Which Coach Other Than Self Could Have Gone .500, or Better, Down the Stretch with the Team Self Had Left Last Season?



  • @jaybate-1.0 Well, I’m not savvy enough about other coaches to feel comfortable in selecting someone who could have taken last year’s Jayhawk squad to .500 or better down the stretch. But if there IS a coach out there who could have done so, I’m wagering that he would have leaned much more than did BIll Self on Hunter Mickelson, esp. after Perry’s leg injury. I think that Self might really have missed the presence of D. Manning and J Dooley after midFeb. last season, heady guys to help him untangle the scramble. As for other coaches, I tend to admire the work of Bo Ryan and Gregg Marshall. I know that I am opening myself up for a heavy barrage of opposing fire, but at this very moment, if Self should depart, I would opt for Marshall to become a finalist for the search committee to consider. The guy is a work horse, and I like the way his kids play. He probably would never garner the fan love and admiration that Roy and Bill have earned. But he would win.



  • @JReyn

    I forgot about Marsha. Marsha possibly could have done it, IF they would have given him carte blanche to have Van Vleet punk the opposing team’s top player in every game down the stretch of last season’s KU stretch run. I am not sure the refs would have let him though. What do you think?

    Without the carte blanche, not a chance.



  • @JReyn said:

    Would another coach have noticed that and played Svi more? Who knows.

    I do.

    I bet a lot of folks do, too.

    Another coach would have played Svi more than one-legged, operable BG, if Svi could have guarded his own shadow over a pick, and hit the broad side of a blimp hangar, as a 17 year old refugee from a war zone half a world away likely with some of his family in harm’s way.

    Heck, even Self would have played Svi more. He tried to start the kid early. That was a bomb.

    Svi was clearly a year away physically, emotionally and probably linguistically.

    And BG was what there was.

    It wasn’t like Conner Frankamp was available; like Conner hadn’t transferred, when Self had said he had intended to start him some and play him in the rotation.

    It wasn’t like Selden was rockin’ the trey at a higher percentage than one-legged, operable Brannen, right?

    It wasn’t like Self didn’t need to use Devonte to spell Frank, even though Devonte intermittently would get speeded up and down the stretch got nicked up himself trying fill at 2 and 3 on top of backing up Frank.

    I don’t know.

    Does Self really have trouble “noticing” viable players?

    Or is it just that some fans think some players are viable that really aren’t…yet?

    In my experience the last five years or so, every time a guy sits a season after stinking up the floor early, and folks start saying that the guy could have played if Self had just given him enough PT, then the next season rolls around and the guy comes out and exposes exactly the reason Self didn’t play him the previous season.



  • @REHawk

    Eh, no.

    Not Marsha.



  • I like your’thoughts of Bo!



  • @REHawk You definitely have to admire Marshall’s record. But to me there is something off about him… He has a very good career record of .715 but he has done it all at the mid-major level. And he has been successful at that level now for 17 years. Why has he never gotten a job at a major program? I can’t decide. He should have been considered and up and coming coach while at Winthrop. But yet, he moves to Witchita State. A near lateral move. Why? I can’t decide if I respect it because of loyalty to a school or not. The skeptic in me says that there is something else. If I were to guess it would be the leverage to take pay raises after successful years while having lower expectations and thus not having to do near as much year in and year out.



  • @Kcmatt7 💰💰💰 Texas didn’t want him. Kochs bros will keep him happy, his wife💪likes it there.



  • @Crimsonorblue22 Well him vs. Shaka is a no brainer. Would you want a 52 year old coach who has literally 0 experience with a major program or a 38 year old coach who has been an assistant for major programs and has made several deep tournament runs already?



  • @Kcmatt7 “Why has he (Marshall) never gotten a job at a major program?” He appears to be comfortable with the Koch backing in Wichita. And a top level Div. 1 program has not yet come calling. Those half dozen top jobs seem rarely to open for mid major coaches; and the guy is happy enough where he is, not to risk his reputation on a gamble for moving to a second tier major Div. 1 program. So, he is more than somewhat stranded…but probably not unhappily so. Will be interesting to follow his Tournament play once VanFleet and Baker are gone.



