Problem with Dan

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:39 am

This is just my opinion on what the problem is with Dan Dakich. I have talked with current and former coaching and staff members about him so I think that I have done some research on the topic.

Dan Dakich acts like Bobby Knight when it comes to basketball. The one problem is that he is NOT Bobby Knight. A player WANTS to play for Bobby Knight becasue of his reputation. They know what they are getting themsleves into. There are not too many kids in America that are growing up saying "I can not wait to play for Dan Dakich."

I have heard countless times how great of a guy Dan is. He is great to drink a beer with, play golf with, etc. These are some of the same things you here about Bob Knight. Off the court he is a good guy, fun to be around. But on the court Knight is a real son of a bitch. And from all accounts that I have heard, Dakich is the same way.

I have no problem with a coach being tough on his players. I have had many coaches in my past be extremely tough and I have enjoyed playing for them. But not all kids are wired this way. Apparently, there is an issue that we can not recruit the right kind of kid for this program, evident by the number of transfers.

Knowing most coaches, Dan will never change. he more than likely thinks that he is right and the players are not tough. Well maybe we should recruit more white farm boys from small ohio and indiana schools. The players we bring in that are athletic and from larger programs are the ones that seem to wash out.

If all of you think we can win with this current staff then you are more optimistic than I am. If Coach could ever realize that he is not the man form Indiana with the sweater than maybe he could make a name for himself and start gaining the respect of the MAJORITY of his players.

SaxyIrishTenor · Post by **SaxyIrishTenor** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:46 am

Did we really need ANOTHER thread on this topic...

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:49 am

Flipper · Post by **Flipper** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:50 am

So if we buy Dan an orange sweater and a fake gut (there's no time to grow one like Knight's) we'll start winning?

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 8:52 am

If Dan checked his ego at the door than maybe. I am convinced that the damage is already done here though.

dduncan · Post by **dduncan** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:41 am

This is just my opinion on what the problem is with Dan Dakich. I have talked with current and former coaching and staff members about him so I think that I have done some research on the topic.

Dan Dakich acts like Bobby Knight when it comes to basketball. The one problem is that he is NOT Bobby Knight. A player WANTS to play for Bobby Knight becasue of his reputation. They know what they are getting themsleves into. There are not too many kids in America that are growing up saying "I can not wait to play for Dan Dakich."

I have heard countless times how great of a guy Dan is. He is great to drink a beer with, play golf with, etc. These are some of the same things you here about Bob Knight. Off the court he is a good guy, fun to be around. But on the court Knight is a real son of a bitch. And from all accounts that I have heard, Dakich is the same way.

I have no problem with a coach being tough on his players. I have had many coaches in my past be extremely tough and I have enjoyed playing for them. But not all kids are wired this way. Apparently, there is an issue that we can not recruit the right kind of kid for this program, evident by the number of transfers.

Knowing most coaches, Dan will never change. he more than likely thinks that he is right and the players are not tough. Well maybe we should recruit more white farm boys from small ohio and indiana schools. The players we bring in that are athletic and from larger programs are the ones that seem to wash out.

If all of you think we can win with this current staff then you are more optimistic than I am. If Coach could ever realize that he is not the man form Indiana with the sweater than maybe he could make a name for himself and start gaining the respect of the MAJORITY of his players.

Can someone translate this for me please.

So you are saying that we should recruit 'white farm boys from small ohio and indiana schools'? I hope you are not serious, right?

Isiah Thomas? Quinn Buckner? Keith Smart? Calbert Cheaney?

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:43 am

Read again maybe slower this time. Dan Dakich is not Bobby Knight this is the problem. Players will put up with Bobby's s**t and play for him. They will not do the same for Dan. Those players were great. We had guys like Ron Lewis, Raheem Moss, Steven Wright, etc., etc.

