Snoop Johnson takes over in the interim.

https://utamavs.com/news/2023/2/10/mens-...rship.aspx

(02-10-2023 04:53 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  Snoop Johnson takes over in the interim.

https://utamavs.com/news/2023/2/10/mens-...rship.aspx

he's a good guy and liked by many but maybe this is a sign that the school wants to get more serious about sports. snoop has had an impressive career. maybe he deserves a look.

Firing someone in the middle of their second season (barring a major scandal) is odd.

That's where I'm at AKC. I've got some calls to make soon, but this came out of left field for me. I know our more hard core fans were excited about our future prospects. Now, we all know the transfer portal era means squat for future prospects, but there a lot of players who could be back next year that are contributing to a team that's won four out of seven.

The timing was odd less than a day after a win too.

(02-10-2023 08:40 PM)AssKickingChicken Wrote:  Firing someone in the middle of their second season (barring a major scandal) is odd.

But you have to remember we are the idiotic school that fired Scott Cross after several successful years (20 win seasons). Feel bad for Greg Young I hear he is a very good guy.

(02-10-2023 10:50 PM)RT98 Wrote:  

(02-10-2023 08:40 PM)AssKickingChicken Wrote:  Firing someone in the middle of their second season (barring a major scandal) is odd.

But you have to remember we are the idiotic school that fired Scott Cross after several successful years (20 win seasons). Feel bad for Greg Young I hear he is a very good guy.

Snoop's winning record at the HS level is impressive (three State championships). I hope he can make a positive difference at this level. GY deserves thanks for his efforts to reconstruct the basketball program after the disastrous Ogden era. IDK whether Coach Young should get credit for the good recruits brought in the last two seasons, but it is obvious the team has been improving.

Nevertheless, the series of late game collapses has reflected poorly on the coaching staff. That 7 minute scoring drought near the end of the recent RGV game was excruciating. Maybe that's what precipitated AD Fagg's decision.

I was never enthused about hiring a mid-to-late career in-house assistant. To me, that signaled a lack of commitment and energy for the program.

I want either one of two things: to win or hope. I went to two games this year and then stopped. I lost hope.

I know it is not fair and everything, and a few people ALWAYS talk about the timing. Coaching D1 is not fair and is a rough business. Coaches know this when they sign up. As to timing, this was decided before winning a few games here at the end. Probably a System lawyer in Austin looked at every thing. Takes a several days to get everything lined-up after a decision is made at the AD and presidential level.

Greg Young is a first class individual, and he will find another good basketball job somewhere if that is what he wants.

I'm not sure where you lost hope. If it was for this season, they are right where they were expected to be in the preseason polls. They have a talented young roster with potential for the future, whatever that means in the transfer portal era. They've gotten better as the season progressed and we are likely a team that no one wants to play. We'd be in the top half of the Sun Belt had we stayed, but being in a harder conference means we can't coast on our merits alone, like facilities and location.

If I recall, you were supportive of the Ogden hire (though not necessarily about the Cross firing). Rebuilding from that disastrous coaching tenure is why we are here to begin with.

I think this is a case where the AD already has his next hire lined up. This is his chance to make his mark at the university and by firing Young now you remove the risk of the team catching fire and somehow playing great over 4 or 5 days and making the tournament. Hard to justify firing him at that point. It reminds me of when Cross was fired when we rejected all postseason tourney invites and then his firing was announced once the NCAA tourney had started.

Whether it works out or not it would just be nice to have some stability in the program. I expect we will lose some more of these good young players again this year, but they will probably need to keep Snoop on staff if they have any hope of keeping any of them.

(02-12-2023 01:19 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  If I recall, you were supportive of the Ogden hire (though not necessarily about the Cross firing). Rebuilding from that disastrous coaching tenure is why we are here to begin with.

My default position is to support whoever our coach is.

Yes, I was unenthused about Young from the start, but I never would have mentioned that anywhere while he was our coach. I won't tear-down anyone leading the program. There are some thoughts I keep private, even on a semi-anonymous platform such as this. This is just my default approach, and don't blame anyone who does differently. This is fan message board.

Of course firing Cross was a big bone-headed move. Is there anyone who does not understand that? But, once Ogden - or anyone else - stepped in to lead the program, I backed him because he was our coach. Simple as that.

Any names being floated around for the next HC?

^It's all speculation at this point. I've seen prolly a couple of dozen names at this point. I've got some calls to make to get caught up on everything. I was blindsided, so this was played closer to the vest than I knew. I've heard nothing about a name like when Cross was fired.