  • Marsha has apparently had D1 major talent at mid major WSU during his best seasons at Kochita State.

    Kochita State looked more talented last season down the stretch than KU decimated by injury.

    Van Vleet looked better than Frank and Devonte combined. He was closer to Nic Moore’s level of that season.

    Baker was certainly more capable than Selden by that time. Selden had not played as effectively as Baker all season. Selden could only get up to the rim on a dead run. He never shot, or handled, well all season. I would have taken Baker over Selden last season for sure. Selden was a former OAD battling back from a knee operation and God only knows what else. Baker was at his best.

    Their 5s healthy looked better than our twin big man projects injured.

    Pretty much anyone they put on the court was better than Oubre and his injured knee by the end.

    Cliff wasn’t even an option.

    Perry wasn’t sound even before the apparent assault.

    BG was operable.

    Where does ANYONE get the peculiar idea that hollowed out KU was more talented down the stretch than Kochita State, especially after Ellis was laid out? That contradicts the facts.

    KU was seeded higher based on an RPI Built largely when when KU was not hollowed out.

    And Marsha’s great teams the two previous seasons? The guy had good players.

    Can Marsha coach? Yes.

    Has Marsha been doing it with second rate players? No.

    Does anyone think Koch grade support can’t get good players to WSU?

    Marsha might have won a title with the talent Self had at the beginning of the season. He has done well when he has had good talent.

    I don’t recall that Marsha has ever turned around a moribund program as Self did ORU.

    Has he?

    Winthrop was a good small basketball school in the south, wasn’t it? My recollection is that Marsha’s mentor had run a good program at Winthrop, that Marsha was asked to continue. Marsha made it better just as Marsha improved already decent WSU. Could be wrong, but that’s what I recall.

    I don’t recall Marsha coaching a hollowed out team that KU was down the stretch. And winning a title. Has he?



  • Ken Reeves and Norman Dale.



  • @tis4tim

    Dale yes!

    Reeves no! 😄



  • @JReyn

    “If you want to blame it on injuries, I’d say Self was kind of willingly blind in that regard too. Greene OBVIOUSLY shouldn’t have been playing. He contributed jack squat down the stretch, and Self never once pulled him aside and said, “Hey, dude, your shot is crap and you can’t slide to the left or right. Something hurting?” Would another coach have noticed that and played Svi more? Who knows.”

    Good dig!

    Or maybe since Bill sees the trey ball as “fool’s gold” when BG started clinking the rim maybe deep down in Bill’s head he was saying… “see… fool’s gold!”

    Makes you wonder what would have happened if BG hadn’t been hurt? What if he had stayed on his hot streak? Would Bill still have canned it for the hi/lo pathetic offense and Bad Ball? Would he have gone against his own words of discounting the trey and started counting on the trey?

    I’m mixed about what I think he would do. Bill is a competitor… so I don’t see him turning away lots of extra points.

    Good points about Marsha. Even with us shorthanded, we still had the talent edge by a landslide. I know Baker was no Top 50 recruit out of Scott City.



  • @drgnslayr yeah, that’s why coach kept playing him. Self wanted to prove he was right about fools gold?



  • @jaybate-1.0 said:

    Dale yes!

    Reeves no! 😄

    I’m not so sure I agree with your assessment of Reeves. Sure he coached at Carver High, and had no college coaching experience, but his time with the Chicago Bulls gave him plenty of pro-experience to draw upon. And talk about adversity! In just his first season at Carver he dealt with Curtis Jackson’s drinking problem, a low-level Shoe Co. representative (probably from Pony or perhaps Nike) wooing Coolidge with promises of riches, Reese’s girlfriend’s pregnancy, Ricky Gomez’ gang affiliation, and Mario Pettrino’s membership in an extra-curricular street fighting club to earn money. He also had a deaf kid on the team and lost a player to a congenital heart condition.

    On the recruiting trail, Reeves operates on the street level, using his charm and skill to get the kids no one else can. He plucked Heyward right from the schoolyard and beat superstar hustler Bobby Magnum in a game of one-on-one to get him to play basketball at Carver. However, not all of his finds panned out. He lost one blue chip, Mack Wade, when he found out the kid was a group two functional illiterate and had been using his huge basketball upside to hide that secret.

