The Deuce: No doubt, there’s no excuse what that looked like last night*

It doesn’t have to get laughingstock bad. We’re getting blitzed. We’re hanging banners upside down. Underwood quotes are getting piled on (part of that is just a consequence of losing). We’re getting nationally maligned. Etc.

All but a very select few have down years from time to time. That’s natural, and you gave plenty of examples of genuinely good coaches with long track records who are guilty of it too. Gard and Izzo are great examples. But those down ones don’t have to become laughingstock bad. And the saddest part of this one is that it has. We’ve been kinda uncompetitive for a stretch here.

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Dennis Gates was a great hire in year one, then in year 2 had the worst P5 team in the entire country, then in year 3 is back to being a great hire.

Wisconsin fans wanted Greg Gard gone both before last season and at the end of last season and now he’s genius. Izzo was washed and the game had passed him by, now he’s a genius too.

Jerome Tang was a home run hire when he struck gold on Marquise Nowell as a transfer up from a mid major, now he’s a guy who is wasting a big money NIL roster. Kevin Willard was tending towards being a bust at Maryland, now he hit on one freshman and a couple good transfers and he’s a stud. Bill Self dominated the Big 12 every year for 20 years, now in this new era he has had two straight underwhelming seasons.

There are a handful of elite programs and coaches that will be great almost every year. We’re not either of those things and probably need to accept that. But wer’re a really good program with a really good guy at the top spot, and you just need more years than not to be good ones. But it’s pointless to make grand proclamations about any single season, it’s all a crapshoot these days and you just have to get it right more times than not with your transfer targets.

We blew it this year, and we need to learn from that. The idea of the roster was good, but the guys we brought in just didn’t pan out. Compared to last year where we got a 99th percentile outcome from the Domask pickup.

And as good as KJ, Tomi, and Riley have been, my biggest worry is that we’re leaning heavily into the Calipari model long after everyone realized that’s not how you win anymore. I’m already seeing talk of us adding multiple Euros and reclass freshman next year, and I just don’t think that’s the path to success. But Brad has more than earned a pass for this year, though I do want to see that he’s learned from what happened here.

All that being said, this program could not be more due for a fluke Sweet 16 run. So I still will hold out hope that this season has a happier ending than what it feels like now.

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Anyone know where the pregame spot will be?