having nearly nothing to do with the game of basketball and everything to do with politics.
Yesterday, I think I very quickly perused the site for a minute or two once or twice. Didn't do the social media thing. I was too busy with just the telephone, plus, everyone here appeared to be out of control. Some of the things I did read were downright laughable. A whole lot of misinformation out there. I was pretty confident with the info I did have and it played out the way I thought it would have - the only real issue was this is UNLV and it's strength has never been in predictability or common sense.
Seems like most people, whether they believe in Rice or not, agreed that he deserved next year with this young crop of players. We could speculate for days who would have stayed, who would have left, etc - and whether that even mattered or not.
The events of yesterday happened for two reasons and without either one occurring, yesterday wouldn't have happened. A subpar season and Ben Howland's interest. This wasn't going to be "Fire Rice, have a vacancy, find candidates, select a new coach". The question was does UNLV replace Rice with Howland. Sure, there would have been the standard dog and pony show of no chance candidates and Howland (state law). But yesterday does not occur with both Howland's name floating (his name is floating behind the scenes at several other places, too) and without UNLV having a substandard season.
My feeling, if this job ever opens up, Howland is not the right guy. No, not the worst possible hire, but if UNLV boosters are willing to shell out that type of cash, they can do much better than Howland. That's just my opinion. And it's not that he's a bad coach, I just think it's more risky than it has to be.
I think that without question, Rice deserves next season. Had there been the turmoil of the previous season, had there been another "reset" required, then I would have thought differently. Unless your mind is dead set to the extreme, I think all the fans were pretty excited about the freshman. And I know those that know about Ben and Jerome are excited about them. And recruiting is not yet done.
Unfortunately, days like yesterday and the couple of days before are just a harsh reminder for me. Knowing many of the things that "went down" behind the scenes, the feeling I've tried to fight for a long time just gets reaffirmed. The way UNLV runs is going to make it incredibly difficult for anybody to get any true sustained success. I don't care who the coach is. I think UNLV will be able to have some really good years, some mediocre years, some crap years and it will be a sporadic thing with no real pattern. So I'm not saying UNLV cannot compete nationally - I believe they can. But I have no confidence that it can ever maintain any consistency. Too many cooks in the kitchen and everyone wants to be the head chef. And they'll do anything to be that head chef. It's almost one of those bad reality TV shows like Big Brother. Posturing, deception... it's really quite sickening. And it's incredibly damaging to the school and the program as a whole. It's just a political nightmare.
Now, none of that is a reason for having a poor basketball season. But those are the types of things that will keep UNLV relatively unstable. I wish it was something that wins fixed, but it won't and has proven it won't. There are just too many egos and too many factions that drive too much at the university. Making it worse, those factions are unstable, too. It's depressing when I think about it.
Yesterday, I think I very quickly perused the site for a minute or two once or twice. Didn't do the social media thing. I was too busy with just the telephone, plus, everyone here appeared to be out of control. Some of the things I did read were downright laughable. A whole lot of misinformation out there. I was pretty confident with the info I did have and it played out the way I thought it would have - the only real issue was this is UNLV and it's strength has never been in predictability or common sense.
Seems like most people, whether they believe in Rice or not, agreed that he deserved next year with this young crop of players. We could speculate for days who would have stayed, who would have left, etc - and whether that even mattered or not.
The events of yesterday happened for two reasons and without either one occurring, yesterday wouldn't have happened. A subpar season and Ben Howland's interest. This wasn't going to be "Fire Rice, have a vacancy, find candidates, select a new coach". The question was does UNLV replace Rice with Howland. Sure, there would have been the standard dog and pony show of no chance candidates and Howland (state law). But yesterday does not occur with both Howland's name floating (his name is floating behind the scenes at several other places, too) and without UNLV having a substandard season.
My feeling, if this job ever opens up, Howland is not the right guy. No, not the worst possible hire, but if UNLV boosters are willing to shell out that type of cash, they can do much better than Howland. That's just my opinion. And it's not that he's a bad coach, I just think it's more risky than it has to be.
I think that without question, Rice deserves next season. Had there been the turmoil of the previous season, had there been another "reset" required, then I would have thought differently. Unless your mind is dead set to the extreme, I think all the fans were pretty excited about the freshman. And I know those that know about Ben and Jerome are excited about them. And recruiting is not yet done.
Unfortunately, days like yesterday and the couple of days before are just a harsh reminder for me. Knowing many of the things that "went down" behind the scenes, the feeling I've tried to fight for a long time just gets reaffirmed. The way UNLV runs is going to make it incredibly difficult for anybody to get any true sustained success. I don't care who the coach is. I think UNLV will be able to have some really good years, some mediocre years, some crap years and it will be a sporadic thing with no real pattern. So I'm not saying UNLV cannot compete nationally - I believe they can. But I have no confidence that it can ever maintain any consistency. Too many cooks in the kitchen and everyone wants to be the head chef. And they'll do anything to be that head chef. It's almost one of those bad reality TV shows like Big Brother. Posturing, deception... it's really quite sickening. And it's incredibly damaging to the school and the program as a whole. It's just a political nightmare.
Now, none of that is a reason for having a poor basketball season. But those are the types of things that will keep UNLV relatively unstable. I wish it was something that wins fixed, but it won't and has proven it won't. There are just too many egos and too many factions that drive too much at the university. Making it worse, those factions are unstable, too. It's depressing when I think about it.