    Despite all the turmoil, Reeves gets his kids to buy in to the system and they win the city championship in his second season.

    It’s speculative at best to know how his coaching would translate at the D-1 level, but it seems like a paintball episode, a couple of clearinghouse issues and an injury here or there would be small potatoes compared to what Reeves dealt with at Carver.



  • @JReyn @Kcmatt7 @REHawk

    Marshall is a real good coach. I understand that he is not liked here because some of the comments he made about KU but you need to look at things in context. He has assembled a “perfect storm” of players and he was/is desperately trying to leverage them to gain notoriety for the program and by extension, himself, and the best way to get to the “grown up” table (for those of you that still remember that expression) is to set up a series with KU (or even KSU) and big daddy KU is just not cooperating. He was doing what his fans base wants and expects him to do. The series has little upside a lot of downside for KU and the reverse is true for WSU, so it is understandable that KU would not agree; nothing wrong with that.

    I really would not call Winthrop to WSU a nearly lateral move. At Winthrop Marshall turned the program completely around and took it to the NCAA for the first time and ended up going to the dance 7 of the 9 yeas he was there (1999-2007); since he left the went o the NCAA 2 more times, the last in 2010; no question the program went down hill after he left. At Winthrop, which I wold call a lower-major, he basically did as much as it can be done with a program that size and moved to Mid-Major WSU, a school with a lot more potential. It is definitely a logical move upwards that any coach with ambition and talent would make. Remember that in 2013 he turned down the USC job that ended up going to Andy Enfield of Florida Gulf Coast deep-run-in-the-NCAA fame, and by many account also tuned down the UCLA job; that was the year he took WSU to the Final Four. So it is not that he has not had opportunities to move up, he has indeed but he has chosen to stay at WSU. As I indicated before, after this season he loses the last 3 players of that “perfect storm” and will be interesting to see if he stays to rebuild, or now that “his” players are gone, he leaves as well.

    If you can separate Marshall’s WSU spokesman persona from Marshall the Coach, you see a very good coach, regardless of how you feel about him personally. Keep in mind that in the last 3 seasons he has advanced farther in the NCAA than KU and has actually beaten KU in the tournament; you just don’t this unless you are a superior coach. The more good teams the state has the better it is for all…now, if KSU can get back to being decent team, it would only enhance the reputation of the state as basketball hotbed. I posted stats before that show Kansas as the only state with 2 or more Division I teams the send ALL OF THEM to the dance. Not bad for a small state.

    To wrap it up, I would put Marshall in the list of coaches that “could” but not necessarily “would” have done better. A lot of writing for simple conclusion…:)



  • @jaybate-1.0

    This is from Wikipedia:

    Gregg Marshall era (1999-2007)

    Gregg Marshall coached the Eagles from 1999–2007, engineering one of the great program turnarounds in NCAA history. He posted a 194-83 overall record during his nine-year tenure and remains Winthrop’s all-time winningest coach. Marshall led the Eagles to a 104-24 conference record, six Big South season titles, and seven Big South tournament titles. Winthrop also appeared in seven NCAA Tournaments, posted six 20-win seasons, and averaged 21.5 victories per year during the Marshall Era.

    So he did indeed turned around a moribund program, Winthrop is now known because of the success he had under Marshall, although is no longer nearly as good as it was under him and has not gone to the NCAA since 2010.



  • @JayHawkFanToo

    Thanks for doing the leg work and clarifying that.

    I stand corrected.

    That is certainly a point for Marsha in my book.

    Now, are there any teams that Marsha has coached at Winthrop, or WSU, that were similarly depleted by injury, transfer, and suspensions, to key players and rotation players, as Self’s KU team was down the stretch?

    If Marsha has in the past had a similarly depleted team to last year’s KU team down the stretch and won a conference title and gone .500 or better down that stretch, then Marsha definitely should be considered as an example of another coach other than Self that could have done it, don’t you agree?

