JMUSB Pod: Back in the Saddle
We did it. We moved on after the Dukes’ loss in Frisco. In the latest episode of the JMUSB Pod we talk about the elephant in the room for JMU hoops, discuss some spring sports, and even touch on football recruiting a bit (you didn’t really expect us to completely move on). And then we have a little bit of listener Q&A. We actually found it quite cathartic and helpful in getting over the championship loss. Give it a listen.
Why are you spending time talking about how bad the Mens Basketball team is on this podcast? They are the worst team in the CAA (let this sink in)…THE CAA (1 team in the NCAA ONLY). Its lunacy and embarrassing how a school our size does not pay more for a quality coach that can make a team play together and defense. At this time in my life, Mens Basketball at James Madison is dead. I’ve written them off. My attention is all drawn to UVA Mens Basketball which is setting itself up for a nice run through the ACC / Madness if they continue to play as the #1 Defense in the country and just find the rhythm in FG percentage > 40, then they’ll be exciting and relevant again.
JMU should just cut the program for basketball altogether and focus back to the other athletic programs.
I too do not understand why we cannot have a consistently successful MBB team at JMU. We’ve now been through four coaches (Rowe, Brady, Dillard & Keener) and not had better than a mediocre team in more than 20 years. This year we were picked to finish in the upper half of the conference based on the supposed talent at JMU and instead we are at the bottom.
Is there a problem recruiting better MBB players to come to a school in a small city, two hours from a metro area?
In reply to the first comment here, the reason the podcast is paying attention to the men’s basketball team is that it is supposed to be the main sport followed during the winter and the podcast was doing a good job of analyzing what the problems with the current season are. We are not paying attention to UVa basketball on here because the blog and podcast are about JMU sports…not an analysis of UVa’s problems with putting the ball in the basket. And the school is not going to drop men’s basketball so please comment with some real analysis or comments worthy of consideration. The podcast made a very good point about how Brady was replaced because we wanted to get beyond 20 win seasons and early CAA tourney losses. But then the athletic director went out and hired someone with no head coaching experience and we have not approached 20 wins in any season since Rowe has been coach, therefore, as the podcast pointed out, it makes one wonder what the thinking is around the men’s basketball program. With a new arena opening I can’t see how they retain Rowe and hope to build any kind of interest unless the team goes on some kind of unexpected run in the tourneys. their main hope seems to be to play UNC-W for every game until the end of the season.
Yeah, we talk JMU hoops on the podcast because we’re fans of the program. It’s that simple. God bless UVA and its success, but if you’re looking to us to discuss it, you’re barking up the wrong tree. Ha.
The big excitement this week is that the opening round of the CAA tournament will probably be the last game of JMU’s MBB season. We can FINALLY end the disastrous Rowe era and move on to a new coach and new arena. Let’s see how the coaching search goes this time around, we certainly can’t do any worse than our current situation. A good start might be choosing someone who actually has head coaching experience.
There might also be a lesson learned from our friends at North Dakota State and Northern Iowa. How do schools like that manage to put together both football and basketball programs that punch above their weight class? And how do they do it on much less than our budget? I do know one thing: they aren’t doing it by selling recruits on their geographic location.