Their issue was picking fruit one too many times from the Bobby Hurley/Nate Oats coaching tree. Eventually, the fruit soured with Whitesell and it killed all the momentum with their program. This is the exact reason why hiring Groce was such a big hire for Akron to sustain what KD had built.
Canada's South Campus doesn't have a very strong athletics backing, so unless they strike gold with coaching hires (they've done well in football, too), they'll always find themselves with a middle of the MAC ceiling at best.