    As an aside, I am excited to learn that Marsha really did turn a program around, like Self did. It makes me respect Marsha more, and makes me want to beat him even more, and makes me wonder if we might be even more justified in punking one of his players next time the way Van Vleet punked Perry. I mean the guy is good. And the punking was unquestionably part of how he beat us. So: is there any reason not to punk one of his players the next meeting? Or maybe even punk him? What do you think?

    To punk, or not to punk; that is the question.–Shakesbate 1.0

    Rock Chalk!



  • @jaybate-1.0 My vote: PUNK!



  • The Coach–no hesitation.

    Dear Bill,

    Hire the Coach.

    Best,

    'bate 1.0



  • Just remember, Marsha did NOT recruit Baker! An ast. Coach told Marsha about him and they allowed him to walk on. What would WSU be w/out baker?



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    If you can separate Marshall’s WSU spokesman persona from Marshall the Coach, you see a very good coach, regardless of how you feel about him personally.

    First, how could anyone have any feelings about Coach Marsha personally unless they knew Coach Marsha personally? Not sure I follow this. I know I don’t have any feelings about him personally. What feelings I have about him are shaped largely by him letting Van Vleet continue to play after elbow-sledge-hammering Perry Ellis’ nose out the back of his head on national TV. It was bad enough that the refs did not eject Van Vleet from the game, but it was far worse that Coach Marsha did not sit Van Vleet for the rest of the game.

    Second, why should we EVER separate the WSU spokesman persona from the Coach? Coach Marsha doesn’t publicly separate them, does he? If he has, I would like to hear about it. If he doesn’t, why would we? I mean, if Coach Marsha would come out and say something like, “Hey, when I am acting as WSU spokesman, well, I say a lot stupid fecal matter. Don’t pay any attention to that. It has nothing to do with my coaching,” well, then we would be obliged to separate the two sides of him, right? But he doesn’t do that. Coach Marsha appears to comment related to KU and WSU as speaking as WSU Head Basketball Coach Greg Marsha.

    When I look at WSU Head Basketball Coach Greg Marsha I see a coach that has won a lot games, baited Self about not scheduling WSU, and failed to remove Van Vleet for the rest of the game for elbow-sledge-hammering Perry Ellis in the nose on TV in an NCAA tourney game. Its all WSU Head Coach Greg Marsha.

    If I were to break out Greg Marsha into WSU Head Basketball Coach, and then into WSU spokesman, I reckon I would then have to break him out into Greg Marsha, human being, that lacked the character to kick his own player out of the game for elbow-sledge-hammering an opposing player in the nose. Do you see what I am getting at here?

    Would you really think it would be fair to Greg Marsha to break him out into a series of abstractions? Shouldn’t we view him as a head coach, since that is all we have much knowledge of him as.

    We don’t know what Coach Marsha is like at home, or out partying. We don’t know what his politics are. We don’t know if he likes to hunt, or fish, or much else.

    All we know is WSU Head Basketball Coach Greg Marsha.

    I for one have no problem recognizing that WSU Head Basketball Coach Greg Marsha wins a lot of games, baits Coach Self about scheduling WSU, and wouldn’t bench Van Vleet for elbow-sledge-hammering Perry Ellis in the nose. It seems easy to keep them all in my head simultaneously.

    And I can do it without having any feelings about him personally either.

    Rock Chalk!



  • @tis4tim

    PHOF!



  • @jaybate-1.0 F&^^%$ H3LL Yeahh! Take no prisoners!!! Machine guns down the ho chi mihn trail!



  • @tis4tim Wow, I like your knowledge of the Chicago public scene! I’ve more or less lost touch with Chicago hoops. I used to attend Proviso West tournament on trips home at Christmas, but it’s been 4 or 5 years since I’ve been there. Don’t know of the Reeves you’re talking about. I love Chicago public league basketball, Nothing like it in the country in my opinion.



  • @jaybate-1.0

    You are taking my comments out of context and making it way, way too complicated.

