Zip Watcher

You know, ever since I left for my trip to Storrs to flip and burn some cars earlier this month I haven't seen that hat. Damn .. maybe they stole the thing. It took a whole golf season to break that in.

Some thoughts on this topic: 1. This is why this particular forum (General .. etc) is here. Z-P .. please continue to drop your thoughts on the Zips Nation. If people don't want to read or reply to off-UA topics .. they don't need to. Drop them in this General forum and if someone's just interested in hoops, gridiron or rifle .. they don't have to come in here. 2. This is not my board. It is that of the Zips Nation. You'll see several people indicated as "Moderators." I'm merely the slug with the time and curiosity enough to get it going. 3. Warnings: To date, I believe we (the moderators) have only warned 2 people. One for gratuiitous use of multiple logins. One for trolling w/o substantive backup of flame-worthy opionions. Zipper, you have NOT been warned. When we had to warn the others for their infractions, the warning thing had to be turned on system wide. Everyone should see a warning level under their own name, and other than 2 special people, everyone should see 0% . That means you're cool. You will however, not see the warning levels of others, only your own. Zipper you didn't do anything to merit such an action .. and none was even considered. Sorry about the confusion .. hope this clears that up. 4. I too am shocked at Z-P's lack of smiley usage in the last post. I'm considering a warning for that. Finally, This forum is open to anything .. censorship has not been used yet, and barring any ridiculous posts & trolls .. it won't be. Neither I, the Doctor, CK or ZFF has time to worry about such things. This is here for all of us to use. Z-P and anyone should feel free to use this for things like this topic. In my view, and if you polled the others here, it's perfectly appropriate .. just drop it in the right box. So on with it .. no harm no foul! ZW

Padre, I'm lurking .. been really really busy lately with travel. Writing this from beautiful Salt Lake City. Can a brother get some caffeine help here?! I've been meaning to get back on the google thing this week or next. The GOOD news is that we're getting hit by the googlebot thingie that indexes sites about every week or so. And getting to where we are on their list is a huge improvement over where we were a month ago. I'm looking into a couple more tweaks to get us up to the top. Funny thing about dreamwater was that it just sort of happened. I submitted the hoops site one time & BAM! it was at the top of the list. I'm not sure what the issue here is, but it's been a tougher climb. We'll get it there ... I do believe that more sluggies the better .. I'm happy to see there is virtually no activity over at macbbs on the akron board there .. it's all here now .. CK, One note about your comment regarding the UA education stacking against others. [soap box] I'm an engineer .. spent a long damn time in school, though NOT at Akron. I'm pretty much tech-track .. still do the nerd thing on a daily basis so I deal with a lot of other eggheads. I'll tell you what most people even locally aren't aware of: UA is probably the best engineering school in the MAC, IMHO the best undergrad engineering school in the state of OH .. and without a doubt one of the best kept engineering secrets in the midwest. As someone who works with engineers, has a few working for me & every year or so has to hire one .. I'll take an Akron engineer any day. Certainly in my field (mechanical) from an undergrad sense with practical knowledge & expertise, which is really what matters .. a UA grad takes a back seat to no one. Doubt me? Look up some of the competitions held by SAE (automotive engineers .. not the frat guys with good hair) over the past 10-15 years. In some cases, you'll see total dominance by UA students over opponents from places like Michigan, Stanford, even one of my alma maters Purdue. In most cases, you won't even see Columbus Tech or any other OH school on the list. [/soap box] Finally, off topic: I've been to the mountain top in hoops. I'll post a lot more about this later, but the wife & I took a roadie to the sweet 16 and final 8 in St. Louis a couple of weeks ago. Interacted w/ fans from places like Kansas, Georgia Tech, Nevada and UAB .. and I see what can be at UA .. it's a nice vision. Now that the cars have stopped burning at my undergrad alma mater UConn , I'll try and relate some of the experience on the hoops board. I've been to a lot of these NCAA games over the years & I'm tired of going as a general hoops addict .. I want to go as the myeopic drunk fan of one of the teams actually playing the games. As for Saturday, I'm hoping to make it, but it may be touch and go. I've got a 2:45 flight out of CLE and haven't seen the family in a few days, so might be a game time call.

