GP1

Good post. I'm not sure that ND was scared at any point during the game. A scare is winning by 3 or 4, not 13. ND had a bad weekend and it was proven when FSU beat them to move on to the Sweet 16. In any event, let's focus on shooting. Akron badly needs to develop a guy who can make shots in big games....a go to guy. It's one thing to get shots, it's another thing to make them. Every offensive trip is an opportunity to make a shot. Every trip to the foul line is an opportunity to make a shot. Execution is the key. The Zips could have easily beat ND had they executed. At the end of the day, the results matter. I'm also cautious to look at one season and infer from that season what a team will do the next season. If the logic is a good season translates into another good season, you couldn't prove it with my Steelers. Over 50% of the times they have made the Super Bowl, they have not made the playoffs the next season with almost the same exact players and 6 of 7 times winning the Super Bowl the year before. Most teams who lose the Super Bowl have a losing season the next season. Akron will have a lot of new guys on the floor and we never know how they will perform when the bullets start to fly. Every season is different. More than anything, this season was interesting. Interesting is a good thing because I'm interested to see how they will do next season. I'm looking for more. I want to see more wins, more wins against major programs, more wins against high level mid majors and a MAC East Championship at the least. A guy who can fill up the stat sheet will be a good start.

OK then, what constitutes a "legitimate job"? Is a public appearance at a local car dealership a job? Lots of personalities do it all the time. Is appearing in an advertisement a job? People get paid for that all the time. It doesn't take much time to go do a photo shot for an ad. Is putting on a football clinic at a local high school a job? People sign up and pay a fee to attend. A service is provide for the fee. Is that a job? A job doesn't always have to be a person showing up at a business, punching a clock and doing a task for X number of hours. There are a lot of unconventional ways to make money.

It is challenging, but that is something the player needs to decide for himself and should be able to make that decision on his own. A player should be required to complete all school related work in order to remain on the team. How he does that is his business. If he thinks he can juggle sports, school and a job, he should be free to do so. If he fails at keeping his school work in order, he will have to make a decision as to what is causing the problem and how to fix it. Maybe public appearances in the spring when football isn't as pressing may be the answer. There are many ways to skin a cat.

My wife called him the lyingest liar who ever lied. His worst nightmare came true last night when the basketball team lost. OSU fans have already forgotten they have a basketball team and are now focusing on football. It's only going to get worse. SOMEONE needs to step in and get the ball rolling on Tressel's firing. It can be members of the Board of Directors if the president of the University isn't going to step in. There is a bigger picture here as well and it has nothing to do with football and everything to do with the integrity of the flagship university of Ohio. This is starting to leave a stink beyond football, all the way up to the president of the University. It looks terrible and everyone in Ohio supports every state university through tax money. The taxpayers deserve better. OSU needs to fire Tressel and then throw themselves at the mercy of the NCAA. If they don't do these things internally, then someone from the outside has to step in. The governor of Ohio has a lot to do and this isn't something he should be involved, but if they can't get it together at tOSU, he is going to have to step in. It would be a shame if it got to that point, but it seems as if there is not going to be another way out.

I wouldn't base the quality of the MAC on how one team does in the NCAA Tournament. I don't think much of the MAC in general, but football was better last year than in recent years and I think one might be able to say the same about basketball.

Major schools were recruiting black players, they just made certain not to recruit too many bacause in the 1960s that would have been taboo even at northern schools. I think the last all white SEC basketball team was coached by the racist coach Adolph Rupp at Kentucky. Pat Riley was one of those players and they were run out of the gym in a national championship game by a team with an all black starting five. Even to this day, there are a certain number of white people who still get upset about the number of black people playing basketball. They also get fixed on the increased number of coaches who are black. It isn't a hard one to figure out....players become coaches for the most part. If most of the players are black, eventually, most of the coaches will be black as well. It's a natural evolution.

Louis Benton was a good place too. I remember the BOB well. For those of you who don't know, the BOB stands for Big Old Building. It was across the street from the Courtyard I used to stay. A lot of people think all of Michigan is like Detroit. Western Michigan is actually a very rich part of the country. Grand Rapids is a growing city full of young people living near this arena and entertainment district. It is a great place.