    From Merriam-Webster

    Full Definition of PERSONALLY

    1: in person <attend to the matter personally>

    2: as a person : in personality <personally attractive but not very trustworthy>

    3: for oneself : as far as oneself is concerned <personally, I don’t want to go>

    4: in a personal manner <don’t take this personally>

    You can have feeling about person without knowing him/her personally. I never met John Wayne but I really like him as an actor. Pete Rose is perhaps my favorite player and I like him as player a lot…most Big Red Machine fans do; however, as an individual off the field he is by all accounts not very nice man and I just don’t care for him personally (see definitions 3 and 4 above). We just had thread about the best player of all time and many member indicated that they do not like LeBron (I personally don’t like him) but they still respect him as a player. How many of your sports idols have you met in person? probably not many but you like them anyway, even when you have no clue how they are off the filed/court. I could not care less about Michael Jackson the person but he was one terrific entertainer and composer.

    See where I am going with this?

    Many posters do not like Marshall personally (see definitions 3 and 4 above) for the things he said about KU, but they can still respect him as a coach. You don’t have to like a person but you can still respect him/her professionally. I don’t like Marshall personally (see definitions 3 and 4 above) but I think he is a very good coach and I respect hm as such. Enough said.

    I never said anything about how Marshal is or isn’t at home and I could not care less. This what I said:

    "If you can separate Marshall’s WSU spokesman persona from Marshall the Coach…"

    I was very clearly indicating two very specific situations, one his public persona as WSU spokesman and two, the coach. I just don’t see any reason why this cannot be done, as I indicated above, we do it all the time in real life.

    As far as VanVleet, this from from the ESPN account of the game:

    "VanVleet was driving to the rim when his elbow caught Ellis’ nose, sending the Wichita native sprawling to the floor. Red droplets started sliding down his chin, and Ellis retreated to the locker room. When he returned, he had wads of cotton stuffed up his nostrils."

    There was no indication that it was an intentional, premeditated or flagrant foul; in fact, VanVleet was not even called for a foul. Why do you think that Marshall should have sat VanVleet when he was not even whistled for a foul? Can you think of a coach, any coach that has sat his starting PG or any other player for the rest of the game, …while playing in the NCAA or any other game…for a non foul? or a foul? a hard foul? even a flagrant foul? I cannot think of one…Elijah Johnson was given a flagrant one for intentionally ringing Mitch McGary “bells” and Coach Self did not bench him, right? It just does not happen.

    I think this topic has been discussed as much as it can be and we need to agree to disagree and move on.



  • @JayHawkFanToo

    You don’t have to convince me that Marsha is a great coach. He is a rare breed and able to do things few are capable of.

    I don’t even dislike him. What do Kansas fans expect him to do? Bow down to us? He is a competitor and I respect that because he is a dang good one! I’m still trying to find him on video saying “chickenhawk” and haven’t found it yet. I listened to the long speech he gave at Koch Arena… still no chickenhawk. And even if he did say it, I could care less. I’m a man and people shouting names is part of life and doesn’t bother me… it just makes them look foolish and childish. So if Marsha did do that then it was a childish move.

    What bothered me about Marsha was him taking job offers when his team was still playing in March. That was very inconsiderate to his players and fans. He should have made a public statement that he isn’t considering anything except advancing in March.

    That doesn’t mean I’m not sad when we lose to the Shocks. I get mad! I want a revenge game!

    He punched us in the nose and I want to punch him back!



  • @drgnslayr

    No argument from me. I have always said that he is doing what his fan base wants and expects him to do to get KU to agree to play WSU.



  • @drgnslayr I heard him say it. A friend of our family is a d1 ast coach and he told us a long time ago-before chickenhawk remark that Marsha is not respected by other coaches. IMO he’s a jackass!



  • @JayHawkFanToo

    Comments taken in context and with right amount of complexity as usual. Thanks!



  • “…he is doing what his fan base wants and expects him to do to get KU to agree to play WSU.”–@JayHawkFanToo

    WSU must be getting very disappointed with Marsha not getting Self to play the Wheat Static.

    Go, Bill, go!!!

    Ignore hell out of the Wheat Static each regular season, then beat them early and often in the Madness!



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    I think this topic has been discussed as much as it can be and we need to agree to disagree and move on.

