(03-01-2020 11:28 AM)JacksonHall Wrote:  

(03-01-2020 10:50 AM)olddawg Wrote:  https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/sch...s-madison/
Interesting to note, Brady's last season is rated as our 5th best team ever. And the schedule for that season was rated as our 4th most difficult ever.

Top 5 highest rated JMU teams:

1981-82: +10.68 (Campanelli)
1992-93: +9.37 (Driesell)
1980-81: +8.28 (Campanelli)
1991-92: +7.70 (Driesell)
2015-16: +6:17 (Brady)

Lowest 5 rated JMU teams:

2004-05: -14.41 (Keener)
2005-06: -12.74 (Keener)
2006-07: -10.18 (Keener)
2019-20: -8.91 (Rowe)
2018-19: -8.52 (Rowe)

I think we all recognize now that to fire Brady without having an actual plan was shortsighted and stupid.

Maybe the AD actually had a good plan.

I believe Brady had reached his potential at JMU and I was all for a change, similar to what W&M did with replacing Tony Shaver. However I wonder if our AD pulled the trigger on letting Brady go before they had Plan A committed. Since there was a delay with the Plan A thing, plan B already commits to another school and the AD had to settle/scramble for Plan C?

I suppose we'll never know how messed up this was but I recall JMU announcing Brady's replacement taking weeks, not days like we normally see in the coaching carousel season.

(03-02-2020 11:01 AM)POTUS#4 Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 09:38 AM)Dukester Wrote:  IMO - Brady's third team was his best. Although he never got along with Denzel.....

I remember that season too well. Kind of a turning point for me - in a bad way. It looked like JMU basketball was finally ready to take its place back at (or sort of near) the top of the CAA. Won a bunch of OOC games. Beat up on the bad CAA teams. I sort of remember they might have gotten a few top 25 votes. And then they lost pretty much every tough conference game including a first round tourny loss to W&M.

Yeah Potus - there was one game that I think was the turning point for two programs. Late in that season we were tied with VCU with a couple minutes to go at the Convo. We had a turnover, and they hit a 3 and beat us in a painful loss. They went on to the Final four that year, and we sputtered. I honestly think that was a key game for Brady, Shaka, and the two programs.

(03-02-2020 02:55 PM)Dukester Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 11:01 AM)POTUS#4 Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 09:38 AM)Dukester Wrote:  IMO - Brady's third team was his best. Although he never got along with Denzel.....

I remember that season too well. Kind of a turning point for me - in a bad way. It looked like JMU basketball was finally ready to take its place back at (or sort of near) the top of the CAA. Won a bunch of OOC games. Beat up on the bad CAA teams. I sort of remember they might have gotten a few top 25 votes. And then they lost pretty much every tough conference game including a first round tourny loss to W&M.

Yeah Potus - there was one game that I think was the turning point for two programs. Late in that season we were tied with VCU with a couple minutes to go at the Convo. We had a turnover, and they hit a 3 and beat us in a painful loss. They went on to the Final four that year, and we sputtered. I honestly think that was a key game for Brady, Shaka, and the two programs.

Don't forget that JMU came to VCU, last game of the regular season and beat VCU right before the start of the CAAT.

(03-02-2020 02:55 PM)Dukester Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 11:01 AM)POTUS#4 Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 09:38 AM)Dukester Wrote:  IMO - Brady's third team was his best. Although he never got along with Denzel.....

I remember that season too well. Kind of a turning point for me - in a bad way. It looked like JMU basketball was finally ready to take its place back at (or sort of near) the top of the CAA. Won a bunch of OOC games. Beat up on the bad CAA teams. I sort of remember they might have gotten a few top 25 votes. And then they lost pretty much every tough conference game including a first round tourny loss to W&M.

Yeah Potus - there was one game that I think was the turning point for two programs. Late in that season we were tied with VCU with a couple minutes to go at the Convo. We had a turnover, and they hit a 3 and beat us in a painful loss. They went on to the Final four that year, and we sputtered. I honestly think that was a key game for Brady, Shaka, and the two programs.

That was a painful loss. JMU also beat VCU (at VCU) later that same season. Why wasn’t that win a “key” game for Brady? Would JMU beating VCU twice elevated JMU to the NCAAT or kept VCU out of the NCAAT?

(03-02-2020 02:55 PM)Dukester Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 11:01 AM)POTUS#4 Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 09:38 AM)Dukester Wrote:  IMO - Brady's third team was his best. Although he never got along with Denzel.....

I remember that season too well. Kind of a turning point for me - in a bad way. It looked like JMU basketball was finally ready to take its place back at (or sort of near) the top of the CAA. Won a bunch of OOC games. Beat up on the bad CAA teams. I sort of remember they might have gotten a few top 25 votes. And then they lost pretty much every tough conference game including a first round tourny loss to W&M.

Yeah Potus - there was one game that I think was the turning point for two programs. Late in that season we were tied with VCU with a couple minutes to go at the Convo. We had a turnover, and they hit a 3 and beat us in a painful loss. They went on to the Final four that year, and we sputtered. I honestly think that was a key game for Brady, Shaka, and the two programs.

So painful. Joey Rodriguez took about 5 steps along the baseline before hitting a go-ahead shot with a few seconds to go.

But it was a game earlier in that season that really opened my eyes to just how far excitement for MBB had sunk at JMU. It was the first tough home conference game, either ODU or GMU, and I think we were on a long win streak. I was thinking "this is it - the crowd/student section is really gonna be fired up for this one" The crowd was mediocre with minimal student energy. We lost and I realized that things just weren't gonna be like they used to be. I think it's really going to take some sustained success, like several years of great teams, before that old fire reignites.

(03-02-2020 03:01 PM)Longhorn Wrote:  That was a painful loss. JMU also beat VCU (at VCU) later that same season. Why wasn’t that win a “key” game for Brady? Would JMU beating VCU twice elevated JMU to the NCAAT or kept VCU out of the NCAAT?

If we had gone on a tourny run, I guess that VCU win would have been seen as the key win. Instead we lost to W&M in the first game of the tourny, and the VCU win, I think, might have been our only really good CAA win all season. I remember getting swept by ODU and GMU. . VCU fans were calling for Smart to be fired heading into the CAA tourny. Said he was in over his head and that they should have hired someone with head coaching experience.

VCU was a controversial at-large pick in the NCAA tourny that year, so if they had lost both to JMU, I think they would have definitely been out. JMU wasn't that close that it would have mattered.