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VincentVegaBond

Is UNLV underachieving this year?

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Just an honest question, interested to know what folks, esp. UNLV fans, think.  

I remember in preseason it seemed every publication was picking us to finish in the 8th-10th slots.  As bad as that sounded, now it appears increasingly likely we'll finish even worse than that, dead-last for the first time in UNLV history.  Does finishing even worse than the abysmal predictions mean we underachieved?

I say no simply because I feel it's a miracle we even fielded a team this year after the never-even-seen-before-in-NCAA-history TKM coaching search disaster.  And then the subsequent hiring of Mediocre Marv, who in case anyone has forgotten was unanimously the least-desirable choice until it became apparent he was probably the only guy who'd be willing to accept the job.  Will Marv encounter any backlash if he indeed finishes in the MW cellar?  Will he be accused of being an underachiever in his first year at the helm?

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To say that MM underachieved never crossed my mind.  I expected the results we see in the current standings.  Our team and bench was filled with players scraped together in a brief period of time.  Dembele had an early season injury.  Morgan was plagued early on with an injury and now out for the season.  No point guard and I don't see any one player who stands out as a leader.  Honestly, I don't see Marvin taking any heat this season.  And, as far as next season I do expect to see better players.  I do expect MM, who was touted as a good recruiter, to bring in some better talent.  As for myself I will start to get uncomfortable if Marvin doesn't land some better recruits for next year.  I still see next year as a rebuilding year but, if he doesn't land some talent to rebuild with then I can see him getting some heat.

 

 

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, VincentVegaBond said:

Just an honest question, interested to know what folks, esp. UNLV fans, think.  

I remember in preseason it seemed every publication was picking us to finish in the 8th-10th slots.  As bad as that sounded, now it appears increasingly likely we'll finish even worse than that, dead-last for the first time in UNLV history.  Does finishing even worse than the abysmal predictions mean we underachieved?

I say no simply because I feel it's a miracle we even fielded a team this year after the never-even-seen-before-in-NCAA-history TKM coaching search disaster.  And then the subsequent hiring of Mediocre Marv, who in case anyone has forgotten was unanimously the least-desirable choice until it became apparent he was probably the only guy who'd be willing to accept the job.  Will Marv encounter any backlash if he indeed finishes in the MW cellar?  Will he be accused of being an underachiever in his first year at the helm?

8th-10th was with morgan. once he was gone, i figured it would be ugly.

 

8 minutes ago, CockyUNLVPoster said:

To say that MM underachieved never crossed my mind.  I expected the results we see in the current standings.  Our team and bench was filled with players scraped together in a brief period of time.  Dembele had an early season injury.  Morgan was plagued early on with an injury and now out for the season.  No point guard and I don't see any one player who stands out as a leader.  Honestly, I don't see Marvin taking any heat this season.  And, as far as next season I do expect to see better players.  I do expect MM, who was touted as a good recruiter, to bring in some better talent.  As for myself I will start to get uncomfortable if Marvin doesn't land some better recruits for next year.  I still see next year as a rebuilding year but, if he doesn't land some talent to rebuild with then I can see him getting some heat.

 

 

 

 

 

believe it or not i saw an article yesterday asking whether he should be fired or not. he said the answer was 'a resounding no!' but the fact that it was even mentioned blew my mind.

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No real expectations this year with all things considered, but I will say this current 6 game losing streak or whatever it is and getting absolutely demolished in Reno has me actually feeling a little disappointed in CMM.

While it was a throw away year, you also want to try and not completely snuff out any good vibes surrounding the program moving forward either lol. 

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Agree with And? 

 

Looking back, the Wyoming win was a big surprise and the Rebels record wasn't bad then. I think we were 8-7 and Wyoming was coming off a great non conference showing. I thought ok maybe this team will finish in the middle of the MWC and eek out a couple wins. It didn't seem hopeless then as it does now. 

Rebels have been 2-9 since then, wheels completely fell off and probably the worst stretch in some time for unlv. We just don't have a go to guy yet and Menzies has been relying on Mooring to take the team on his back to wins.  I think that is asking too much of Mooring because he's just getting acclimated to this level. Mooring is a legit spark plug type that would be dangerous off the bench if we had a legitimate starting 5.

Hopefully we eek out a win or two and end the season on a good note. Because seeing a crowd of 2k-3k for a unlv basketball game is a killer, the fans need some sort of positivity going into next year. 

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Guest RoscoesDad

No I thought .500 would have been a great job and expected us to be about 10-15 at this point.  I am not worried about the current losing streak, it was bound to happen at some point this year.  At the end of the day nothing really matters until the 3 games in March and I think we'll be playing better by then.

