GP1

It's the same nothing their presence offered the MAC.

I'm glad I'm not the only person on this board who sees the people working in college athletics at the MAC level for what they really are....despicable opportunists who don't act in the interest of their schools.

I think it is a great solution. For example, there is no reason why some of the religious based schools that struggle to find a home couldn't have their own basketball conference. For example, Providence, Seton Hall, Gonzaga, etc. couldn't have their own conference for basketball only. There is no reason every school has to be trapped into a single conference.

Below is the list of power conferences that would accept Akron: Thank you and have a nice day.

If I'm not interested in any one game, I watch Red Zone on DTV.

Exactly. There is nothing wrong with where we are. We just need to make the best of it. Sort of reminds me of the industry I work in. A medium sized commercial roofing company sells around $3 million worth of business a year. With the right mix of maintenance and reroofing, an owner can make a really good living. Lots of guys get it in their heads that they need to be a $6 million a year company so they take more projects at lower margin and make less net profit than the $3 million a year guy for many, many, many reasons. All the $6 million a year guy did was buy himself $3 million worth of headaches, but his ego wouldn't allow him to resist the try at $6 million. The MAC is a nice medium sized company. No reason to increase every problem under the sun just to feed egos. There is nothing wrong with being in the MAC.

Link I think he is missing the point. Watching good football every day of the week is great in my eyes. Watching good football 2-3 days a week and crap the other 4-5 days a week is horrible. NFL is losing audience with Thursday games because the level of football being played is crap. There isn't enough time to prepare for games mentally or physically from Sunday to Thursday. Americans like quality. These games are not providing quality.

NIT... Makes me yawn. A lot of teams who win the NIT look more excited the season is over than they won. . A win in the first round is good, but a lot of mid majors do that now. North Dakota did it for crying out loud. There are some mid majors who expect to do at least this. Making money points ignores all of the success mid majors have had against the big boys in recent years. Apologists also like to use it as a deflection from focusing on the real problems.

You've sold me Dave. I now see that the brain trust that is our Board of Trustees setting this search up for a guy who would rather be coaching football than becoming a university president is in the best interest of UofA. I mean, putting his name out front to scare off any decent candidates was a great move to make sure this man with a commitment to coac........UofA has been a brilliant move.

Before making a post like this, please at least do a basic Wiki search. Since 1990, Dayton's success can be described as modest at best. Certainly not a top mid major. If money matters that much, how in the heck did they beat Syracuse yesterday? I know it's a "building process". That's most of the problem.

Because he coaches at a big league institution. Introvert? Sorry, you couldn't be more wrong. He has season tickets for football, tailgates with those who sit around him (sort of like the introverts in Lot 9?). He was also on the faculty/athletics advisory committee and attended regular USC football practices when Pete was coaching and they know each other by first name. Rabid St. Louis Cardinals fan. Wife works for a well known TV show and they are able to get tickets to surprisingly important events around LA. Weirdo?...Maybe, but who of us isn't a little weird?

Nonsense. Some of you are going to have to get over the fact that a new basketball arena isn't going to improve our situation. Dayton is doing this because they have recruited better players, done a better job of developing their players and they have a better coach. Put all of that together and they get the big wins when they matter.

I realize time has passed you by a little Dave, but Deadspin the Gawker websites are just about as likely to break a news story and have that story spread rapidly as the NY Times.

If the President doesn't know how the provost's and dean's are supposed to do their jobs, how can he make sure they are doing their jobs?

Followed up with a question to my friend stating they may be setting it up for Tressel and asked if it made any sense. Remember, this is a real professor at a MAJOR university. "Only if they want to be a laughingstock. Does Tressel have a Ph.D? Even the least impressive universities get a Ph.D as President." For those of you who think Tressel is some sort of savior, this is what the rest of the country will think about UofA. People in Ohio are so irrational about the guy that his hiring will somehow be acceptable just like covering up for his players was "protecting them". Deadspin posted about this. They don't post something like this unless it is complete stupidity. We will get buried nationally if he gets hired. You want exposure? This isn't the kind of exposure that is going to look good.

