So lets hear them. He's starting to sound like a below average coach if you have better complaints. Bad inbound plays, not taking advantage of mismatches, not trying to take advantage of opponents in foul trouble...
If I had to summarize his major failings as a coach so far --
(1.) He lost control of the locker room and the various egos on the team last February. To act like winning the Big 12 should have been the expectation is absurd, but you all are right we were in a very good position to compete for the conference regular season title. We saw how good that team could be in Kansas City when it won the thing.
So that was a big opportunity squandered, though not grievously so. But it hurt me, too. My concerns are more about it (a.) showing that Prohm might not be able to handle the level of talent you need to win at the highest level, especially given the egos involved and (b.) what that breakdown might mean for team chemistry long-term.
(2.) He has failed to build a competitive roster for this season. There is no big secret or quick fix to the team this year. They are collectively just not good enough and, even worse, the pieces do not really fit together in a sensible or complementary way.
It is a team of 1s, 2s, and 5s. We have those positions locked down, but we lack the lanky, rangy, flexible wings that really define basketball nowadays. Lewis being a bust and Griffin trending in that direction is really hurting us right now. We do not rebound well went we go big, and we do not shoot well when we go small. We *could* try to pay a hard-nosed, defensive or Press Virginia style, but the team lacks an aptitude for it (after a decade of Cyclone basketball being all about putting points on the board) and Tyrese Haliburton, by far our best player, is best served in an uptempo score-first system.
We lost A TON of talent after last year, and not all of it was "supposed" to go. The roster went over another cliff, though one of Prohm's doing this time around. I bet this season would look very different if we had Talen Horton-Tucker back. But we do not.
This team...
Haliburton
Bolton
Nixon
Horton-Tucker
Conditt
---
Jackson
Griffin
Jacobson/Young
...probably has 3-4 more wins at this point.
That was a difficult situation, but Prohm failed to handle it with aplomb. Now he has another 1.5 years to rebuild. If we are not competitive next year, then I would probably say it might be time to make a change. If we look better next year, I might say he can have one more year to see what he can do with senior Bolton and senior Conditt leading the team.
The next recruiting class is going to be critical in producing some help at the wing. Dubar, Blackwell, and Foster are all modern 3-4 types of guys, which we need.
The news that Blackwell is the staff's favorite recruit *and* he might stay in Florida due to his mother's health is really not good. I hope they can still bring him to Ames. We need somebody like him to be good to replace Lewis/Griffin and modernize the lineup. If not Blackwell, then we better do well with the other incoming guys.
He needs to replace Tyrese (with a competent PG for next year, not another All-American, I know that is not happening) next year, find some shooting, and hope Johnson and 2-3 of the new guys are solid contributors. Somebody of Jackson, Grill, Griffin, and Lewis needs to show they are not a bust, too, and I would imagine the likelihood of that descends as you work through my list. Pollard is going to give Prohm a long leash, so we might as well hope for the best and try to enjoy. Things will not change soon.
