(03-04-2023 09:36 AM)McG Wrote: My hope for the program this year was to qualify for the MAC tournament, anything that happens here is gravy in my eyes as the program continues to trend upwards!
Same. No matter how bad they were, coming in 8th was always an achievable goal, but they exceeded that, which is awesome.
They still have a young team but the core is probably mostly leaving (ie, Crump and Thornton although...Hunter was a much stronger presence on the team and probably in the locker room than we thought at the onset of the season).
Russell might make the loss of Thornton palatable. He's not the same kind of PG but he's pretty good and plays confidently. Thornton had his flaws for sure, mostly when he tried to be more of a scorer as opposed to a distributor. But when he was distributing and the game was going through him...he was really good.
Thornton and Ibarguen have developed a fantastic relationship this year as Ibarguen is a constant mover and he's always ready for a pass. If I said it once...I probably said it a dozen times. If you are even remotely open, Thornton will get you the ball 9 times out of 10. Ibarguen took full advantage of that this year.
But now that they've qualified and I'm more than happy with that and agree that anything else is gravy...it doesn't stop me from wanting to get greedy.
Step 1...Qualify for the MACT.....Check
Step 2...Be a disruption in the MACT....
Step 3...Retain and continue to build for year 3 of the Burno Era
Btw...regarding Burno...
I think we're safe for now with him but we all know what happens to successful mid-major coaches...
We're not there yet, but as year after year of DePaul sucking azz goes by, the more I expect them to snatch him up.
Hopefully, it's not for a few more years.