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The Forum looks great. Big thanks for the owners/moderators for investing the resources and the efforts. One question though, every time I try to like any comment, I get a message saying that I reached my maximum quote for voting. Is anyone else getting this issue? Thanks.

It is hard to imagine that a 5-7 coach Bowden cannot recruit better than a 1-11 coach Bowden. My only concern would be if coach aimed too high and spent his resources recruiting major talent that didn't pan out and he ended up with nothing.

Nice! That's an impressive job inspector Dave! I didn't mean to make this a guessing game. I just wanted the topic to remain the Rowdies and Akron students.

5000 seats.

Add Wright state to that list. Also, I am not sure if 100 miles gets you to Indy as well. There you get IUPUI and Butler.

If your son was a recruit. Would you want him to be a teammate of Alex?

I work for a university with a student population of 6,000 (25% of that of Akron). The city population is 30,000 (10% of that of Akron). The team is around .500 in a league that is less competitive than the MAC and the team is meh... and their coach will give a leg to have a player of the caliber of Tree, Quincy, Harney, Jake, Reggie, or Pat. The students all have big screen TVs and video game consoles. If you're a student, you need to come early to home games because otherwise you won't get a seat! On game days (or the day before, the game is all what students talk about (well 80% of them). The record doesn't matter, the opponent doesn't matter either. On thanksgiving break, the dorms were open till Sunday (rather than Friday evening) because students wanted to delay going home until after the Saturday game. Akron doesn't lack numbers, it is not the TVs, it is not the MAC. It is the lack of pride and identity at UA. I can't put my finger on it! It could be that a lot of our students only went to Akron because they couldn't go to tOSU? is it because they don't live on campus, they don't feel as committed and attached? Those are the things you need to look at.

This article is a month old: http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story/_/...e-autonomy-ncaa And then this one yesterday: http://www.cleveland.com/osu/index.ssf/201...ml#incart_river I don't mind the split. It will make Football better without the 4 money games every. I think a Midmajor only NCAA tournament of say 32 teams will be amazing to watch. Unfortunately, our soccer program will probably hurt.

I just have to say that I have a lot of respect for a D1 student athlete who can still major in something as demanding as civil engineering.

http://www.ohio.com/sports/zips/marla-ridenour-former-ua-standout-zeke-marshall-in-nba-s-d-league-1.460770 Marla has a story in the ABJ about Zeke's visit

This could be my "Post of the year". It is a long standing pattern. We did not achieve so many 22 win seasons because we were doing these things right. We were winning despite lacking fundamentals because, in the MAC, we had superior talent and depth. Now that Toledo has equivalent talent, they exposed us. Regarding KD addressing free throws, in the past he used to say: "it is mental. I try not to talk about it and let the players snap out of their mental funk". Now he has a different answer of ridiculing those who ask about free throws. I am not sure which of the two answers is more inappropriate.

Even better, I saw that Rajon Rondo was assigned to the very same team that Zeke is playing for: Maine Red Claws.

Thank YOU Dave. It is a pleasure reading your posts and having discussions with you. What you're stating about being too critical of one's own coach is absolutely correct. You'll never ever see me complain about Senderoff being out coached or Jim Christian failing to draw a play. On the other hand, If KD was the second best coach in the world, I am going to point at his shortcomings in hopes that he will become the best.

Just like you, I can't definitely tell from watching a play fail whether it was due to coach plan or player mis-execution. It is just frustrating to me to see that year after year, calling a time out to draw a play when we need a basket doesn't seem to improve our chances to get a good shot. And since that has happened over the years, and with different teams and different players, the only common denominator is the coach. I may be wrong. This is just a fan opinion on a fan board, not a scientifically proven argument. Anyways, my comment was not meant to steal the joy of the great win tonight. I guess I am just a perfectionist who can't enjoy a win without always looking for ways to get better and improve. And when I talk to KD, I don't get the feeling that he is so fragile and anti-criticism. Why do some of you (not directed to any one individual) feel that you have to protect him from his fans?

Let me guess, did the refs screw them?

Relax my friend You can call it a shot at KD if you want. I call it saying it as I see it without sugarcoating. I am as happy as you that we got the win, but the lack of ability to draw a play has cost us games before and I don't want it to cost us again.

Great win. Amazing game from Pat, Reggie, and Q. Harney not so bad either. I will give a leg to know what was said in the last time out of regulation. With the game tied and 20 seconds left, did KD draw a play or did he tell the guys to just go wing it?

I'm optimistic. I can't explain why. The bobcats (just like every other mac team) will be giving us their best, and I know that it doesn't logically make sense for me to predict a win in Athens but I will.

Jake and Reggie are faster than the average SF but they are not fast enough to consistently beat their defenders off the dribble. If you want them to drive on a half court offense, a play needs to be drawn to them: back door pass or screen of some sort. It doesn't look like KD has drawn such plays for our wings, ever. KD prefers the inside out approach which requires 2 or 3 sharp shooters to camp at the arc and punish the opposing team if they collapse to help inside. My point is rather than calling the two wings, the call should be directed to whoever draws and calls the plays.

Bravo!

Don't pet yourself on the shoulder. The gamecocks are not that good. They have 7 freshmen and a transfer player. They lost to USC upstate and you will see how they fare in their conference play. Losing is one thing. Getting blown by 33 is another thing Now I am ready for the "only march games matter" and the "we are better than Hipsher era" responses.

In academia, Doctoral schools (Akron included) do not hire their own alums as professors upon their graduation. This is known as academic incest. Substantial research shows that academic incest hurts school because new hires will always be under the wings of their old advisors and professors and cost the university the new perspective and connections that hiring a "stranger" would bring in. Some top schools (MIT, Stanford, Harvard, etc...) believe that no one is as good as their alums so they, at least, require them to go elsewhere and get a substantial experience before they come back and interview for a job. Every assistant coach/grad assistant KD had on the bench in Hawaii is his own "alum". Thomas has worked elsewhere (maybe not substantially) but no one else did. I love McFadden, Futch, Walsh, Dials, McNeese, and I enjoyed having them in Zips uniforms. I don't know much about Weigand and Thomas but I appreciate their effort and all what they did for our program. This is not personal, it is pure professional and for the sake of our program we need new perspectives and more help from the assistant coaches. Akron is not the MIT/Stanford of basketball and KD is not the best basketball mind in the country. We cannot afford hiring all his proteges and help them become coaches. It is very nice of him to give them a helping hand and help them kick start their coaching careers but this is not a charitable organization. We have an opportunity to grow this program now. We have an influx of great talent with the team. This is the time to grow this program... we don't know how much of a time window we have. If we don't become a relevant team at the national level and grow our fan base to build a new arena in the next 10 years, we will fall back to be the average MAC team for God knows how long.

Well stated... I don't think it is possible for me to argue with your numbers ! Like you suggested, I am a big fan of all the players on the list and each one of them have special memories and moments in the minds of all zips fans.

I don't want to come as a Zeke hater but I wouldn't say that he was productive for four years. In his first two years he was a non factor on the offense and a fouling machine on the defense. None of us minded of course because we saw the potential. But again, although not as flashy as Zeke, Linhart was a soldier giving us solid minutes from day 1 in the program.