    Not even close to exhausted as a topic or you wouldn’t be responding. 😄



  • @drgnslayr said:

    What do Kansas fans expect him to do? Bow down to us?

    Yes, and after that bend over. 😄



  • @drgnslayr said:

    You don’t have to convince me that Marsha is a great coach. He is a rare breed and able to do things few are capable of.

    I still need a ton of convincing. He is good at best till he wins a ring. Period.



  • @Crimsonorblue22 said:

    @drgnslayr I heard him say it. A friend of our family is a d1 ast coach and he told us a long time ago-before chickenhawk remark that Marsha is not respected by other coaches. IMO he’s a jackass

    Most interesting!



  • @jaybate-1.0 said:

    @JayHawkFanToo said:

    I think this topic has been discussed as much as it can be and we need to agree to disagree and move on.

    Not even close to exhausted as a topic or you wouldn’t be responding.

    Ah, an appropriate and succinct reply. When @JayHawkFanToo plays pickup, he must have a special rule that he always gets the last shot.



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    There was no indication that it was an intentional, premeditated or flagrant foul; in fact, VanVleet was not even called for a foul

    Opining your honor! And quite unpersuasive opining.

    And the Zapruder Film doesn’t document that JFK got his brains blown out either!

    Next, refs not calling a foul in this era hardly means there wasn’t one, but of course you know this.

    Yeeee hawww, now we are having some off season fun!

    Wha



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    Can you think of a coach, any coach that has sat his starting PG or any other player for the rest of the game, …while playing in the NCAA or any other game

    Irrelevant.

    Can you think of a valid reason why a coach should not pull a player for a game, as punishment for unsportsmanlike conduct? I cannot. Heck, they pull players for games for poor performance?

    Can you recall another coach in the same tournament faced with one of his players appearing to wield his elbow at the nose of another defender in quite the way Van Vleet appeared to do to Ellis? I cannot. So: why would I expect to find another coach to have pulled another player for such a play as that appeared? I haven’t seen an elbow appear to be wielded in that particular way before. It appeared extraordinary to me then and still seems so in recollection. Quite startling in first viewing and repugnant in replays.

    Perhaps someone can post a feed of the elbow incident?



  • We could be up against a much worse coach than Marsha in Wichita.

    I respect him a lot more than I do Cal, Stumpy Miller or Scott Drew. We could be losing half our players to Wichita because they have a dirt bag coach handing out Presidential Rolexs.



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    Elijah Johnson was given a flagrant one for intentionally ringing Mitch McGary “bells” and Coach Self did not bench him, right? It just does not happen.

    Irrelevant whether any one benched anyone for unsportsmanlike conduct last season, same as it is irrelevant whether anyone else other than benched anyone for improper loans. But you should know that.

    Also irrelevant, because of invalid comparison. A nut punch is not remotely as dangerous to a victim as an elbow to the head. It would not make sense to compare an elbow to the face with a gunshot to the face either. Different levels of violence. Different situations and fitting responses. But you should know that.

    But from what I could see, Self should have benched EJ, too. It’s a mark against Self that he didn’t. But Failing to bench Van Vleet for what he did to Ellis? REALLY BAD FORM on Marsha’s part. Suspending him for the rest of the season might have even been a fitting disciplinary action.

    And it is possible that by not disciplining Van Vleet for the contact Marsha has increased the long term risk of playing for WSU. Any coach and team that prepares for WSU now probably realizes that this sort of play by WSU players is apparently tolerated, so opposing teams must train specifically to self protect and retaliate for such plays, or perhaps even adopt pre-emtive doctrine. The next players injured BOTH on WSU and WSU OPPONENTS by this kind of play may to some extent be victims of both those referees and Marsha’s apparent failure to address this issue constructively.

    But you should know that.



  • @drgnslayr

    Now that’s a scary thought.

    Marsha and Cal switch jobs.

    Marsha at UK.

    Cal with the Wheat Static.

    Cal might not even HAVE practices at Wichita.

    He might just have watch settings.

    Auto-Howling!



  • @Red.Rooster

    We are keeping you busy this morning!!!

    We will all have to chip in to an @Red.Rooster fund in case of repetitive stress injury!!!

    Rock Chalk!!!

