Walters: ISU hires McRoy

[Cydkar]

We Cyclone fans always find something to fight about. :)

What's wrong with fighting with a KU fan?

[jdoggivjc]

Color me less than excited about an assistant whose #1 tag-line skill is his JuCo connections.

I'm not a fan of using JuCo players for more than a (very) occasional stop-gap. Even Gilstrap, although he was better than the typical JuCo kid, did very, very little for us as a program.

Admittedly, I don't know much about McRoy, but at first glance, I think Hoiberg could have done better here.

Because Jamaal Tinsley (and others) is the definition of "stopgap"

I agree that a program shouldn't be built around JUCOs, but there are a lot of very good players at the JUCO level that would help out our team, whether they had personal/educational issues that they needed to sort out or whether they just flew under the radar.

[ISUChippewa]

Looks like a pretty good hire to me this late in the off-season. John Brady at Arkansas State is a very good coach (took LSU to the Final Four a few years ago), so hopefully he has learned a thing or two being under Brady's guidance.

This is going to come off as politically incorrect, but I think just about every school in the country, BCS or not, needs at least one African-American coach on the bench, and he certainly does that.

Welcome to Ames and Iowa State Coach McRoy!

[Clonefan32]

Reading up on him didn't really change my opinion. Even the most glowing write-ups of him still make him sound like a one trick pony, whose trick is his JuCo recruiting. It's not a completely worthless trick, but I'd rather focus on prep players. You all apparently disagree.

So what exactly is wrong with having Otz and Lutz focus on prep recruiting and Coach McCroy focus on the JuCo ranks? Although I doubt any coach will deal specifically with either high school or prep players I see nothing wrong with hiring a coach that has some experience with JuCo while our other coaches deal primarily with preps. It's called balance...

[CloneState1028]

Looks like a pretty good hire to me this late in the off-season. John Brady at Arkansas State is a very good coach (took LSU to the Final Four a few years ago), so hopefully he has learned a thing or two being under Brady's guidance.

This is going to come off as politically incorrect, but I think just about every school in the country, BCS or not, needs at least one African-American coach on the bench, and he certainly does that.

Welcome to Ames and Iowa State Coach McRoy!

I was going to say this myself but didn't want to get bashed for it. This honestly is very true, and I'm glad we hired McRoy for this reason.

Also, in an unrelated note, hopefully this guy is good for team chemistry as well. It'd be nice for someone to be able to handle potential egotistical problems, and hopefully he can be that guy.

[hiwhatis]

Color me less than excited about an assistant whose #1 tag-line skill is his JuCo connections.

I'm not a fan of using JuCo players for more than a (very) occasional stop-gap. Even Gilstrap, although he was better than the typical JuCo kid, did very, very little for us as a program.

Admittedly, I don't know much about McRoy, but at first glance, I think Hoiberg could have done better here.

i see where you're coming from here, especially with the gilstrap example. but like you said it's just at first glance so once he's given a chance we'll see how good of a hire it was.

[Royalclone]

Jason Belzer: Always Be Closing: Elwyn McRoy a masterful recruiter.

Will trust in the program until he proves otherwise.

After reading the article, I think Fred did a good job of balancing out his staff. He did not need another TJ or Lutz. He needed a guy with strengths in different areas that would complement theirs and make the overall composition of this staff stronger. Pretty good experience to there to back up a first year head coach.

[kucyclone]

So what exactly is wrong with having Otz and Lutz focus on prep recruiting and Coach McCroy focus on the JuCo ranks? Although I doubt any coach will deal specifically with either high school or prep players I see nothing wrong with hiring a coach that has some experience with JuCo while our other coaches deal primarily with preps. It's called balance...

I don't think you can have long-term success by frequently relying on JuCo kids. Thus, for me, I wouldn't have one of my three assistant coach spots filled by a guy whose main skill and focus is on JuCo talent.