I'd like to see a team earning the jersey they're wearing .. making us proud with hard work in practice, during games .. and in the classroom. I'd love to have a year where we don't have to readjust rotations in December due to grades casualties. I'd like to see balance between effective half court execution and getting out on the break (more on this later). i don't want to become a Huggins Cincy team that is capable of blowing people out on the fast break, but in slowed down games (like against Miami or BG for instance) be incapable of finding and taking good shots before the shot clock expires. I'd like them to find the picture of the 86 OVC team that used to hang in the concourse by the concessions and put it back up on the wall where it belongs. People need to be reminded of why the JAR & this team are special to us. I don't know when it dissappeared (was it just moved?) ... but it annoyed me the first time I noticed it was gone .. and every time I walk by the empty spot on the wall, I get more pissed off about it. Someone tell me they just moved it? Or get a memo to the AD to get it out of the damn closet and put it back up. There must be some team photos from the 60's & 70's also. I'd like UA to recall the rich hoops tradition that exists there .. NOT ignore it. Speaking of traditions & history .. I'd like some respect shown to the Cricket. If he has a degree from UA .. his jersey should be retired. Would make for a nice tie in to the 80's teams. Two Male athlete of the year awards. 3 postseason berths. How many games did he win here? 100? Gotta be close. On the court I expect the following: 1. Conditioning .. I expect KD to run teams ragged with our depth. 5 man substitutions .. whatever it takes. Teams should be tired after playing the Zips and sore the next day after getting their asses kicked up and down the court. 2. I expect the Zips to be in the top 4 in the conference for FG % defense and turnover margin. 3. I think a 12-6 conference season is a minimum expectation. If the 03-04 team can be in every game but 1 .. the Zips should be able to nearly double up on conference wins next year with some experience & practice. The more I think about it, I don't think we lost any significant court presence to graduation ... er .. attrition this year. 4. I want teams to dread playing the Zips .. especially come tourney time. This means I want them to improve and come together as the season progresses (see Buffalo in 03/04). 5. I want a win at the JAR in the tourney & at least 1 win at the Gund. We need the MAC to get going on the contract extension w/ the folks at the Gund and a healthy Zips crowd might go a long way to helping that.

Just curious & went looking for our old friend. First, I found the following link to his bio at SMU: This doesn't mention his lockerroom brawl strategies! Then I noticed that the head coach had just been hired & I found the following discussion over at PonyFans.Com: Click Me!

Go Zips, Thanks for the added information. I think I can make a few suggestions that should help avoid this trouble in the future. 1. Especially w/ AOL use, you should generally never use the back button while posting. 2. To update and / or edit your post, be sure to do it in the gold box below your previewed post. When you hit preview, it will bring up your post at the top of the page so you can see how it will look. It will also maintain the edit box (black text on gold background similar to the original post entry page) just below the preview post. Any updates you make need to be made in the gold box. I'm not sure if that's where you had the problem, but you should use that area to edit posts. Further below that is another set of buttons where you can "preview" and "post" .. to see your edits .. hit preview again. Don't hit "Back." Regarding Forward Navigation: Just below the blue bar at the top where it says you are "Logged in as: Go Zips" is a navigation bar. It is white bold text on the gold background with a blue circle / arrow next to it. It lists where you are at the moment. For example, as I post this message, the navigation lists this for me: Each section of this navigation list is a link. Click on the one you'd like to go to move forward out without using the back button. The First section "ZipsNation.Org" will take you back to the top level of the board .. and each additional level you have gone is also listed, right down to the post title. This navigation text will get you around the board no matter where you are .. you can always get back to the top by selecting the ZipsNation.Org text. I hope this helps a little .. again sorry for your frustrations .. please advise us if this helps or not .. and if you need any other help. Regards .. & go Zips! ZW

Try it again .. I fiddled with some permissions .. does it work for you now?

