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Davis just took his 3rd school to the dance and might be a candidate for the Houston job if it opens up. It's been two years since he left UAB, and I wonder how fondly Blazer fans recall the Davis era?

As I remember Davis at UAB, his teams were always pretty salty during the regular season, but had some unfortunate upset losses in the CUSA tourney which wore out his welcome with Blazer fans over time. Do I have it right?

Also, I remember he brought in a transfer from Indiana (Vaden?) and signed some jucos. How would you characterize his recruiting?

I notice the APR was pretty bad early in his tenure, but it improved tremendously his last 2 years. The APR lags, so I assume he inherited a bad situation from Mike Anderson on graduation rates and turned it around, but correct me if I am wrong.

Anything else a school should know about Mike Davis before hiring him?

Thanks.
Solid gameday coach, very lazy recruiter. Doesn't recruit until about July maybe. Also tenses up in big games.
He's winning with another coaches players. Wait until he has his own players. 05-stirthepot
When we hired him, Indiana fans had nothing good to say, and we blew them off.
When he left, we had the same opinion Indiana fans had.

Great X&O guy. Other coaches spoke very highly about how complicated his schemes were.

Awful program manager. Always seemed to think he would sign the #1 recruit and passed up some pretty good recruits. We never knew who woukd be on the team until the fall.
He did a decent job of getting a patchwork group of folks to play together.

Completely collapsed when the pressure was on. As they won some games and started to have expectations, he would tense up and the team would follow his lead.
Severely under performed as a favorite in the conference tourney

Good guy
Great X&O guy
Glad he's not our head coach
I think he is taking the Auburn job.
Is he really rumored to be in the mix for the Houston job? Did Houston fire their coach already?
He lives off transfers. How he gets those transfers has been questioned as unethical. The players will love him though and go thru a wall for him. Unfortunately, as stated above, they take on his personality and tense up in big games.

It should also be noted that a lot of UAB's success under Davis came from their defense, which was coached by his assistant, Donnie Marsh. Marsh no longer works with him.

If Houston wants to compete in the American, they need to aim higher.
Houston Basketball will not improve under Mike Davis. It is very tough to recruit when you don't like to travel.

You should wait until next season and you can get Anthony Grant for next to nothing.
The higher profile the job or game, the worse Davis does. Many assumed he would be at home at UAB but he was terrible getting us ready for the big games most of the time. Whether playing Memphis or any CUSA tournament game, we just didn't perform well.

Recruiting was another problem. Overly confident with a very lazy approach.

Other negatives with him. Very high turnover with assistants and players. Also not good with fans or media.
He's ok, I think he would be a good fit for Houston. Wish you guys luck
Some of his early teams were incredibly talented, but he underachieved with those teams, partly due to collapses in crucial games like the CUSA tournament. UAB was (unfairly) on the wrong side of the bubble a few times during that stretch. After AJ and Jamarr's final season, Davis's lack of recruiting prowess really became apparent, which we're partly still recovering from.
(03-18-2014 07:31 AM)jthrashr Wrote: [ -> ]Some of his early teams were incredibly talented, but he underachieved with those teams, partly due to collapses in crucial games like the CUSA tournament. UAB was (unfairly) on the wrong side of the bubble a few times during that stretch. After AJ and Jamarr's final season, Davis's lack of recruiting prowess really became apparent, which we're partly still recovering from.

Without a doubt. He had 0 players signed when Haase got here in the spring. Haase pretty much had to go with what we were recruiting at that point, because the talent pool was already thin after the early signing period. This is one of the biggest reasons I have been very reluctant to criticize Haase for much of anything up to this point.
Mike Davis & his coaching staff did thier best work in developing Aaron Johnson, Howard Crawford and Cam Moore, IMHO. Most everyone else that was a key contributor was at least a semi-polished product when they transferred in.
(03-17-2014 10:33 PM)Memphis Blazer Wrote: [ -> ]He lives off transfers. How he gets those transfers has been questioned as unethical. The players will love him though and go thru a wall for him. Unfortunately, as stated above, they take on his personality and tense up in big games.

