Quote Originally Posted by Utah View Post
I agree. We all have to remember that Larry has shifted his philosophy towards recruiting.

That he has been able to make that shift and then so quickly recover is remarkable.

If anyone thinks his seat is hot...

It should not be at all. I think Larry is where Whitt was between his two 5-7 years. We may have one more "rough" year ahead of us (i.e., we don't make the tourney this year), but I expect a big jump forward in the 2018-2019 season.

Like Whitt was finally able to rebuild the football program, Larry should be ready to roll that year.
This is how I can see it going. Certainly how I hope it goes.

Honestly, once Krystkowiak took his team to the Sweet 16, I thought we had gotten over the Giac/Boylen hump. That part was probably true, but what was weird was how the program still sputtered after a moderate spike of success 2014-2016.

There was a moment where LK and Delon took us to the S16, and you could see that the players coming back from that season (Poeltl, Kuzma, Chapman, Loveridge, Taylor) were positioned for another deep run the next season. Add to that the spittin' shiny new basketball facility finally opening, and it looked like we were off to the races as a newly-minted P5 program with a decent history of success to point back to. Once that '15-'16 team got worked by Gonzaga it was like the recruiting wheels came off for a couple cycles.

I still wonder what the story was behind all of that? Was it LK's cancer/health making a bigger dent than we figured? Were LK and staff shooting too high for recruits still out of reach? I never expected us to recruit punch for punch with UofA and UCLA, but I thought we were better than surviving off of D1 transfers and JCs. I thought solid 3-stars and 4-stars were within grasp with the occasional top 100 kid - more like this last cycle has gone. Why that weird blip?