I'm not 100% certain this is 100% true. If you get something for your gift, it may not be a tax deduction. I gift must be given free of any benefit received in return for it to be a tax deduction.

Any college athlete receiving a scholarship is getting paid. The question isn't about paying the players to play. It is about them being able to earn money outside of a scholarship from places other than the university they attend. They should be able to have a job or earn money of some kind. It's a free country. First of all, it's not a free country. It's a country of laws and regulations. A totally free country without laws and regulations would be anarchy. So you'd need enforcement officials to check on every player with an alleged job to ensure that they actually show up for work. It would be way easy for wealthy boosters to pay kids big "salaries" and not require them to show up for work. That's not a job. That's called evading laws and regulations in order to cheat the system. Any system regulating compensation for amateur athletes must be fair and enforceable. The current system is obviously far from perfect. But it would do no good to replace it with a system subject to equal or greater flaws. My system would allow for the NCAA to have fewer enforcement officials. The NCAA needs fewer of everything, not more of everything. It is none of the NCAA's business, under my plan, what a player does to earn money if the player wants a job. It's about freedom to work. If someone is stupid enough to give a player a $1.0 million to attend University X, then so be it. I don't think it would get that bad, but if it did, it is the fault of the guy giving the money. There are CEOs of companies across America who are making much more per year than that and they know nothing about the business they are running. The NCAA is not a government institution. They can't put you in jail if you break the rules. There are no "laws", only non-legal regulations placed upon players from a time long passed. Tear down some of the regulations and the NCAA can focus on other things. If you believe the NCAA is there to make things fair, you have a misconception of what the NCAA actually, in reality, does. The NCAA is there to make money for the large schools. If you don't believe that, they you don't watch the BCS games. I know there is this whole mission statement about education, etc., that is all secondary to making money. If it can be about the money for schools and the NCAA, the players should be able to share in the money making process of the NCAA by being allowed to market themselves. They are the ones making the money anyhow.

It's not even an Ohio thing. I shook his hand after a game once and my life did not change. There are pathetic, grown men in Ohio who, if given the chance to be close to Tressel, would try to run up and hug him.

When I lived in the midwest, job traveling 100 nights per year. Grand Rapids was one of my favorite places to go. It is a great town. Seeing this post reminded me of one of my favorite places to eat. Bistro Bella Vita. It is right by the arena. If you are ever in Grand Rapids, this is one of the great restaurants in the midwest nobody has heard of. Great place! Thanks for the trip down memory lane Blue & Gold!!!!

Any college athlete receiving a scholarship is getting paid. The question isn't about paying the players to play. It is about them being able to earn money outside of a scholarship from places other than the university they attend. They should be able to have a job or earn money of some kind. It's a free country.

I don't think I want to watch players play who have such little talent the value is measured in zero. People watch minor league baseball,go watch the future pros in the minors. Minor league baseball players get paid to play. Some rather well.

Going to Zips baseball games always brings back good college memories for me. There was nothing better than sitting outside on one of the first nice Saturday afternoons in the spring and watching a game or two.

Isn't Wake still looking for a coach? I would think Shaka would be better fitted for that job than the pressure cooker of Knoxville. And he could be neighbors with the Great GP-1. Hmmmmmm Wake fired their coach after last season. They had trouble getting a decent person to apply for what they had. Coach Smart would have been the smart choice if he was available.

I say the odds are 50/50 that by the time he is finished, the program will be worse off than when he took over. How many games? Four minimum. One win? Ready......aim......F-I-R-E.

I work in the construction industry..... The E. Europeans are much better at it than us though. I really give them credit.

We all know about the Eastern European strippers working these days. I don't blame him. There are plenty of organized crime families to get a job with in E. Europe these days. Maybe he could run a small gambling ring and then move his way up to a mid level manager in whatever family he joins. If he does, I say best of luck. Would it really hurt to say one more year though? I think he should stay. There are always openings in organized crime.