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No.

    It is a team with next to no experience, poor talent, and a new mediocre head coach. Anybody expecting unlv approaching 500 in conference play (and there were plenty of unlv fans delusionally thinking that) were out of their mind. UNLV was always going to finish near bottom of conference and have a bad year. Next year will say more about Menzies who I don't think is any good of a HC.

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Guest RoscoesDad
54 minutes ago, sdsuphilip4 said:

No.

    It is a team with next to no experience, poor talent, and a new mediocre head coach. Anybody expecting unlv approaching 500 in conference play (and there were plenty of unlv fans delusionally thinking that) were out of their mind. UNLV was always going to finish near bottom of conference and have a bad year. Next year will say more about Menzies who I don't think is any good of a HC.

Yeah sorry.  This league is terrible and every team in the league has a shot at .500 at the beginning of the season.

 

2 hours ago, Rosegreen said:

I think everyone knew this team wasn't competing for any postseason spots.

Though, you have to admit the player development has been slower than anticipated especially with the amount of emphasis Menzies is putting on development. 

Player development for a group of players that were last second stop-gaps and a couple of 5th year transfers?  Come on.  However if you want to get specific, I would say that Mooring, Dembele, Baxter and Zion have all shown nice improvement.  The only disappointment in my book is Poyser and maybe Clyburn.  

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48 minutes ago, sdsuphilip4 said:

No.

    It is a team with next to no experience, poor talent, and a new mediocre head coach. Anybody expecting unlv approaching 500 in conference play (and there were plenty of unlv fans delusionally thinking that) were out of their mind. UNLV was always going to finish near bottom of conference and have a bad year. Next year will say more about Menzies who I don't think is any good of a HC.

I fine with all that, with the exception of how you could really label Menzies as anything at this point unless you've personally worked with him or other coaches have said that about him. Other coaches have actually highly praised him. At this point, he went from Pitinos staff to NMSU, where year in and year out he pretty much did everything an NMSU is capable of, short of winning a few first round games, which at NMSU is way more about luck and match-ups. Labeling him mediocre or anything else is way too premature considering he hasn't even had a forum to prove himself outside of the lower levels, to which, he pretty much did.

 

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10 minutes ago, And? said:

I fine with all that, with the exception of how you could really label Menzies as anything at this point unless you've personally worked with him or other coaches have said that about him. Other coaches have actually highly praised him. At this point, he went from Pitinos staff to NMSU, where year in and year out he pretty much did everything an NMSU is capable of, short of winning a few first round games, which at NMSU is way more about luck and match-ups. Labeling him mediocre or anything else is way too premature considering he hasn't even had a forum to prove himself outside of the lower levels, to which, he pretty much did.

 

When he was hired the one thing that concerned me was not the lack of any NCAA tourney wins but the lack of any wins vs top 25 teams. I think he has an atrocious record vs top 50 teams as well. Programs passed on him for those reasons and even UNLV passed on him until he was literally their last option so late in the game. 

He is a good recruiter and speaks well about the game. He needs to hit a couple home runs on the recruiting trail this year and take in some transfers to turn it around. Tall order like last year but that's the job.

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27 minutes ago, RoscoesDad said:

Yeah sorry.  This league is terrible and every team in the league has a shot at .500 at the beginning of the season.

 

Player development for a group of players that were last second stop-gaps and a couple of 5th year transfers?  Come on.  However if you want to get specific, I would say that Mooring, Dembele, Baxter and Zion have all shown nice improvement.  The only disappointment in my book is Poyser and maybe Clyburn.  

Baxter has been a disappointment with the staff making up different injuries. I'm not even sure what game he was injured in. Zion is the only one I see improving consistently.  Mooring is hot and cold, low shooting % at times. Like I keep saying, his role would be best as a 6th man, second unit leader/scorer. Problem is that the starting 5 is not very good.  Dembele is still turning it over and taking dumb fouls, he about cost us the SJSU. He'll learn from it and give him some time.

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I always thought the ceiling was middle of the pack MWC.

The team battled numerous injuries which kinda hurt as the season progressed.

1st Dembele and Jones, then Morgan. Then Baxter.

Mooring and Dembele are a lot better than they were in November.

Tyrell Green is Tyrell Green. Solid shot. Tries hard, but shouldn't be a go to guy at this level. His defense is atrocious.

Poyser has been a complete disaster. The highest rated recruit on this roster and was averaging over 18ppg early on...now he lost his spot to a freshman and is shooting some absolutely ugly numbers.

Clyburn is another disappointment. He isn't efficient and his motor has been all over the place. I thought he had some of the better talent coming in, but I was off on that.