Midnight madness would be interesting ... haven't been to one of those in a long time. They'd have to really get some interest drummed up on campus to pull that off the first season around. As for the new scholarship .. I think we need a bomber .. a 2 guard that can just light it up. Maybe Walther is that guy, but maybe adding an experienced JUCO guy to the mix wouldn't hurt us. Certainly, it's got to be the right kind of player and student, but it's worth considering. One of our big struggles this year was not being able to stretch the defense with consistent outside shooting. So my vote would be for a 2 that can shoot like Falknor. If I'm KD (and I'm not) .. I take my chances with Dru and Mario at the point next season.

Here's the link to the Repository story in today's paper. No stupid Elton comments .. how refreshing Click Me - Registration is Free

AP copies things just like BJ & PD I guess. Here's a remarkably similar article posted on Yahoo today. Early Redemption?

Click Me. Some of these guys are getting back to coaching quickly. I can't believe Bliss will get a head job anytime soon .. and van Brenda Koff should be banned for life. Somehow, I think Elton thinks KD should be in this article. Apples & Oranges.

Hipsher did a good job & improved the situation he was given. Respectable, but not a great job. Now we need a great job & MT has decided to move on. Regarding the OVC .. it is a good hoops conference .. was then and is now. MTSU, MSU & AP have all had good teams recently and over the years. Certainly not the depth of the MAC, but opening round wins by the OVC are not uncommon. I think people are also forgetting what I believe was a near Sweet 16 run by Austin Peay back in 87 or so. It sticks in my mind because they got absolutely jobbed by the refs against a Rick Pitino coached Providence Friars club. Remains the worst call I've ever seen in my life.

Yesterday was the one month mark for ZipsNation.Org. Time flies when we're having fun. I thought I would pass along some information to everyone. Some statistics - in one month: 1. We've amassed ~45 members. The board stats will say 50, but with the exception of 2 of Andy's girlfriends and Z-P's alter egos as well as the admin logins, I think it's about 45. 2. We've had 612 posts. I think this is a pretty good indicator. If you go over to macbbs and look at the Akron page there, they've had 1530 posts in over 2 years. So I think we're doing pretty good. I have no time to figure out what the activity was at dreamwater, but I think we've brought everyone with us successfully. 3. We appear to be averaging about 150 visits a day to the site. The range is from 120 to about 300. Either we have a bunch of guests, or us slugs have a lot of time on our hands (a combination of both I think). 4. More than 900 unique web addresses have visited the site in March alone. Some highlights of the unique visitors include dozens of addresses around campus @ UA and other MAC schools, one visitor from Seychelles (where is that anyway?), and at least one guy sitting in class at UA. Where was that when I was in school? General thoughts on the Nation: 1. We own the domain "zipsnation.org" for the next 5 years. This cost us $100 for the 5 year term. Already paid for. 2. The current annual cost of hosting the site (@ dr2.net fyi) is $40. 3. Several members of ZipsNation.Org have donated to help defray the costs of putting this up. To date, I have received $150 in contributions, so ZipsNation.Org has a net balance of $10 at First Zip Watcher Bank of Ohio. We are good to go as far as the actual website stuff for the next year. Thanks to all who have donated (CK, ZFF, JP, ZP, Dr. Z, zipboy, hilltopper .. let me know if I'm omitting anyone). 4. If anyone is interested in contributing to the cause, please send me a PM here at the site. There has been discussion of using surplus to put some ads in the Buchtellite. Perhaps we can plan this at the spring game. 5. We seem to be getting closer to showing up on google & other engines. With the help of ZFF, I've made some tweaks to the coding on the site (including the new title) that will hopefully move us up th charts w/ google. Currently, if you search for "akron zips basketball footballl" I think it comes up about 110th on the google list. My constant goal is to have this show up second on the list behind goZips.com (or before it if we can). The dreamwater sites are pretty easily found. This process takes time, and I think we should be in good shape with the search engines in another week or so. We're getting crawled by google every few days now, so hopefully these changes will have a positive impact soon. That is all for now .. any ??'s, please drop me a line, or post them here. I think this is rolling well. Can't State MAC NCAA

Don't know if you caught it last night, but J. Taylor was on SportsCenter last night doing the athlete Q&A contest. Did pretty well, but at the end, Scott Van Pelt spoke briefly with him about being a Zip & asked if he was the best Zip ever. JT says: {paraphrasing} Football player, maybe .. there's only 2 of us left in the NFL & I think I'm better than Dwight over in Tampa Bay. Thoughts?