I don't say he doesn't develop players. He does. He develops them too slowly and rarely does a player take a big jump in ability from is first year to his second year. I'll put this in terms you understand best. Assume a player comes to a school and his starting point for his ability is at 1. Over a four year period, his ability increases to a 10. At 1 he is at his starting ability and 10 he is at his ability as a senior. This scale only applies to individuals and is not applied to a group as a comparison between players. Most players improve and that has been the case under KD in most cases. This is what I would like to see based upon the ability to maximize a player's ability over a four year period and this is what really good coaches get out of players: Frosh year 1 Soph year 6 Junior year 9 Senior year 10 1 + 6 + 9 + 10 = 26 26/4=6.5 On average, the player functions at 6.5 over a four year period. That's good player development. The way I see KD is we get: Frosh year 1 Soph year 4 Junior year 7 Senior year 10 1 + 4 + 7 + 10 = 22 22/4 = 5.5 "But GP1, that's only one point so your math is silly." Is it? The really good coach gets an average of 7.5 out of a player his middle, soph and junior, seasons while the bad player developer is getting the same as his overall average...5.5. The really good coach gets accelerated performance, accelerated results and better results from his players over a four year period. The poor player developer simply doesn't. I'd also argue that the 10 number reached by the good player developer has gotten more out of his player than the 10 the player under the poor developer gets because if you are bad at development, players never reach a higher potential.

Below is my friends response. My question centered around whether or not this is what the resumes of candidates applying at Akron would look like. "At first glance, yes. I only see one Dean, and it is CSULA. I don't see any high powered academic fundraisers either. Unless there is an inside story here with one or a couple of the candidates, it seems like they are shooting low."

I've sent a friend of mine who is a professor at Univ. of Southern California an e-mail with the link to all the candidates. I'm not sure what to make of the list of candidates. To me it seems as if it is a weak list of candidates, but I don't know if this is normal for a MAClike school or not. My friend is a midwest guy who understands MAC schools and the challenges they face. In terms of Tressels resume, it's long and lacking real substance which in the crazy world we live in might make him the perfect candidate. I can't tell if he is applying for President at UofA, school master at a pre-school or a football coaching position.

When I was still working in corporate America, I had a business manager once ask me, "What do we do wrong at Company X?". I really didn't like working at that company so I just decided to tell him the truth, which can be a huge problem in corporate America. My response was, "Too many action plans. Not enough action." Being a former General Electric manager, the guy made a funny face as if I called his mother a prostitute. The spread of GE managers into American business has been a disaster for this country, but that is another topic. Now that I own my own business, I think about that conversation a lot and the fact that business manager is still toiling away for thankless shareholders. I prefer action to action planning. People spend too much time action planning and not enough time in action largely because one mistake in corporate America means getting fired so they have to create the illusion of work without really doing anything. Action plans are a good way to do that. Easily the best survival method. "Think Bigger" should be replaced with "Act Boldly". Thinking isn't action. Thinking is what you should do before you act. KD has been at this for eight years now. Replace much of the thinking with bold action. He should have been acting more boldly 3-4 years ago when he went past the point where one mistake or a change in Athletic Director would get him fired. It's the perfect position to be in if you want to act boldly. Will we get more decisive action or will we get more farting around with the rotation for half the season? Will we get more decisive action or will we get the guy who likes to develop players entirely too slowly? Will we get more decisive action in terms of staff changes or will we continue to get the same reaffirming ideas?

It can't be us because the highest paid person in our Athletic Department is our basketball coach, so I'm going with Butler. Butler plays in one of the oldest arenas in the country and their football team made the I-AA playoffs last year. Clearly, football is a priority over basketball. Unless, it really isn't about facilities, but really about getting talent, developing talent and coaching. Over the past five years I can't think of many, if any, MAC basketball teams more talented than us but we fall short. The list of MAC teams making NCAA runs is too long to list at this point and some of those schools play in arenas just as bad, if not worse, than the JAR (Can't & Miami). What's left? Is the talent being developed fully? Is the coaching staff using the talent properly? Everything points in one direction and it isn't a new basketball arena. We would be in the exact situation with a better arena.

Are we talking about football or basketball? The success of a basketball team does not depend on the success or failure of a football team. It is an illusion fans create for themselves to believe one can't be successful without the other failing. It's small minded. BTW, Butler football went 9-4 last year making the I-AA playoffs. They were good in basketball last year...how could this happen?

