Assistant Coaches

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Gold Vision said:
Why do so many people want an all Minnesota staff? We need connections throughout the country. We checked the Minnesota/Midwest box with the Ben Johnson hire.
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Those who believe Ben was a good to great hire can only cling to Minnesota recruiting because it's truly the only selling point at this time, there are dreams of grabbing recruits 1-5 every year vs. anything approximating a coaching philosophy.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
How many NCAA tournament games has Thorson coached in?

Nuness hasn't even been an assistant at the college level.
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Two names, Kendall Brown and Dain Dainja. Nuness is a good recruiter with strong MN ties. Like it or not if their direction is really to go all in on MN talent it’s a good hire.

I go back and forth. We certainly have enough high end talent in state to be nationally relevant and the only thing that would energize Gopher fans more than a winner is a winner led by in state kids.

That being said, all I want is a winner.
 

howeda7 said:
I buy the concern more with Nuness than Thorson. But honestly, the NCAA is such a joke now that bending over backwards for guilt by association appearances is dumb. Unless there's evidence that either did something wrong, hire who you want.
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Here is an example. Dain Dainja did not have the academics to get into the U. Apparently Baylor does not care as much and figured out a way to get him in school. Does that mean Baylor cheats? I don't know. I think it just shows that some schools will do whatever it takes to bring in top talent and its a commitment from the top.
 

atsgopher said:
I think Ben Johnson is 3rd in most years coaching, when hired as Gophers Head Coach in their history (not counting interim and HS).

Also out of the 14 Big Ten Teams he is 8th when hired of current or last coach employed where applicable.

Not sure about all Big Ten history though, but I'd bet that ranks on the more experienced end.
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Do the same analysis for head coaching experience and see what you get.
 



Nuness and Thomson? Sign me up! If BJ gets one I will be surprised and my guess it will be Thorson. Baylor is loaded with talent , could play for the title and Nuness has his fingerprint all over their success. This could open a lot of doors for Nuness if that is what he is looking for. Compared to being an assist under a rookie HC with an unknown roster and huge rebuild? Possible but likely not probable. IMO, Thorson has more to gain but has to give up long time relationship with Niko and the Colorado high to come back home.
 

TruthSeeker said:
Hopkins was notorious back in the day. Are they still recruiting?
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Fair point. And on the flip side, I'm pretty sure that each of the main private high schools either run their own schools for lower grades and/or are affiliated with "feeder" schools.

The over all thing is: what is the percentage of a team's starters/contributors who did not "grow up" in that school district or system?


At some schools, it obviously just does not matter if they win with "their kids". They'll gladly, happily take a kid who grew up in the district/system, has waiting patiently their whole lives, and just kick them to the curb like a sack of trash for someone else who is recruited to show up.


As like almost everything, it's a spectrum. It feels "less bad" to me for a kid who at least has come to the school by 9th grade. Showing up at 11th grade to a be a two year starter, driving halfway across the metro, feels just wrong. Might as well just make it all club sports, then.
 

atsgopher said:
So if we pay for someone’s school it OK behavior, but if someone pays themselves the. It’s not OK?
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Huh? I think you completely misinterpreted what I was saying.

I don't have any problem with the offering of scholarships to private high schools, in of itself. I was just lumping in that with all of the "recruiting" and "improper benefits" type of discussion, that a lot of people feel has no place in "school teams" at the high school level.
 



Gold Vision said:
Why do so many people want an all Minnesota staff? We need connections throughout the country. We checked the Minnesota/Midwest box with the Ben Johnson hire.
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Another way to look at it:

Thorson is someone who has a lot of experience (mentor), considered an excellent teacher of skills and is a legend in Minnesota high school basketball. His MN ties and possible desire to help build the program at the U could attract him to join the program, where others may not.
 

The recruiting state kids is a nice story but it is two assumptions; one is that you get them, two is that the state always produces them. The second one will not prove true over time. Just look at the last 20 years and the years that had zero elite championship players (conference titles) And years where there were two or three high end players. We have had very high end state kids in the last 20 years. It did not lead to any success. People act like it is a never ending supply. Even what locals call a loaded 2022 class must realize that several of them will work out. The key is getting the ones that fit and then coaching your tail off. Getting great talent is not enough.
 





MplsGopher said:
Public is public, no scholarships and cherry picking. If kids/families choose to go to a district, open enrollment is the law in this state. Much more even playing field than privates.
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Eden Prairie football? Any recruiting going on there over the years? Some memorable running backs from Chicago come to mind, complete with host families.
 

Dakota2 said:
Eden Prairie football? Any recruiting going on there over the years? Some memorable running backs from Chicago come to mind, complete with host families.
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See post #248
 

goldengophers said:
His arguement is actually one against Ben, long time in coaching with many stops but no prior head coaching offers.
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Well, we'll see. Dwight Eisenhower was a major for 16 years. But, then the winds of war started blowing and he got a promotion; then WWII began, he got more promotions, and the rest is history.
 



cjbfbp said:
Well, we'll see. Dwight Eisenhower was a major for 16 years. But, then the winds of war started blowing and he got a promotion; then WWII began, he got more promotions, and the rest is history.
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Ike’s big break was his strong performance at the 1941 Louisiana war games which impressed Gen. Marshall—I suppose coach Ben’s equivalence would be bringing Dawson Garcia home😀...
 