 

 

You literally can't underachieve with this roster. Plus with what happened all of last year, it was pretty expected that this was gonna take a few years before Menzies can even get on track.

With Zion Morgan, Mooring, Dembele, D Morgan, PG Jordan Johnson and a few other pieces, next year will be a better step in the right direction. Hopefully MM can grab some solid recruits the next few years.

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All is well, For Rice is gone.                  

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50 minutes ago, Rosegreen said:

When he was hired the one thing that concerned me was not the lack of any NCAA tourney wins but the lack of any wins vs top 25 teams. I think he has an atrocious record vs top 50 teams as well. Programs passed on him for those reasons and even UNLV passed on him until he was literally their last option so late in the game. 

He is a good recruiter and speaks well about the game. He needs to hit a couple home runs on the recruiting trail this year and take in some transfers to turn it around. Tall order like last year but that's the job.

Oh no doubt. He's not proven he can beat those type of teams as of yet, which he absolutely will need to . Again, I'll give it the "NMSU"benefit of the doubt. He won't get any free passes at UNLV outside of this year and maybe next year if an upswing is clearly evident.

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4 hours ago, Poster17 said:

No.  This is a throwaway season.  Underachieving occurs when expectations are in place.  There were no expectations this season.  Next year, once MM gets a chance to bring in an actual recruiting class, then there will be. 

 

I think you have to give him two recruiting classes to see a team that shows something.  If anyone expected something more than what they are getting they are delusional.

**  “It’s a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies. The only variable is about what.”

“There’s no ‘I’ in team. There’s a ‘me’ though, if you jumble it up.”

 

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I am amazed by all of the talk about the next or next two recruiting classes. As of now we will have 3 openings next year and one has been taken by a JC transfer Junior 2 star small forward. The other has been taken by a Freshman 2 star point guard. That leaves 1/one opening to have this better than this recruiting class. Menzies isn't DR who would run off 5 or 6 players to bring in a new group because he wasn't committed to living up to his promises. The only player that may be frustrated enough to leave on their own is Poyser  and he isn't exactly a hot commodity right now.

To expect an automatic big uptick in MM's recruiting just because he's at UNLV or because DR managed to find a way to bring in his group of so called "Players". He will need to prove it to me before I believe it because I've gone down that road too many times to just be all in any more. I want MM to succeed because I want UNLV to succeed but he has already built a record completely different from what we all want here and just "Hoping" for a different result hasn't exactly worked all that well to this point now, has it? 

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54 minutes ago, quickdraw said:

I am amazed by all of the talk about the next or next two recruiting classes. As of now we will have 3 openings next year and one has been taken by a JC transfer Junior 2 star small forward. The other has been taken by a Freshman 2 star point guard. That leaves 1/one opening to have this better than this recruiting class. Menzies isn't DR who would run off 5 or 6 players to bring in a new group because he wasn't committed to living up to his promises. The only player that may be frustrated enough to leave on their own is Poyser  and he isn't exactly a hot commodity right now.

To expect an automatic big uptick in MM's recruiting just because he's at UNLV or because DR managed to find a way to bring in his group of so called "Players". He will need to prove it to me before I believe it because I've gone down that road too many times to just be all in any more. I want MM to succeed because I want UNLV to succeed but he has already built a record completely different from what we all want here and just "Hoping" for a different result hasn't exactly worked all that well to this point now, has it? 

well, we really don't know who might leave, or what recruits/transfers we might get. MM is behind (and came in that way) and i don't expect any 'big time' recruits for a while. as i have mentioned, none of this was his fault, and he put this team together late, in just a few weeks. he gets his shot, and if he has to do it with transfers for a couple years then that's the way it will have to be.

but here's the thing.. even if we end up with the same team (which we won't) and get d morgan back, add in jordy johnson, now we have a point guard, and everyone else now has a year of playing together, which is kind of a big deal.

a couple of these players are who they are, and will not have a much higher ceiling, no matter how much time is spent on 'player development'. but several others have shown some pretty good improvement from where they started out, and with another year of playing together, they might look different than what they do now.

and of course he has already built a record completely different from what we all want here...what chance did he have? i predicted 12 wins with morgan, and i think cocky predicted 10, and others did as well. did we WANT that? no, but it was a realistic expectation. anybody who thought this team could possibly get 18 wins had been smoking too much.

one last thing... we are 10 points in 4 losses away from being 5th in the conference. :blink: maybe if they even learn how to finish a close game, their confidence will be a lot better, which would make a huge difference.. i'm just going to go with that, lol, because i just don't have the energy right now not to. 

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