Very good post CK. I'd like to focus on this point. OK, all of us can think bigger about the program all day, but it will have the same impact on the program as trying to use "the force" to lift a rock. There is only one person who this phrase applies to and that is KD. At this point, anyone who gets hyper about any criticism about KD should stop reading because I've posted something like I'm about to post before and drives people into a frenzy. It is criticism, but not intended to be nasty in any way. I've said this before. KD is a Division II coach with Division II ideas. That doesn't make him a bad coach or bad for UofA. In fact, it doesn't take much past Division II thinking to win in the MAC. It is a terrible conference. What it makes him is a coach who has reached his limits of ability. I don't think he has the ideas to move the program forward in the way you would like him to CK. I'm not certain KD is anything more than a "coaches clinic" coach. What he knows he learns at clinics and carries that back to UofA for implementation. To become the coach who gets Akron to a "thinking bigger" level needs to be able to come up with his own unique ideas and work them. So, my questions would be for a person who doubts this.... Where is the creativity in the program? Where is the player development that propels a players ability forward rapidly from year one to year two? Where is the great offense? Where are the people at the secondary levels of the coaching staff who present anything other that what they have learned under KD? We get a lot of things about KD that look smart when you read about them in the paper. Basically, they are a bunch of tired cliches. "KD likes to bring scoring off the bench."...Really?...This is one of the oldest cliches in the book and it makes no sense in 2014. Here is an oldie, but a goodie...it normally comes up mid way through January and I want to poke my eyes out when I see it...."KD is still working on the rotation."...Really?...Looks like a guy throwing crap at the wall to me. All of this looks like insecure indecision to me. Thinking is fine, but things have to get done and what KD does isn't going to move the program forward. If I could boldly give KD two pieces of advice based upon what I see on television in games that have Hall of Fame coaches, or just a good coach who has won big in the MAC and NCAA Tournament while in the MAC. It isn't hard: 1. After Christmas, make tough decisions and start your best players (save me the argument..."But GP1, what if they are all guards?" It's a stupid argument and you know what I mean). It makes it so you maximize the potential minutes in a game your best players can play. Don't bench a starter because of one bad game and don't replace him with a one trick pony for one game because it screws up the starting line-up. Make a decision and make it work. 2. Play your best 2-3 players as much as possible throughout the game. Most of the time college teams only have 2 really good player. If that is the case, play them until they can't stand it or get in foul trouble. 30 minutes minimum. Stop with the mindless rotation game. I don't think any of my advice is going to get us further than where we have gotten, but I think it would make the chances much better. At the end of the day, KD isn't the guy to take the program to a high level. There is nothing about him/the program that indicates he can. There aren't the guys on the coaching staff to do it and most of all, there aren't the guys on the court to do it either. Nevertheless, he is going to be around for a long time and there is no reason for him to change since he is basically locked into a contract so we can keep having these discussions over and over again. BTW...the guys on the court. For a team with as much success as we have had in recent years, there should be better and more versatile talent on the floor. I was the first to say the Zips have too many one trick ponies, and I stand by that. You guys can think what you want, but if there isn't drastic improvement in the returning team next year, the Zips have a problem. Many of you know this too and are too nice to point it out.

Why does it have to be either/or? VCU seems to be a program that can do both. Why can't we be like that?

#12 Harvard beat #5 Cincinnati as well.

You are correct. He does bring in good recruits. That isn't the problem. The problem becomes the glacier like way the recruits develop over four years. I can't think of a single player under his term that took a big jump from year one to year two, the most critical year for development. If there is one, good for you for thinking of that person. Thinking bigger is, in my mind, perfectly fits what this program needs to do. DiG made a good point the other night. KD is about defensive basketball. If that is who you are, then be who you are and be really good at it. Surround yourself with people who can fit within what you want to do, but bring in a few fresh ideas to compliment your style. Changing the people can change how players hear the same message. Specifically, the coaching staff is stale. Too many guys who have been around too long. I know this sounds harsh, but that has to get cleaned up. It might be good for us AND them. UofA isn't a place for an assistant to linger. Guys who linger too long, IMO, tend to be on the lazy side in terms of their career. If they are lazy about their career, there is a good chance they might be lazy in other areas. There are some more things he can do, but there isn't enough time. The arena, Joe Akron, etc., that is out of KD's control. He needs to get back to who he is and surround himself with different voices and ideas.