Married@SiebertField said:
Ike’s big break was his strong performance at the 1941 Louisiana war games which impressed Gen. Marshall—I suppose coach Ben’s equivalence would be bringing Dawson Garcia home😀...
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Good info! The point is that we can never tell for sure what a seemingly undistinguished individual may do when he gets his chance at the right time.
 

cjbfbp said:
Good info! The point is that we can never tell for sure what a seemingly undistinguished individual may do when he gets his chance at the right time.
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True but the great part about a major conference is that a majority of the time you find a coach in a lesser conference who has proven it with past results or an assistant from a great program. We have neither, but it is fascinating that ancient analogies to Ike are being used as justification. Our exception proving the rule is a major turned general from the 1st half of the 20th century.
 
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Gold Vision said:
Why do so many people want an all Minnesota staff? We need connections throughout the country. We checked the Minnesota/Midwest box with the Ben Johnson hire.
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Kimani Young was as connected as anybody to the Northeast tri-state when he got here (which is why Hurley wanted him at UCONN), that didn't help us at all in recruiting good players from that area while he was here. When you're a building program, a kid with strong P6 interest from the coasts or down south isn't going to sign up to play for a program that's near the bottom of a conference that they don't care about. You can pull players from the rest of the country that none of the other power conferences want and a few will surprise but most won't as we saw in the Pitino era.

We need to look at recruiting through the scope of what is going to draw in good recruits in the position we're in right now, what are our selling points? we can't sell on court success because we haven't achieved much in 25 years, we can't sell that we're going to get you to the NBA because we had a player drafted last year for the first time in 15 years so what can we sell? Proximity to your family, strength of the conference which is going to mean more to a kid from the Midwest than those from California or Texas, early playing time, selling the Twin Cities is easier to sell to kids in the Midwest than recruits from warmer regions and so on. You can't sell something you aren't so you have to use your strengths even if there aren't many yet.

Chris Beard sent Zhaire Smith, Jarrett Culver and Jahmi'us Ramsey (all Texas kids) to the pros and all of a sudden he can go up and grab a couple sought after recruits from Chicago in Terrance Shannon and Nimari Burnett (who's now in the portal) because he's proved he can get you to the NBA and he's gone to a Final 4. Scott Drew's story is the same, sent Texas kids to the NBA and now he's bringing Dain Dainja and Kendall Brown to Waco. GopherHole's favorite coach Tony Bennett brought Joe Harris with him from the state of Washington after recruiting him at Wazzu but needed Mike Scott (Virginia), Malcolm Brogdon (from an ACC city), Anthony Gil (North Carolina), Justin Anderson (Virginia) to get to the NBA to land Kyle Guy (from Big Ten country), D'Andre Hunter, Ty Jerome and now Jabri Abdur-Rahim (from Big East country), Reece Beekman (from an SEC town)....you can take players from anywhere but the difference makers will come from your conference's footprint AT FIRST. Develop, win and put players in the NBA then you will get in the door of a great recruit from Georgia, Florida, New York, Uzbekistan wherever...you have to prove yourself first.
 
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goldengophers said:
True but the great part about a major conference is that a majority of the time you find a coach in a lesser conference who has proven it with past results or an assistant from a great program. We have neither, but it is fascinating that ancient analogies to Ike are being used as justification. Our exception proving the rule is a major turned general from the 1st half of the 20th century.
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There's plenty of P6 coaches that weren't head coaches before getting hired at their current jobs.
 



goldengophers said:
We have neither, but it is fascinating that ancient analogies to Ike are being used as justification. Our exception proving the rule is a major turned general from the 1st half of the 20th century.
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Good one! Well, in the interest of optimism, we have to find the analogies where we can.
 




GopherNuts said:
Kimani Young was as connected as anybody to the Northeast tri-state when he got here (which is why Hurley wanted him at UCONN), that didn't help us at all in recruiting good players from that area while he was here. When you're a building program, a kid with strong P6 interest from the coasts or down south isn't going to sign up to play for a program that's near the bottom of a conference that they don't care about. You can pull players from the rest of the country that none of the other power conferences want and a few will surprise but most won't as we saw in the Pitino era.

We need to look at recruiting through the scope of what is going to draw in good recruits in the position we're in right now, what are our selling points? we can't sell on court success because we haven't achieved much in 25 years, we can't sell that we're going to get you to the NBA because we had a player drafted last year for the first time in 15 years so what can we sell? Proximity to your family, strength of the conference which is going to mean more to a kid from the Midwest than those from California or Texas, early playing time, selling the Twin Cities is easier to sell to kids in the Midwest than recruits from warmer regions and so on. You can't sell something you aren't so you have to use your strengths even if there aren't many yet.

Chris Beard sent Zhaire Smith, Jarrett Culver and Jahmi'us Ramsey (all Texas kids) to the pros and all of a sudden he can go up and grab a couple sought after recruits from Chicago in Terrance Shannon and Nimari Burnett (who's now in the portal) because he's proved he can get you to the NBA and he's gone to a Final 4. Scott Drew's story is the same, sent Texas kids to the NBA and now he's bringing Dain Dainja and Kendall Brown to Waco. GopherHole's favorite coach Tony Bennett brought Joe Harris with him from the state of Washington after recruiting him at Wazzu but needed Mike Scott (Virginia), Malcolm Brogdon (from an ACC city), Anthony Gil (Virginia), Justin Anderson (Virginia) to get to the NBA to land Kyle Guy (from Big Ten country), D'Andre Hunter, Ty Jerome and now Jabri Abdur-Rahim (from Big East country), Reece Beekman (from an SEC town)....you can take players from anywhere but the difference makers will come from your conference's footprint AT FIRST. Develop, win and put players in the NBA then you will get in the door of a great recruit from Georgia, Florida, New York, Uzbekistan wherever...you have to prove yourself first.
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Great post!

Also, Uzbekistan is a huge untapped resource?? “I like-a basket-bool! Is niiiiccceeee!”
 

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