I hope you are right. He needs to average a lot more points per game than what he did this season. The highest ppg total was 11.7. That is unacceptable and someone needs to produce more points on a nightly basis. Abreu is actually the best pick pocket on the team. He had more steals than anyone and averaged more steals per minutes played (0.063) than Nik (0.040)or Q (0.046).

Respectfully, there is nothing wrong with our current schedule that a couple of wins against some of the major programs and wins against teams like CSU and Dayton wouldn't cure. The rest of this post isn't directed to you Can't State sucks. We need to develop one great player who can get us over the hump against these teams. "But GP1, we are a defensive team, we can't have a great player and play good defense at the same time. KD runs a TEAM game, not a game for selfish THUGS. I'm a closed minded fool and I can't see it another way." Thank you for your comment closed minded fool. You are a proud moron and on some level I can respect a person's pride in their trade. Tell that to Michael Jordan. He was once the Defensive MVP of the league and was league leader in steals three times. Is anyone so stupid as to think we can't have a great offensive player who can also play defense? Keep in mind that in basketball, the guys who play defense also play offense. Want to improve the program? Improve the players. Get one go to guy.

It's a long way from losing to Gardner-Webb to winning a championship. I'm not sure RI knows how to get there. Moving the gearshift from reverse to forward would be a good start.

Or, you run into a team that plays poorly on offense for a couple games straight. The way ND played last friday, Akron could have won if they could have scored. Akrons great defense didn't beat a poor offense.

Or, seed 1 vs 16, 2 vs 15, 3 vs 13 and 4 vs 12. From what I see, there isn't much difference between the teams that get seeded anywhere between 5 and 11. Go back to 64 teams. The selection committee should at that point take the next 40 teams they feel deserve to be in the tournament and pick the names with a lottery. Seven teams won't make it, but that could be part of the suspense. The Tournament Lotter Show would be much better than what they have on now. More suspense would be better and the selection of the teams would be in a more fair manner than what takes place now.

Milliken isn't the problem. Everyone plays a team like that every year. Year in and year out, the Zips lose to teams like Dayton, CSU, Minnesota, Temple and Miami. These programs aren't exactly hitting the cover off of the ball. We need to win games like these on a regular basis if people are going to take the Zips seriously. Until then, we are going to have to settle for winning the MAC as much as possible and going one and done in the NCAA.

Akron needs better players and we need to do a better job of developing players when they get here. Steve M was a four year letterwinner and averaged less than nine points per game his senior season. McKnight at < 11 points per game during a senior season? Guys don't get much better here during their soph-senior seasons. We need a guy like BYU has, a mid major program, who can fill up the rim. A go to guy....we don't have one. Jimmer F. is averaging 23+ points per game. We don't have a single guy who even comes that close. Can't had that guy when Gates was in school. Zeke needs to be that guy. He should be scoring more than 14 points per game in the MAC and he didn't. Next year, he should average at least 15 points per game. A guy like Zeke should end his career with 2,000 points and that isn't going to happen. I know what everyone is going to say....we are a defensive team.... it's a team game. That's all well and good, but there needs to be a go to guy the team can count on and can fill up the score card. Good defense can win the MAC because as long as you don't shoot yourself in the foot, you can win a lot of games because every MAC team is dying to blow every big game they are in. This topic is about getting to the next level. What I think a lot of you don't realize is basketball is not the same as football. Different players play on offense and defense in football. In basketball, the same guys play defense and offense. At some point, the good defense needs to turn into offense. If Akron was going to take the next step Friday, that needed to happen. They played good defense, ND was asking them to win the game, and they couldn't get anyone to throw the ball into the basket. Quincy had a quite eleven and Steve M had his usually unimpressive 8 points. If the game was really on the line, who was go to guy who would take the final shot. I can't think of a single guy I would want with the ball in his hands....a BYU fan couldn't say the same thing. Team game? Fine. Find a guy though who can fill up the rim. Want to get to the next level? Fill up the rim and find a go to guy to do that.