It should also be noted that a lot of UAB's success under Davis came from their defense, which was coached by his assistant, Donnie Marsh. Marsh no longer works with him.

If Houston wants to compete in the American, they need to aim higher.

Completely agree.
Decent X's and O's. He's a pretty good big man coach as well. He's a nice guy personally, with a dry, self-deprecating humor. His players tend to love him.

He's a lazy recruiter and tends to live off of juco's and late transfers. As said above, many times we would have no idea what recruits we would have until the last possible week to sign someone. Haase comes in and his recruits all sign the first day of early signing period, and our fans are like "Can you do that?"

Not a very good game day coach, and in pressure situations tightens up. If things start going against him he starts to scowl and clam up. Or stomp and rage. Neither of which help coach out of the hole he's gotten into.

We tended to think the IU fans who threw bricks at the guy were all Bobby Knight loyalists and scoffed at them... till we'd had him a while and wanted him gone desperately.

I don't know who to point you guys at, but somebody needs to do what Guy Lewis did, get down into the 3rd Ward, 5th Ward, and recruit and keep some of those kids in Houston.
I'll point out something specific that Mike Davis is very good at, at least that I saw when he was here: We always, and mean friggin' ALWAYS scored out of timeout.

The inbound jam by Howard Crawford in Fayetteville was a thing of beauty.

And the APR improvement came after Carol Z. tapdanced in front of the NCAA to avoid probation. He pulled it together because he was forced to.

Coaching 101: Don't be quoted saying, "Nobody studies on road trips" where your president can read it when your APR is in the crapper.
Mike Davis can coach and as some have already validated, he was able to win with other coaches recruits as well as develop his on players. Houston could do worst as so far coaching the actual game goes.
But since there is more to a basketball program then coaching, Mike Davis will not be a good fit everywhere.
Mike Davis IMO isnt an extroverted person, he is friendly, generous and accommodating to people, but wasnt comfortable in front of crowds, and thats not strange, because introverts are some of the best workers you can have they are usually low maintance but they are reserved, and dont seek out the crowd or attention.
Coach Davis isnt IMO a real people person, he couldnt deal well with conflict and adversity,he known to procrastinate in recruiting and procrastination in recruiting is a program killer.
Mike Davis after losing his mother appeared to mail it in and the season was a loss, maybe after losing his mother he should have taken a leave of absent and I believe the fans would have accepted the season results better.
So, what does that say, the Good, Mike Davis is a good guy, most who met him liked him. Good Coach, won a cusa championship, developed his players, graduated players, players loved him.
The Bad, divided fan base/opinions, not a people person, recruited late year in and year out, could never win the big ones, appeared to give up at times, heck some even complained that he scowled, screamed and stomped his feet, so you see what Davis was working with, with opinions like those.
The Ugly he was a BAMA man, some UAB fans never really cared for the hire.
So I agree with some of the posts, but anyone who say Davis cannot coach, I question their basketball IQ.
He can coach and it can be said by many coaches that he/she just would not be a good fit everywhere.

But a basketball programs still could do worst then Davis.
Mike Davis. You get both of them with one hire.
If Houston hired him they should ash themselves three questions.

Question one: Is Donnie Marsh part of the deal. As MB already stated Marsh's defenses were a big part of UAB's success. Marsh will be looking for work now as he worked under Stan Heath at USF last year and Heath got canned.

Second question would be if he could snag a top assistant to be lead recruiter. This was never Mike's strong point and it must improve.

Third question is has this Texas Southern run helped him overcome his tenseness of big games. This problem was apparent at UAB & Indiana.

If the questions can be answered he is a great game day coach, he can develop players, & his players love him.
Epiphany time:

Donnie Marsh to Auburn with Bruce Pearl.

I have no inside info, other than it just popped into my head. And that qualifies as legitimate message board material.
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