that he would be willing to leave just one year after becoming the head man somewhere. I think he may leave once the Stony Brook program is more established but not sure if he would go just 12 months in.

I'm a little damn tired of the "forever a Zip" BS.

I watched Kent play with UCLA, one of the top teams in the country for 35 minutes. Kent earned the championship, we did not give it away. The weakness on our team is that our guards were undersized, weak defenders, and could not slash to the hoop. If we were not shooting the 3 well, we were doomed and we did not shoot the 3 ball well in the MAC championship. There is no question the effort was there but we were just not good enough in the most important game of the season.

But that would sure get us some publicity. I wish our fan base was that "fanatic."

Having debt /= being in the hole. They're doing just fine

Leaning? I'm all the way there. You may have missed some of the information shared here. They are 2.6 BILLION in the hole financially, which has TRIPLED in the last 10 years. I think some people are too naive to acknowledge these things. I wouldn't go as far as calling this particular activity corruption, but this is yet another example of how you'd publicly classify expenses under something like "Student Amenities" (they may have even borrowed money and tagged in on the University's debt to build it...sound familiar?) knowing that you're building something that you will use to impress recruits. Then you sell it to the public that this is a necessary expense to help your University conquer the great humanitarian causes of the world, and how it is "not just for athletes", and most people never question it.

Im in Phoenix with my family for the Final Four and spotted Williams and Tom Crean having dinner last night. They spoke for about an hour, and the waiter told me Crean was perusing a folder with photos of what looked like our players.

For starters it appears we're using different rankings, but considering OSU made the tournament every year between 2010-2015 and made 4 Sweet 16 appearances during that period, I'd say it's fair to say mine are a more accurate depiction. They are also the composite rankings which averages all the top ranking sites. I only included rankings where Boals was there for the entire recruiting cycle. 2010 - #2 6 recruits 2011 - #6 5 recruits 2012 - #106 1 recruit 2013 - #36 2 recruits 2014 - #6 4 recruits 2015 - #5 5 recruits Every single recruiting class that OSU had more than 2 recruits, OSU finished top 10 in the nation in recruiting. The only class that was 'bad' was the class where they only had 1 scholarship available. http://247sports.com/Season/2015-Basketball/CompositeTeamRankings

Jeff Boals is the main reason that we got Zeke Marshall. Zeke's mom was crushed when he left the staff. With a little web research, you would see that Boals was regarded as one of the nation's top recruiters at OSU and reason he landed the his first HC gig. IMO Boals is the man to get but I doubt that Williams can land him.

Speaking of this, how long till we hang Dru III & Rome's jerseys in the rafters? IMO this should have happened already!!! (Probably Big Bad Jeremiah Woods' jersey too.)

I'm still salty about the situation, but in 5-10 years when they have a banner raising ceremony to honor Dambrot I'll be at the JAR (yes, I have 0 faith we'll have a new arena by then) standing and clapping as loud as everyone else in the arena.

Things are going to feel a little different to all of us, at first. But I think this team and this program are going to need all of us more than ever. No turning back. I've endured bad Akron basketball many times going back to the early 80's. No more.

Already there, Skip. And, quite honestly, this has recharged my enthusiasm. Go Zips!

I am mostly on point with all three of you here. Ran out of likes. I never watched the Duquesne press conference and never will. If I'm flipping channels and I see Duquesne is on, my remote will continue to flip to the next channel. Time to move on. Akron will still be suiting up next year, with or without any of the staff or players from this past season. Our goal should be to support those that stay and also the new coaching staff.

I've had this same thing on my mind, LZ. I just have to wonder if KD is salty because a contingent of fans did not appreciate the 21 wins or the trips to the MAC tournament CG or whatever fill-in-the-blank success he accomplished while here. Putting myself in his shoes it would be disheartening to hear complaints about not being able to take the next step. It had to be a heartache. On the other hand, I think you really have to put on your big boy pants if you want to be a D1 coach, but when someone gives you seven million reasons to forsake an unappreciative fanbase it's not surprising. I think we all feel a little betrayed because KD played the Akron for Life card but it turned out to be just words. I appreciate what he did for this program, but I don't feel especially warm and fuzzy about wishing him luck in Pittsburgh. Maybe in time I will feel differently but right now I'm a little sore.

Some would call that description generous. I do believe he has improved. He might be good at getting athletes here but he'd need a very good staff to work the details.

You're right. Their objective is only to make them operate within their means. But any directive that would stop Universities in Ohio from runaway borrowing to spend on their own empire of facilities would at least give everyone the same set of limitations, which does indeed benefit the "smaller schools". I noticed that you used the words "essential", "necessary" and "reasonable". I'll be the first to admit that I sometimes wished that we could have sent our debt ceiling to the moon to build our own little empire. Then I had to remind myself that we are a PUBLIC institution of higher learning.

Kreed, by the way, I enjoy many of your posts as well. But no, this is not where I'm going at all. Everyone does indeed spend too much on buildings. But I'm trying to keep this on topic...as best that I can. I see meaningless sports coaches making 300k-500k or more at an Ohio Public Institution that we have to compete against. Then they borrow Billions of dollars more, spend 30% of it on "new student amenities", and people are too naive to see that this further benefits recruiting and provides further perks for their athletes? I never claimed that what they are spending is solely to benefit athletes. But I can also clearly see how it does, and how it didn't have to be accounted for at all as an athletic dept. expense. None of the numbers I presented are skewed. The conditions under which we have to compete against this school in nearly every sport are skewed. That's what makes the 12-year run of undefeated soccer competitions against them so laughable and enjoyable. And as someone who's invested in this University's athletics in many ways, personally and professionally, financially and otherwise, it pisses me off We're losing badly in an "arms war" against them. That's stating the obvious. But when they can already leverage their resources to gain advantages against us in athletic recruiting, student recruiting, facilities, and publicity.....and you discover that an additional 2.6 Billion have been added to their resources in the form of borrowed money....I'd think that anyone else who cares about the growth of Akron and Zips Athletics would be pretty disgusted as well.

Being able to make payments on your debt is commendable. Congratulations. But back to the topic once again: You can't justify having 2.6 Billion dollars worth of things you can't pay for, which has TRIPLED in the last 10 years, when you are paying your Fencing and Tiddly-Winks Coaches $300,000 per year. You missed the part that said that 30% of their debt is attributed to "new student amenities". I'm sure that has no impact on student/athlete recruiting, and becomes no benefit to those people once they enroll. I'm glad that they think their expenses will lead to the cure for Cancer. I'm disappointed that you're sold on their BS to attempt to lead people to believe that their expenditures are for higher causes related to saving the world.

Can potential NFL draftees decide to not hire an agent and if undrafted return to college? I know it's common practice in the NBA draft, and was thinking that might have been a better move for Lane. Since most people seem to think with a WR-heavy draft he might end up signing somewhere undrafted. I'm hoping the Browns take a chance on him. They did a good job making Pryor a receiver and think that coaching staff can help Lane become more polished.