Big 4 Hoops Blogger

It was a GREAT defensive performance but an UGLY offensive performance. I credit UB for finding a way to win fairly comfortably despite not having their typical offensive output. Jeenathan Williams had himself a night and the Bulls defensive intensity was a nice thing to see. That said, they’re desperately lacking quality shooters and going 7-30 (23%) from deep is concerning. Williams shot 4-4 from behind the arc. The rest of UB: 3-26 (11.5%) This is not your typical Kent State team. They’re still capable of pulling off an upset or two but are not a MAC contender. UB will need to improve their situational basketball if they want to make a run in Cleveland.

Sears, BVP and Carter make a solid top 3. One bad game doesn’t define a team. They’re still 14-3 with a win over Belmont and all of their losses against Top 100 opponents including two Top 25 teams. I think that game says more about Toledo. IMO, they look to be the top team in the MAC at this moment. We’ll see where Ohio and Buffalo stack up when they battle each other. The rest of the league is battling for 4-12.

Bullet Points Postgame Show:

I wish I had more information. I’m not sure the specific details of what Hardnett is dealing with. Was told that it was going to be a difficult season for him and that he probably wasn’t going to have a significant role early in the year. We’re now starting conference play and not much has changed in regards to his play on the court. I’m hoping things get better but I don’t have any new details at this moment.

This is accurate. I was told prior to the season not to expect him to have a big year because he was dealing with nagging injuries. I don’t have any specific details but it seems whatever he’s dealing with is having a significant impact on his performance and playing time.

So essentially, the reason I’ve been so difficult on UB at times is that I didn’t want what happened to Ohio to take place at Buffalo. Luckily for the Bobcats, they eventually figured things out but it was looking scary for a while. Unlike Whitesell, Jim Christian didn’t receive much support by the Ohio fanbase at the beginning due to his personality and him being a former Kent State head coach. Bobcat fans wanted to love Saul Phillips but he just wasn’t consistent enough. I think the moral of the story is, hiring a solid coach is an inexact science. Sometimes making a safe hire keeps you consistently good but never great while risky hires have the ability to elevate or destroy your program. Then there’s obvious choices that schools luck into and I think OU is benefitting from that right now. To sum up, I think UB is better than Ohio was when they hired Boals but he was lucky to inherit untapped talent. I don’t know if I like the depth behind the Bulls Big 3 that a new UB coach would inherit in the unlikely scenario that Whitesell leaves.

I would say Ohio hit rock bottom before they finally decided to go with the obvious hire in Jeff Boals. People forget they hired Jim Christian after Groce departed and won 49 games in two seasons before he bolted for Boston College. Christian won a lot but was considered a disappointment. They settled for the NIT in their final season with DJ Cooper, Walter Offutt and Ivo Baltic despite making the Sweet 16 and finishing 25th in the country the year before. Saul Phillips won only 10 games in his first year as the program couldn’t deal with all of their short term changes but he figured things out with Antonio Campbell and everyone thought they were back. They had two 20-win seasons under him before they completely fell apart. Boals was the guy the fanbase wanted since John Groce departed. He’s an Ohio alumnus, high energy, great recruiter, relates to the younger generation and knows the game inside/out. It only took the program to bottom out before realizing that’s what they needed. I don’t know enough about Turner Battle beyond his playing days at UB but that’s a hire that would fire up a portion of the Bulls fanbase.

There will be a quarterback competition at UB this offseason. Best of luck to KVT wherever his future takes him. We’ll always remember his role in the Bulls magical 2020 season.

I believe he’s the highest rated prospect to ever commit to UB. I think he has one year of eligibility remaining.

Quite the journey but was quite the recruit. If he plays, will be an instant upgrade for UB’s secondary. https://247sports.com/Player/Elijah-Blades-88047/junior-college-204258/

Covid is destroying the beginning of conference play across college basketball. Two of UB’s first three games have already been postponed and Jim Whitesell will miss the Bulls MAC opener against Miami assuming that it’s played.

Without going into details, I'm mainly making an assumption because I believe Jim Whitesell will remain the head coach at UB for at least the next few years and it's impossible to predict that far ahead unless you already have a coach in waiting or a successor mapped out.

I appreciate this post and agree with the majority of your input here.

There’s someone out there who wanted to be the UB head coach three years ago but I don’t want to say his name out of fear… Plus, it’ll never happen anyways. And just so it’s clear, I have never vouched for Jim Whitesell to be fired. I have my criticisms of him but have never stated that UB should move on from him.

I like this class as well. Mading and Blocker are raw but have high upside. Jones has held his own. We’ll have to wait and see on Williamson.

I have never said the UB program was dead and I’ve never claimed they were on the level of P5 schools. You obviously have some connections inside UB athletics and use that to talk down to the rest of the posters on UB Fan that disagree with your opinion. I didn’t attend UB. In fact, I went to Ohio University, a school that went through the same thing Buffalo is going through now. I’ve talked to those connected with their program on where things went wrong after John Groce left and formulate my own opinions. I have multiple connections inside UB and know some of my opinions are shared by others close to the program so please don’t dismiss my thoughts as “fantasy.” That’s insulting and dismisses the fact that many others on this board have valid opinions and know what they’re talking about as well.

Thanks for the response, Mark Alnutt

It was literally an outside hire that ignited the Buffalo program with Bobby Hurley. I get what you're saying and you're mostly correct but don't dismiss it as something that never happens or works out. Hurley is the reason Oats came to UB in the first place which brought the success and internal pipeline. There was a time when many Bulls fans were outraged that they had fired Reggie Witherspoon after the success he had turning around Buffalo. The key is not to become content with "who you are" and I think the big divide on this board is there's fans that are clamoring for more and others who are saying "be happy with what we are" or "it's impossible or too risky to take chances" to improve the UB program.

I didn't give my personal opinion. I stated two potential scenarios and asked what fans would choose.

It all comes down to risk. Whitesell was the safe play to keep the young talented roster together. It was a short term play, banking on the young players keeping the program at a high level. So far, they’ve succeeded based on UB’s previous standards but have regressed (which was gonna happen regardless) from where the Oats teams were at towards the end. The real question is if fans would’ve accepted falling flat if they hired a young, flashy coach that didn’t work out. We would’ve called out the program for not hiring someone internally who would’ve kept the program together. So, it was a lose-lose situation either way but I can guarantee almost no one in the fanbase ever expected or wanted Jim Whitesell to be “the guy” regardless of his resume, merits and ability to keep the roster together. Almost unanimously, the reaction was: “He’s a nice guy. Will keep the roster together. Hope it works.” Whether the positive posters on this board like it or not, there’s a faction of the fanbase turning on Whitesell and the team and that won’t be good for the long term health of UB basketball if they continue to struggle.

It’s not a guarantee they would be worse *right now* if the whole team had departed three years ago. Nate Oats took over a depleted roster and look how he rebuilt the program. Yes, I realize that Oats is a special, generational coach but whoever inherited the position was going to takeover a program with a ton of momentum behind it and an active recruiting pipeline with players eager to play for a top tier mid-major. Hindsight, would you have taken a mediocre, retread head coach guaranteed to have a young talented roster or taken a risk on a highly motivated, talented young coach with unknowns regarding your team? I’m not going to answer and will let everyone decide for themselves but it’s not as clear cut as some make it out to be. If they don’t make the NCAA Tournament this year, we’ll have the answer.

I’ll just say this so I’m not accused of targeting a specific player or coach. It was a poor performance by EVERYONE. The collective performance of the team from coaching to the players executing on the floor was miserable. No one deserves a pass after that performance today.