And I don't see why it's crazy to second-guess a coaching hire, when Hoiberg has no experience doing this. Frankly, I'm a little disturbed that I'm the only one that seems to doubt this hire, even in the slightest. Apparently everyone is going to blindly agree with everything our coach does, without regard to the fact that he's never gone through any of this before. I understand the enthusiasm, but ignoring the fact that a first-time coach is going to make a mistake or two is silly.

[CycloneCJ]

Jason Belzer: Always Be Closing: Elwyn McRoy a masterful recruiter.

Will trust in the program until he proves otherwise.

Thanks for posting this article, sounds like a great hire by Hoiberg. If McRoy can get great players to Arkansas State & Georgia Southern he should be able to get them to ISU as well.

[nickwc]

I believe the assistants we now have are better than the assistants we had the last couple years under Mac. Once Jean left I think that took a blow to our program.

[mt85]

I don't think you can have long-term success by frequently relying on JuCo kids. Thus, for me, I wouldn't have one of my three assistant coach spots filled by a guy whose main skill and focus is on JuCo talent.

And I don't see why it's crazy to second-guess a coaching hire, when Hoiberg has no experience doing this. Frankly, I'm a little disturbed that I'm the only one that seems to doubt this hire, even in the slightest. Apparently everyone is going to blindly agree with everything our coach does, without regard to the fact that he's never gone through any of this before. I understand the enthusiasm, but ignoring the fact that a first-time coach is going to make a mistake or two is silly.

Maybe most are intelligent enough to know that you should judge someone on facts rather then supposition. You admit you know nothing about this hire, yet you are more then willing to pass judgment.

[crooksie_26]

How can you not remember JUCO guys at ISU...lets do a quick recap of recent juco's...

Jamaal Tinsley
Kantril Horton
Michael Nurse
Jackson Vroman
Jessan Gray (not great but a role player, minute eater)
Marquis Gilstrap
Damion Staple
Anthony Davis (role player)
Jiri Hubalek
Mike Taylor
Corey McIntosh (role player)
Brian Peterson
Little Haluska
Tyray Pearson
Vanderbeaken
Laron Dendy

Yeah a lot of the players listed didn't pan out to expectations but a few of them were top two players on our team the year(s) they played i.e. Mike Taylor, Jamaal Tinsley, Jiri, Tyray, Horton, Nurse...I honestly can't remember a team that we had that didn't have at least 1 Juco player play a important role on the team...

[kucyclone]

How can you not remember JUCO guys at ISU...lets do a quick recap of recent juco's...

Jamaal Tinsley
Kantril Horton
Michael Nurse
Jackson Vroman
Jessan Gray (not great but a role player, minute eater)
Marquis Gilstrap
Damion Staple
Anthony Davis (role player)
Jiri Hubalek
Mike Taylor
Corey McIntosh (role player)
Brian Peterson
Little Haluska
Tyray Pearson
Vanderbeaken
Laron Dendy

Yeah a lot of the players listed didn't pan out to expectations but a few of them were top two players on our team the year(s) they played i.e. Mike Taylor, Jamaal Tinsley, Jiri, Tyray, Horton, Nurse...I honestly can't remember a team that we had that didn't have at least 1 Juco player play a important role on the team...

I understand this, but almost everyone on this list was a part of an awful team. Didn't we hire Hoiberg to be better than these teams of the last decade? I don't doubt that you can have successful JuCos on crappy teams. My point is that to be successful long-term, you can't frequently rely on JuCos. But everyone has tried to dance around this point the whole thread.

[Frak]

I think McRoy is a great hire. Not only does he give us an "in" with especially the Kansas JUCOs, as a former JUCO coach, he recruited high schools from all over, so he will have a ton of contacts with high schools around the country. To me, ISU should have a dynamite recruiting staff.

[gocubs2118]

I understand this, but almost everyone on this list was a part of an awful team. Didn't we hire Hoiberg to be better than these teams of the last decade? I don't doubt that you can have successful JuCos on crappy teams. My point is that to be successful long-term, you can't frequently rely on JuCos. But everyone has tried to dance around this point the whole thread.

Why are you assuming that because he hired this guy we are going to rely on JUCO's? It doesn't make any sense.