(02-12-2023 04:21 PM)UTArlingtonMaverick Wrote:  

(02-12-2023 01:19 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  If I recall, you were supportive of the Ogden hire (though not necessarily about the Cross firing). Rebuilding from that disastrous coaching tenure is why we are here to begin with.

My default position is to support whoever our coach is.

Yes, I was unenthused about Young from the start, but I never would have mentioned that anywhere while he was our coach. I won't tear-down anyone leading the program. There are some thoughts I keep private, even on a semi-anonymous platform such as this. This is just my default approach, and don't blame anyone who does differently. This is fan message board.

Of course firing Cross was a big bone-headed move. Is there anyone who does not understand that? But, once Ogden - or anyone else - stepped in to lead the program, I backed him because he was our coach. Simple as that.

No harm in supporting the program, but everyone I talked to was quite upset with the Ogden hiring. I don't remember the same outrage there. Maybe your point is accurate and it didn't matter because it was done. Maybe it was revisionist history and the optimist in you thought Ogden would get over the hump. Either way, it doesn't matter much.

You are right in that this is a business, but success depends on how well you treat your people. Right now we have a bad track record for this program. The knife in Scott's back, hiring a guy most of us knew would bail the first opportunity and now this. Getting a great fit may require them to want to be here, and that is a gamble. Maybe this won't be in play at all, as we have to point to a lot of variable that likely won't happen again, most notably a new AD. But giving GY a full season was the least that the school should have done.

I think part of it is we know that the team is young, but talented. As the year goes on, they are getting better and can beat anyone. Hard to fire a guy if the unlikely happens and they get hot in Vegas.

Our student newspaper actually did some in depth work:

https://www.theshorthorn.com/sports/athl...eef50.html

The bit at the end of the players not being happy is a concern that I’ve had since the beginning. We have a very young, but talented roster.

(02-14-2023 05:39 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  Our student newspaper actually did some in depth work:

https://www.theshorthorn.com/sports/athl...eef50.html

The bit at the end of the players not being happy is a concern that I’ve had since the beginning. We have a very young, but talented roster.

Strange comment from Fagg that Snoop might help them at the end of games. Like he was on the staff this whole time…

I agree Grump. Unless there's objective beliefs that Greg and him disagreed at the end as far as strategy goes, I wonder the same thing.

My biggest concern when it comes to Snoop comes in recruiting. After firing Scott, UTA was frowned upon by high school coaches. Since Ogden has departed, DFW recruiting has improved. Johnson has been a big part of that as a former state champion HS coach. Time will tell.

(02-15-2023 07:07 PM)FoUTASportscaster Wrote:  I agree Grump. Unless there's objective beliefs that Greg and him disagreed at the end as far as strategy goes, I wonder the same thing.

My biggest concern when it comes to Snoop comes in recruiting. After firing Scott, UTA was frowned upon by high school coaches. Since Ogden has departed, DFW recruiting has improved. Johnson has been a big part of that as a former state champion HS coach. Time will tell.

I think the next coach has to keep him on for recruiting in the DFW area. Don’t think he is the answer at head coach. It’s pretty clear we need someone who has had some success building a program because we are back at square one for the 3rd time in 5 years

Looking at today's game, there was no difference between now and the rest of the season. You can be disappointed with the inconsistency all you want, but that's what young (no pun intended) teams do. I worry about being back at square one too.

Look at Ulric, he’s making a play and a great guy.

https://twitter.com/jonrothstein/status/...7IleA4WEPw

https://ukathletics.com/sports/mbball/ro...-t-turner/

(03-13-2023 06:48 PM)TexanFan Wrote:  https://twitter.com/jonrothstein/status/...7IleA4WEPw

https://ukathletics.com/sports/mbball/ro...-t-turner/

KT Turner was a finalist for the NMSU job a year ago. In hindsight NMSU should have hired Turner (or James Miller) over Greg Heiar. I would have liked for NMSU to reach out to Turner this go around but our AD (Mario Moccia) made it clear that he is looking for a new Aggie head coach with prior or current D1 head coaching experience.

If Turner turns UTA into a WAC power, Aggie fans will be kicking themselves for NMSU not hiring him a year ago. Kansas State's Jerome Tang was a finalist for the NMSU job the year we hired Paul Weir. But we got Chris Jans a year later, so it all worked out for NMSU and the Aggie fans.