Cool reverb on the question CK. Don't know if the live version had it, but the replay on the web has an awesome special effect on your question. A similar birdie spoke to me a week or 2 before the end of hoops season regarding the football conditioning ... players have responded, but apparently it's much more intense than ever before.

Do yous guys need to get a room? If you like, I can set up a private forum for yous.

Gotta scroll down By my quick count, they've got him as the 11th QB in the nation, behind the guys at Toledo, UConn and Oklahoma, among others. Interesting .. maybe because he's learning a new system?? I've gotta believe he's a bit higher among QB's.

Z.I.P., I agree .. the right coaches for the time they were brought in .. no longer the right guys for the job. I do think we've moved upstream with both JD & KD. Hopefully MT sticks around to see it through.

Guest ... welcome aboard. First, why don't you register and become a contributor here. We always need more opinions. Second - Read my post again .. read ALL of it. Then look at my signature. Nowhere am I saying it wasn't time to move on or that I'm even remotely against the decision. It was the right call .. and probably would have been last year as well. My point is this: He left us with more than we had when he got here. He didn't embarass the U ... but he couldn't do better than third place, so it was appropriate that we move on. We're moving onward and upward. These are the facts. Where exactly do I say I'm happy with the nine years? Respecting someone's professional efforts on our team's behalf has nothing to do with wanting to be an also ran. It has to do with common sense and decency. My type!!? At no time am I happy being an also ran. How you read that, I don't understand. I also don't know any Zips fans who want to be also rans. We're all starving for a return to the traditional successes that are the history of the program. Here I couldn't agree more with you. We should be a top 25 team. Every year. We should be in post season games (after the MAC). Every Year Read the comments carefully before you come in here anonymously and in the ZipsNation! People that don't read posts and then make inaccurate generalizations piss me off.

