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(03-29-2022 01:14 PM)ODU BBALL Wrote:  

(03-29-2022 10:55 AM)Stat Geek Wrote:  I disagree completely about players not wanting to play in certain systems in a broad perspective.

There are tons of schools with high tempo or NBA style offenses that don't recruit well at all. On the other hand, some schools that play structured/slow college offenses still recruit extremely well. Schools like UVA, Villanova, Dayton, VT, St. Mary's, Houston, Texas, Butler, Boise State, Loyola, UCONN, etc. North Texas plays about the most unattractive offense of any team in our conference and they won the league.

Pretty much every one of those schools plays in a much better conference and most of them have a much stronger basketball pedigree than ODU does. That alone is an attraction for kids to go there.

Fair, though I would point out that if systems were an issue they’d be struggling to succeed within their conferences. Being better than ODU or even a high-tempo mid-major isn’t the issue, but Virginia, Villanova and Wisconsin in particular show that they can be competitive at the highest levels without high-scoring offenses, and there’s nothing special about mid or low-major ball that makes low-tempo less successful in and of itself.

Now whether JJ is in any way able to translate this to sustained success going forward depends on your definition of success (his deal has been lot of wins until recently but few big-game takedowns). Prime BT probably would have been very successful in CUSA, though the added stressors of travel (especially those second games of three-day Texas trips) and the sheer size of the conference might have bit him in the ass at times too; it’s not as simple to say “well he was great in the CAA and the CAA is better than CUSA so he’d be better in CUSA.”

Tl;dr if ODU wins goes to multiple NCAAs out of the Belt and wins there once or twice, players and fans will flock to the program even if they’re winning 42-35 every night.