lamar1 Posted January 29, 2021 Share Posted January 29, 2021 I attended the Lamar/Sam Houston State game in Huntsville with a friend who's a former NJCAA divison1 basketball coach. His comment of the night "how can a conference member (Lamar) be so bad" I agree. Worst Lamar team maybe since Jack Martin's last years. With a new league, it's past time to go in a different direction with the basketball program. It's not going to improve with what we have today. WAC is a tougher league for sure. What we have now is an embarrassment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted January 29, 2021 Share Posted January 29, 2021 Seems like Coach Price is just going through the motions and not really trying. This is the last year of his contract so I would think Born is going to bring in a new coach after this season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geezer Posted January 29, 2021 Share Posted January 29, 2021 Assuming Lamar moves on without Price the incoming coach will have three openings from graduating seniors. The new coach will also have an immediate need to find a quality post player. Someone that can play with at minimum the type of performance that Sullivan has demonstrated this year. He has definitely upped his game. The new coach will also need to find a forward that can rebound and score. Again making assumption that all the underclassmen return your inside players are Mouka and Nickerson. My opinion Nickerson isn't getting the playing time his potential deserves, but maybe he isn't earning his chances in practice. I may be wrong but I don't expect the kind of improvement for Mouka that Sullivan has made. Hope I'm wrong. Harrison should be a staple for the next few years. Bennet and Smith may have the most potential of the guard/forward types. To be honest Kopp hasn't impressed me. I think some of the problems are from the apparent lack of a half court offense and that's on Price. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamar1 Posted January 29, 2021 Author Share Posted January 29, 2021 Assuming Lamar moves on without Price the incoming coach will have three openings from graduating seniors. The new coach will also have an immediate need to find a quality post player. Someone that can play with at minimum the type of performance that Sullivan has demonstrated this year. He has definitely upped his game. The new coach will also need to find a forward that can rebound and score. Again making assumption that all the underclassmen return your inside players are Mouka and Nickerson. My opinion Nickerson isn't getting the playing time his potential deserves, but maybe he isn't earning his chances in practice. I may be wrong but I don't expect the kind of improvement for Mouka that Sullivan has made. Hope I'm wrong. Harrison should be a staple for the next few years. Bennet and Smith may have the most potential of the guard/forward types. To be honest Kopp hasn't impressed me. I think some of the problems are from the apparent lack of a half court offense and that's on Price. Are you saying "baseline' is not an effective offense?! All kidding aside we need better than Sullivan at post. He has really struggled with bigger posts. But you're right. Mouka may have more potential as he's much taller but neither he nor Nickerson are strong enough and have and will continue to be pushed around. The coach may need to look at JUCO or Grad transfers to get us to where we can even hope to compete. The SLC is terrible and we're right near the bottom. With what we have now and returning I'd expect Lamar to be picked last in the pre-season WAC poll. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamarfan360 Posted January 29, 2021 Share Posted January 29, 2021 Geez, we are probably going to be picked last in the preseason WAC fall football poll and now you say possibly last in the WAC preseason men's basketball poll. The above makes me proud to be a Cardinal. :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geezer Posted January 30, 2021 Share Posted January 30, 2021 Think of it this way, in the 80's Lamar left the SLC with La Tech, ULM and Ark St. to form the American South. By the late 90's the American South became the Sunbelt and Lamar returned to the SLC with at least some thinking they would automatically be at the top of the SLC, only to continue to hire mediocre coaches and fall further. It should be pretty obvious when Tic Price (a head coach who was let go from a conference rival) was a significant upgrade from the bottom Lamar reached with Pat Knight. In my opinion Lamar is lucky that the other three Texas schools allowed us to move to the WAC with them. I don't think you can show me one sport that Lamar was a consistent top tier program in the SLC. I am hoping that Born has made the correct moves so far with the coaches he has hired, but with all the distractions this past year it is a little hard to tell. I am cheering that Lamar football won't finish last in this springs conference race. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamarfan360 Posted January 30, 2021 Share Posted January 30, 2021 (edited) Think of it this way, in the 80's Lamar left the SLC with La Tech, ULM and Ark St. to form the American South. By the late 90's the American South became the Sunbelt and Lamar returned to the SLC with at least some thinking they would automatically be at the top of the SLC, only to continue to hire mediocre coaches and fall further. It should be pretty obvious when Tic Price (a head coach who was let go from a conference rival) was a significant upgrade from the bottom Lamar reached with Pat Knight. In my opinion Lamar is lucky that the other three Texas schools allowed us to move to the WAC with them. I don't think you can show me one sport that Lamar was a consistent top tier program in the SLC. I am hoping that Born has made the correct moves so far with the coaches he has hired, but with all the distractions this past year it is a little hard to tell. I am cheering that Lamar football won't finish last in this springs conference race. geezer, we have women's soccer that we can hang our hat on. They have won conference two straight years and are picked to win the conference this year. Cross country is pretty good too. However, they aren't the Big Three, football, men's basketball and women's basketball. Some may say baseball is one of the Big Three. That would kill me, as Coach Davis has not got the Cardinals to the upper tier of the conference. Edited January 30, 2021 by lamarfan360 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geezer Posted January 30, 2021 Share Posted January 30, 2021 Your correct, Lamar cross country is a solid program, I overlooked soccer too. I was looking at the men's big three as the sports that another conference would invite a school to join a conference for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamar1 Posted January 30, 2021 Author Share Posted January 30, 2021 Geez, we are probably going to be picked last in the preseason WAC fall football poll and now you say possibly last in the WAC preseason men's basketball poll. The above makes me proud to be a Cardinal. :unsure: Well. Chicago State is supposed to have one more year in the WAC. (Suspended their program this season). They'll give us a run for our money for last next year if they play. I know this is negative but I'm afraid it's a realistic possibility. Hopefully Born can hire a young energetic coach that can breathe life into this once stored program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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