Is Gophers basketball really one of the toughest jobs in the country? | BMTN video

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Block M said:
Yes it is. Cold weather. Outdated arena. Lots of great local HS basketball but they want to spread their wings elsewhere understandably.
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Ya, all that but I do believe what makes it most difficult is no boosters comparable to the winning programs and an administration that only gives lip service to athletics. And an Athletics Director that is not a promoter.
Need a really good coach to overcome all that.
Oh, and 5 professional sports teams competing for the fans attention and money.
 


I can't get myself to push play. Has Tony worked on eliminating the constant "um's" in each sentence? It seems best if I just read an SI piece he's written.
 

Block M said:
Yes it is. Cold weather. Outdated arena. Lots of great local HS basketball but they want to spread their wings elsewhere understandably.
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The weather: I'll put you in touch with my friend from College Station. When he and his wife stayed with us a few summers ago, they couldn't stop talking about how they loved the weather here compared to the humid hellscape they were going to have to return to. Of course, there's that other six months of the year 🙄, but the only place in the country with perfect weather is southern California, and I wouldn't want to live anywhere without a change of seasons.
 

Bad Gopher said:
The weather: I'll put you in touch with my friend from College Station. When he and his wife stayed with us a few summers ago, they couldn't stop talking about how they loved the weather here compared to the humid hellscape they were going to have to return to. Of course, there's that other six months of the year 🙄, but the only place in the country with perfect weather is southern California, and I wouldn't want to live anywhere without a change of seasons.
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In San Diego you can drive to any season you want in 2 hours.
 





The biggest problems for a prospective coach at the U are poor pay for assistants, poor pay for head coach, poor NIL support, pro sports town, mediocre administration and regents that have tepid support for basketball, and no history of winning.
 







It's a darn Tough job: No money, no national appeal, crummy home court, disjointed facilities for players, has become known as place where coaches come to die, Poindexter athletic director, afraid to play the other Division 1 school in town.

That's a pretty good recipe for a pretty darn tough place to create a consistent Top 25 program in today's Major College Basketball.
 

Pay for performance matters in every industry where money is abundant. NCAA basketball is a money-making machine. Put money on the table, players will show up.
 



Block M said:
Yes it is. Cold weather. Outdated arena. Lots of great local HS basketball but they want to spread their wings elsewhere understandably.
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Cold weather: East Lansing Ann Arbor, Madison. Historic arena. If we had a winning program, they’d spread their wings here.
Veritas
 

WoodburyTim said:
Depends what time of day. There are some times you won’t get more than a couple blocks away in 2 hours.
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That isn't in San Diego, that's LA or what has become of the Bay area, or if you want to get into Tahoe.
 
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No, no, no. Not even remotely.

The Gophers job comes with good pay at a world class university in a prosperous, world-class metropolitan area. There's plenty of local talent, an incredible training facility, and a base of sports fans just waiting to celebrate some success.

And the arena isn't a problem for the coach; he doesn't have to sit in the cheap seats or stand in line for concessions. All he has to do is win, and the place will fill right up.
 

A NIL deficit compared to other top programs is currently the hardest part of the job.

I know the Gophers had their woes before NIL or Portal existed, but it's become vastly harder to turn the program around over a period of seasons when it's hard to retain players. Ben Johnson would have probably put the 2023-24 team into the NCAAs this year were it not for most of the main guys transferring out for more money.

Any coach coming in has to realize that it's going to take 2-4 years to durably improve the program, but it's going to be hard to hold quality starters longer than 1 year without the cash.
 

gopher watcher said:
It's a darn Tough job: No money, no national appeal, crummy home court, disjointed facilities for players, has become known as place where coaches come to die, Poindexter athletic director, afraid to play the other Division 1 school in town.

That's a pretty good recipe for a pretty darn tough place to create a consistent Top 25 program in today's Major College Basketball.
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Other than the stadium, couldn’t most of this once be said of the football program before PJ?
 


alchemy2u said:
In San Diego you can drive to any season you want in 2 hours.
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If the weather and the ability to drive to any "season" in 2 hours was the reason for choosing a college to play basketball, then Dutcher and SDSU should be getting the best recruits in the country. MN, IA, WI, NE, MSU, MU all have winter. If the team wins the players will come and the coach is the primary driver for a winning program.

Many years ago, facilities were the problem, and the U built a new hockey arena, a new FB stadium and remodeled Williams. Next was practice facilities and those were improved. Now it's NIL. I think, at least for basketball it's back to winning. And winning begets NIL funds, fans in the stands and recruits wanting to join the gophers.
 

golf said:
The only evidence I have seen regarding nil indicates if you take away the four or five blue bloods at the top, then we are in the middle of big ten nil. Not the bottom.

NCAA Revenue Sharing & NIL Collectives – Big Ten Schools – NCAA Revenue Sharing & NIL Estimates 2025

nil-ncaa.com nil-ncaa.com
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IF I read the Collective chart correctly we are 11th out of 16 reporting in the BG18. So not at the bottom. But still 11th! Also to the best of my knowledge we aren’t competing only against BIG18 schools for players Payne went to Texas A&M and Hawkins went to Texas Tech. No matter how you cut it, losing those two was the difference here between a winning year, a losing year, and Johnson’s job.

As for revenue sharing, each team gets about 20? While this should help, it mentioned that the schools expect NIL to shrink "substantially"? But will it shrink proportionally? Won’t the big hitters just continue to rake in donations far and above the common folk? While revenue sharing will allow more players to join the distribution of wealth, I am not so sure that it will cure the disparity in regards to the total amount of moneys each school has available to fund the bidding wars?
 


TwistingMyMelon said:
Can't disagree with that but it remains to be seen whether that is the only issue.
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There are definitely other issues but back to back bad hires is the overwhelming issue, really hopeful that Niko do what PJ has done in building a strong foundation.
 

Gopheritnow said:
IF I read the Collective chart correctly we are 11th out of 16 reporting in the BG18. So not at the bottom. But still 11th! Also to the best of my knowledge we aren’t competing only against BIG18 schools for players Payne went to Texas A&M and Hawkins went to Texas Tech. No matter how you cut it, losing those two was the difference here between a winning year, a losing year, and Johnson’s job.

As for revenue sharing, each team gets about 20? While this should help, it mentioned that the schools expect NIL to shrink "substantially"? But will it shrink proportionally? Won’t the big hitters just continue to rake in donations far and above the common folk? While revenue sharing will allow more players to join the distribution of wealth, I am not so sure that it will cure the disparity in regards to the total amount of moneys each school has available to fund the bidding wars?
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There just doesn't seem to be a lot of solid info out there regarding nil. This is all I could find, but indicates we are not quite the poor sisters that media would have us believe. There are other schools in the same boat or worse than us.

The other issue of course is how schools distribute the nil among respective sports. Can't find any data on this.

I am not an expert at all on revenue sharing going forward. My understanding is it somehow changes next season, so that will be more equitable among schools going forward. Others on GH will be more helpful on this than myself.
 

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