vs. Kent State (2/9)

[FalconTurf]

Caleb Fields has scored like 15 total points since the Buffalo game where Huger was visibly upset with him trash talking Buffalo after BG won. They have lost every game since.

Finally something interesting and possibly insightful 44. Has Coach Huger clipped the talons off our Falcons?

My thought has been on the atmosphere change around the team since Stacey left. Can anybody on staff keep the team loose but fierce now?

[hammb]

I have zero inside info and haven't heard any rumors, of anything. I'm not STARTING a rumor, I'm merely making an observation as a fan that watches nearly every minute of every game and follows the team as closely as I can.

This season has all the makings of finding out after its over that their was locker room turmoil, that everybody hated each other, and on top of our senior class graduating have a couple guys enter the transfer portal to leave. Something just feels "off" about this whole thing. The team doesn't play engaged for 40 mins a night anymore. When they are engaged it still doesn't look or feel like a team capable of making a big run in any individual game, let alone stringing multiple games together. When a team starts a season 9-2 and then has a 1-7 stretch it is very tough to imagine anything other than something major happening behind the scenes around that time.

Especially since we also had a player quit around then (even if he was a bench player).

We've known for years Huger wasn't a good coach. But he has brought in some quality players over the years. There is zero reason this team should be losing games like they have. They've been noncompetitive in quite a few of them, even against mediocre or bad competition. The players need to play better, obviously (can't have seniors blowing bunnies and front end of 1 & 1s), but I have a gut feeling there's more going on than a simple "cold streak".

[hammb]

What's fun about this team?

The offense is a total mess. We don't believe in the coaching at all.
There are glaring weaknesses in ball movement and rebounding that we ALL saw coming but the coaches didn't.
Beyond that all, what frustrates me the most is that the people who cover the team don't try at all. We don't get any stories about why the offense is bad. Why we don't have a good rebounder. Why we didn't try to fill out our roster in this crazy year where there were essentially free agents. We get nothing. Huger is boring, the people who cover the team are boring, there isn't anything from this team that brings any joy. The roster is actually pretty talented but they are never put in position to succeed.

The coverage of the team is awful. It probably always has been, but it's especially noticeable nowadays. The newspaper industry is obviously a shell of its former self. Hell the Blade recently decided they are not even employing a OSU or Michigan writer anymore, so you can imagine what sort of coverage they'll lend to BG or UT. The guys that cover our sports cover a billion other things as well, and while we all want more articles, they probably don't sell papers (or ads online).

The only real "coverage" I ever see about this team is from guys like Strack and Piotrowicz on twitter, and they basically keep one of Huger's nuts in their mouths while saying we're getting blown out of our home gym again. They'll say in one sentence how Huger and company deserve no blame, but that there is no excuse for our losing streak. I don't like writers that are just incessantly negative for no reason; lord knows I have enough of those in my life following the Browns for decades. But writers that refuse to ask any real questions, but the tone of BG hoops coverage is just as bad. It's a whole lotta, "Yeah they lost, but guess there was nothing they could have done better." "Just gotta play better" type bullshit.

I haven't listened to the radio this year since I've been watching the games on TV, but is Huger still doing post game with the radio guys? The TV crews usually get Noon or nobody to talk postgame, and his message every game seems to be, "We knew this would be a tough game, that team has been working hard. We have to do better."

[guest44]

The past several decades of BGSU Basketball have all included the same thing. Unnecessary contract extensions to mediocre coaches. Each and every time the AD sees a glimmer of a good season, he overreacts trying to make themselves look good, and extends the BGSU drought 3 or 4 years. Now, with Frack money involved it should stop, but it won’t. The contracts get longer and the BGSU mindset doesn’t change. The only coach who would have changed that was Jans. He was hired knowing his family would stay in Wichita and was drinking at BGSU sponsored events months after the hire. Nobody stepped in and everyone acted shocked when it went to cellphone video. Any school willing to open a new facility with Louis Orr as the coach is not committed to winning.

[Globetrotter]

If you are a freshman why would you stay? Just transfer to Kent State, Akron, Ohio or Toledo and play for coaches that put you in position to win.

If you had other options why would you stay here?