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:46 am

04, not trying to dismiss your thoughts because I agree with some of what you are saying. But, we also have lost Doliboa, Wilson, and Vandermeer. So it is not simply a matter of race/background/ethnicity. We are an equal opportunity transfer generator.

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:47 am

Warthog wrote:04, not trying to dismiss your thoughts because I agree with some of what you are saying. But, we also have lost Doliboa, Wilson, and Vandermeer. So it is not simply a matter of race/background/ethnicity. We are an equal opportunity transfer generator.

Yes, but I know that at least 2 of those 3 there was some public reasoning other than mutual descision and so on with other transfers.

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 9:55 am

Oops, I missed Montgomery in the previous post.

04forheisman · Post by **04forheisman** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:05 am

Warthog wrote:Oops, I missed Montgomery in the previous post.

Maybe you are right and he is an equal opportunity prick to his players.

BGorDeath · Post by **BGorDeath** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:14 am

Is there a phone on the scorers table? If so, I really would like to see Dan beat the crap out of it. If not, I would really like to see him throw a chair across the floor. Or, state that if a woman is getting raped, she should just relax and enjoy it. Or, if I was his son, have him kick me during a game. Yeah, that's who I want to play for.

dduncan · Post by **dduncan** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:18 am

Okay, I read it slowly. What you say is pretty obvious and doesn't take much 'research'. Of course, Dakich is not Bobby Knight.

Are you saying that Dakich and his staff do not find the right high school kid, mentally? Do you think Dakich and his staff go out and recruit the best athlete, not thinking on whether that kid will fit into his system? I think it's pretty obvious that they just don't look for athletes. They contact the coaching staff, do background checks with their coaches. Ask him what type of player he is, mentally. Unfortunately, some players aren't ready for his system.

What I have a problem with is that you think kids from bigger schools are more prone to not taking discipline than the 'white farm boy'. At least on the basketball court. It's the job of the coaching staff to find the right person and they haven't done a great job of doing that recently. It doesn't mean they will stop recruiting athletic, big school kids. They just need to find the right ones.

Flipper · Post by **Flipper** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:54 am

Knight has won national titles....Dan hasn't. Knight has been tothe NCAA's Dan hasn't. I think the original idea behind this thread was the notion that Dan can't expect peopel to buy into his Knight v2.0 regimen because he hasn't got the rep to back it up.

Personally, I don't agree with that...forgive me if I misstated the concept.

I do think that Dan may have benefitted form working under a different coach than Knight if only to get exposed to a different philosophy, but that's just my opinion.

hammb · Post by **hammb** » Thu Feb 23, 2006 10:56 am

I think what O4 is trying to say is that some players are more willing to take the crap that Knight dishes out because of his legacy. He's been a high profile coach for decades, he has national titles, etc. Even though he's a white Ohio boy, the dude has street cred.

Conversely Dan Dakich (and this is me trying to translate O4's point) is a poser. He tries to act all Bobby Knight-esque, but the kids won't take it because Dan doesn't have that cred. He doesn't have a legacy other than playing & coaching under Bobby Knight.

That's my interpretation, anyway.

Something has creeped up in the back of my mind recently when everyone is saying that Dan needs to find the right kids. I'm not so sure that is good for our program. We are a mid-major. We are obviously going to be going for the guys who slip through the cracks or are overlooked by the major programs. That makes our talent pool a lot smaller to pick through than many larger schools. Are we really in a position to eliminate a large percentage of kids with enough talent to play here, because they don't have the mentality required to play under our coaching staff? Wouldn't it make a lot more sense to have an adaptive coaching staff that would mold it's system/mentality to the players' strong suits? I guess my thinking is that it's a lot easier to be the hardass and run off all but the mentally strongest players at the upper levels than it is down here, where we've already lost a lot of our potential talent pool to the major programs. What's more the players that are mentally tough enough to play under a coach like Dakich are likely to be the most sought after players in the country, and there are even fewer of those falling through the cracks than there are the talented athletes who just need some direction.

I dunno, just some thoughts...