I know I'm late to the party with these .. but hey, work has been busy & w/ everything else going on .. this is what happens. At any rate, some of this was posted already ... I know some of this won't go over well .. but these are my thoughts. First and foremost: Dan did some serious heavy lifting during his tenure at the JAR. I don't care if you were a Hip fan or not .. I think we all generally agree that he left the program in a much better place than it was when he inherited it. I hope this isn't lost on us during these changing times. I know this season it was hard for me to be mindful of that at times. Certainly we had some academic casualties in the past couple of seasons. But think back to the CC era, and there's no comparison. I don't recall ever thinking that a DHip player embarassed the university with off campus idiocy or legal troubles. I don't think giving at risk kids a chance at a world class education at UA was a bad choice, though I would have liked to see it work out more often. By and large, he was a good steward of UA's reputation and image. We're all trying to improve things around us, whether it be in our jobs or lives in general. I think at the end of the day, Dan did that at UA. And I for one am aware and appreciative of that. The ultimate measure of the state of the program is to compare the cupboards that DHip and now KD inherited upon getting the head job. No question KD has some tools with which to win right now. General Musings: - I like his systems when they worked it. Early on (years 1-6) he was almost exclusively a man-to-man D guy with good motion offense. I thought it was fun to watch during through Ball / Bosley / Shindy / Falknor years. Last 2 years, that broke down due to personnel .. but I didn't dislike his general game framework. - There were some games where he gave other coaches fits with his strategy. A couple of nights come to mind now: Just about every time he coached against Coles & Dakich. Those were fun to watch. Great adjustments from both benches led to some entertaining hoops. Sometimes it went against us, but I think of a couple of wins against Miami & one particular game against BGSU Falknor's senior year that I'll remember. This season's Can't & Miami games were the most recent examples. The other coaches in the conference hold him in high regard as a sideline tactician. - There were also some games where it seemed like he just gave up trying to get what he wanted out of the kids. I think of a game a few years ago (the quitters' senior year) @ Can't State and this year @ EMU .. and I shudder. - His eldest son had the most potential of any player I've ever seen at Akron. The day he got hurt at WKU will always rank among my worst days as a Zips hoops fan. - He did have some seniors quit on him, but he also had some seniors really go after it in their last several games. Scott Gooden, Jawanza Moore, Nate Schindewolf & Dave Falknor come to mind. Andy played with a lot of heart all the time. - Many have said that no players improved over their time at UA playing for DHip. I don't have a long list of counter-arguments though there are some exceptions. I do find it pretty funny that the most improved player over his tenure was the one who tried to punch him during a game. Think back to Ryan Andrick as a freshman, and then think of his play as a junior and (first half of season) a senior .. and his game improved a hundred fold. Perhaps as fortunate a knee injury if there ever was such a thing. Andrick in my mind was a player that improved a great deal while he was here. Falknor another. - DHip kept local kids coming through the program. I hope that continues, providing the players are at the level needed to play in the new era at the JAR - He was nothing if not entertaining to watch on the sidelines. Anyone remember the time he spiked the clipboard during a game, and the pen flew onto the floor, prompting the requisite "please don't throw objects on the floor" announcement to the fans? Or how many times his gum fell out of his mouth, only to be handed back to him by an assistant coach?!! Final Thoughts: The MAC Tourney program, in it's discussion of DHip on the Akron page, labeled him a "rebuilder of programs." Maybe that's the right way to look at it. He came here to virtually nothing and guided the program through it's first 9 MAC seasons, and when he left it was a competitive MAC team. Perhaps he can build it to 80/90 % and can't get over the top? We'll debate that forever I guess .. but he did a solid job. I do think it was time for a change .. the Zips have been sort of stuck in neutral for a couple of seasons, and new blood was needed. This program is in great position to move forward now .. but a change was appropriate now. Utlimately, I trust MT's judgement in these things. As for DHip, I can only assume & hope that he lands on his feet near a bench in the very near future. He should always be welcome around these parts for his efforts and I will always respect his heart, determination & knowledge of the game. My guess is he'll find either a new head gig this spring or will be a top assistant at a big school (a la Larry Hunter) very soon (maybe TX Tech?). It won't be a long time before he's got a new DI head job & if he learns from his experiences here .. some school will get a pretty good coach. I won't be surprised at all to see him back in the MAC down the road. At any rate thanks for your time here & good luck Dan. You left it better than you found it & you're always welcome at the JAR.

AO / ElusiveQB is long since gone .. surely lurking in Ashland these days. Our best wishes to him! AkronZipsFan34_1_5 = DareYouToMove = Akronballa34 ... etc. This is the user of concern here. I'm hoping she'll respect the wishes of the community and become a productive member w/ one chosen name. After all, if she is a Zips fan, she'll want to remain around here. We'll see how it goes.

As of this morning, she's been advised by a moderator / administrator that she is welcome here (with ONE account name) under the circumstances that she has something of substance to add, rather than her recent performance in this thread. This initial warning WILL be the only one given.

Hello all, I saw Zipboy and spoke with him on Thursday & missed connecting w/ CK during the afternoon. Wondering if anyone's up to getting together between the games tonight @ the Gund to trade opinions on the state of the nation. There's an open area in the main concourse by the 108/109 tunnel. There's a bunch of bar tables set up there across from the concessions. What say you to meeting there between games? Certainly all members of the nation are welcome. Go Miami! P.S. Anybody see our advertising at the Gund yesterday??!

Pretty much the whole team was there. I was in the SRO by the door, so I couldn't see everyone in the room, but the only players I didn't see were Meyers, Preston & the Hipshers .. the rest were there.