[Falconwriter]

It's maddening to think how basically everyone on here said BG should not extend Huger -- and BG did it, anyway. They had to see what we had seen, that Huger had done nothing to that point to warrant any kind of extension. It's so blatantly obvious now, it may actually be amusing to see what kinds of excuses or explanations are offered by those who make these decisions. And by amusing, I mean painfully awkward and funny in an "I'd rather laugh so I don't cry" kind of way.

The real bottom line on all of this is pretty simple: I'm embarrassed to be a BG basketball fan. That's not a feeling I like to admit.

[guest44]

It was pretty much consensus that he didn’t deserve an extension. But he used Nick P at the Blade to start the extension talk, and a random article planted by his agent for him and another former Miami assistant to be candidates at George Washington. His success came around the same time Dambrot left Akron & Oats left Buffalo. It was the perfect scenario to actually see the success before committing further. Nope. Not BGSU. Everyone knows it was as easy as can be to get the extension and raise from Moosbrugger. This is the same guy who still employs the entire Kingston crew after Jans and Jinks.

[hammb]

It's maddening to think how basically everyone on here said BG should not extend Huger -- and BG did it, anyway. They had to see what we had seen, that Huger had done nothing to that point to warrant any kind of extension. It's so blatantly obvious now, it may actually be amusing to see what kinds of excuses or explanations are offered by those who make these decisions. And by amusing, I mean painfully awkward and funny in an "I'd rather laugh so I don't cry" kind of way.

The real bottom line on all of this is pretty simple: I'm embarrassed to be a BG basketball fan. That's not a feeling I like to admit.

I could dig through and find the thread on here about the extension. I think it was probably actually the same thread started to talk about him leaving, and I many of us that closely follow the program were saying to not let the door hit him in the ass on his way out. There were definitely people here saying that an extension was necessary and deserved, although even they (I think) thought perhaps we went too far in extending him an additional 3 years. Notably though, I have an inkling that the people thinking he had actually earned and deserved an extension were those who had paid little attention to the program until that magical season where we were picked to finish last, ended up near the top, then made it to the MAC finals.

They tuned in, after not watching his teams play for 3 years and agreed one magical run of games made him worthy of 3 more years, even though he still had a full extra year to show it wasn't a fluke BEFORE his "lame duck season". And I don't want to hear anybody supporting the actions of our administration moan how you cannot have a lame duck year...well this group has forced us to sit through Orr's & Dakich's lame duck seasons, and I'd sure as hell rather have a lame duck season than a needless extension followed by 3 lame duck seasons (which is what we got with those guys, and what we're gonna get from this one, I bet).

The crazy thing is can you imagine what would have happened if we didn't extend him when we did? We might have looked foolish midway through last season, but then the team fell apart at the end and a global pandemic hit. No way we would have been giving him a major raise this past offseason, perhaps we would've given him another year or two at his current number. Or perhaps they would have gone into the pandemic lame duck year to see how it goes rather than commit big bucks in a pandemic. Sure as hell wouldn't be getting any raises NOW.

The thing I find most disturbing and disgusting about the way this season has gone, is I keep thinking about NEXT season. How freaking awful is it going to be next year watching this same shitty ass basketball, but now being played without multiple all MAC seniors to make things look better than they really are. And then after that season we are likely stuck with 2 more after that, since you know the Frack money (wasted somewhere I'm sure, probably paying to bring Findlay in again) won't be used to rid us of this coach.

Much like on the football side, these guys CAN NOT COACH. Period. It was obvious with Huger right away. It is obvious with Loeffler. They both may be able to amass enough talent to win a lot of games some years, but when the s**t hits the fan: THEY CAN NOT COACH.

[HoopsFan]

The rumor last year was that Anthony Stacey had his hand in the Dylan Frye affair and caused the big man defection. Of course that could have been a rumor to take the heat off the head coach problems. I tell ya, if Huger starts opening his postgame with "to God be the glory" I'm gonna smash my Echo.

The crazy thing is we may be looking to tiebreakers to see if BG can keep out of 9th place!

HoopsFan

[Falconwriter]

The rumor last year was that Anthony Stacey had his hand in the Dylan Frye affair and caused the big man defection. Of course that could have been a rumor to take the heat off the head coach problems. I tell ya, if Huger starts opening his postgame with "to God be the glory" I'm gonna smash my Echo.

The crazy thing is we may be looking to tiebreakers to see if BG can keep out of 9th place!

HoopsFan

At this point, I really don't care if they finish dead last. I'm normally not an "all or nothing" guy, but in this situation, I am.