    And hurry up Late Night!!!



  • @jaybate-1.0

    YES !! I’m playing Catch-Up this morning. It’s late in the game and I’m coming back!

    Thanks for your thoughts JB !!



  • @JayHawkFanToo said:

    Gregg Marshall coached the Eagles from 1999–2007, engineering one of the great program turnarounds in NCAA history.

    I wonder if Marsha wrote that?

    Or maybe one of his supporters?

    It doesn’t sound quite, ummm, objective to me. Does it to you?

    194-83? That’s .700. Hmmm. That’s a good turnaround. But great? Wouldn’t good fit a little better than Great?

    Wouldn’t calling Marsha a good coach rather than a great one fit a little better?

    I know there have been a few great coaches that have not won rings, but we really can’t tell how great those non-ring winners are until we see their careers beginning to end. We have to see how they stack up with the other great coaches that have not won rings. We have to gauge their lasting contributions to the game, their character, their positive impacts on the game, the respect they earn from their colleagues and so on. Marsha has coached 17 seasons and is 358-159; that is a .715 W&L statement. It is good. But great? And what lasting contributions and/or innovations has he made to the game? I really can’t think of any, can you? Is he held in high esteem by the most respected of his fellow coaches? Has he made good enemies? You know. Do all the weasels dislike him?

    And what is the context of his turnaround at Winthrop?

    What was Winthrop’s record the previous few seasons? Any idea. I looked and couldn’t figure it out. You seem pretty good at ferreting this sort of thing out. Was Winthrop’s coach before Marsha a hapless coach? Or had he built a modest foundation Marsha could take and run with? If there were no decent players to build on at Winthrop, how did Marsha get the good players there his first season, which was a fine 21-8 and 9-1 in conference? Just trying to ground our understanding and perceptions of Marsha in whatever reality may exist about him.

    I want to know my opponent. 🙂



  • @wissoxfan83 said:

    Wow, I like your knowledge of the Chicago public scene! I’ve more or less lost touch with Chicago hoops. I used to attend Proviso West tournament on trips home at Christmas, but it’s been 4 or 5 years since I’ve been there. Don’t know of the Reeves you’re talking about. I love Chicago public league basketball, Nothing like it in the country in my opinion.

    wissoxfan83: Ken Reeves is the name of the head coach of Carver High School on the old TV show The White Shadow, which ran from 1978-1981 or thereabouts. I was trying to be funny with my White Shadow/Hoosiers coach references as Jaybate didn’t specify real or fictional coaches in his original thread. My family and I just cut our cable and got a Roku at Christmas, so I’ve been sifting through old shows from my youth and found The White Shadow on HuluPlus. I’m currently watching the final season, which is why I know so many of the plot lines. Anyway, sorry for the arcane reference. If you haven’t seen the show, I’d recommend it.



  • @tis4tim Ah, I remember the show, but don’t think I ever watched it! There is a Carver High in Chicago and thought you were referencing that! Lots of episodes on youtube I just saw so maybe I’ll check it out.



  • @ParisHawk

    The Marshall topic has been discussed ad-nauseum in this and other threads; people feel the way they do about Marshall one way or another, be that as a person or as coach, and neither is right or wrong, they are all personal opinions that we are all entitled to have.

    If you read my posts on the subject, my view of Marshall is very clear and if someone else has a different opinion that is fine with me. I personally feel that additional posts on my part will not advance the discussion further as I have said all I wanted to say. If other posters feel that there is more discussion to be had and want to continue discussing Marshall, they are most welcomed to do so, and again, I have no problem whatsoever with that. Like I said. we agree to disagree and move on. to more interesting topics, preferably related to KU basketball.



  • @tis4tim

    I did not catch the reference the first time around. That takes me back a lot of years. Good show with a good message. I remember some of the characters, Coolidge and Salami and I believe there was Hispanic player as well. If I recall correctly the High school setting was in South Central LA not Chicago, right?



  • @JayHawkFanToo oh, additional posts on your part only. I must have misunderstood, sorry.



  • @ParisHawk

    Just explaining my position, not discussing Marshall. my other post on different subject all together.


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