The year Pitino was at FIU and his first year, his teams were about top 10 in the country in steals, but maybe they just went away from that identity of trying to force lots of turnovers. It kinda felt like there was a lot of underachieving relative to talent level. I'd bet you could find a Lunardi bracketology projection that has the Gophers in the tournament at some point in every single season that Pitino was here, with the lone exception of his third year, 2015-16, but they only made the tournament twice in 8 seasons (but were very close in 2013-14 after Pitino got some big contributors in the spring transfer market, which we'd never seen Tubby do, and which Pitino would do a few more times over his career at Minnesota). Pitino's Gophers were always capable of a big win or two against some highly ranked opponents, as much as you'll likely see people in this thread acting like it was 8 straight years of no hope and pure misery.
We had a lot more star power than we had in the Tubby years. It felt like Trevor Mbakwe and maybe Andre Hollins were the only players who could bring it every night and maybe put the team on their back if they needed to for Tubby. Nate Mason became our first All Big Ten first team selection in several years, maybe since Vince Grier? Jordan Murphy became one of the top rebounders in Big Ten history, Amir Coffey was probably the first real big fish recruit that the Gophers had gotten since Royce White, Daniel Oturu became our first NBA draft pick since maybe Kris Humphries, Reggie Lynch, Daniel Oturu, and Liam Robbins made a run of actually really strong post play for the Gophers for a few years, and Marcus Carr is the most clutch, offensively gifted player that has come through this program in maybe the whole ~15 years I've been watching.
Pitino offered a number of top 50 prospects in the 2014 class and didn't get them, maybe thinking that he could get the same sort of guys at Minnesota that he got at Louisville and Florida. Couple of 3 stars we went after turned out pretty good though. Wade Baldwin and Riley LaChance both went to Vanderbilt. Baldwin was a 1st round draft pick after his sophomore year, and LaChance was a double digit scorer and a 40% 3 point shooter. But was a 5 man class that ended up not giving us a whole lot beyond Nate Mason. Bakary Konate I think was okay as a reserve big, but not suited to play 30 minutes as the main guy. And actually I think Zach Lofton was a 6th player in that class, who never ended up playing for us.
The 2014-15 team had some talent and promise, and we were hoping to make the tournament, then opened conference play at like 0-5, losing a bunch of 1 and 2 possession games, and never recovered. 2015 recruiting class was good, but Kevin Dorsey, the highest rated player of the bunch, got suspended for the end of his freshman season and then transferred, and Jarvis Johnson was medically ineligible. Jordan Murphy (recruited by Ben Johnson) ended up being a star, and made the decision to pass on local top 150 recruit Alex Illikainen look like a smart one.
2015-16 season was bad, the only season where we basically never had hope that it would be decent. We were in a hole from lackluster recruiting from Tubby in the 2012 and 2013 classes, and Pitino striking out on top targets in 2014. Still got a memorable win against a top 10 Maryland team, at which point Joey King finally got to stop being the scapegoat for every loss, as every tall white guy at Minnesota ends up being, while we waited for Amir Coffey, Eric Curry, and Reggie Lynch to rescue us the following year.
2016-17 was Pitino's best year. I'm not sure we actually got ranked all season, and I think there was still an expectation that the transfer players were counting on, Reggie Lynch and Akeem Springs, wouldn't end up being game-changers, but they were, along with Coffey. Started Big Ten play 3-6, then won 8 straight before losing to a hot shooting Wisconsin team in the final regular season Big Ten game. Beat Michigan State in the Big Ten tournament before losing to Beilein's team of destiny, the Michigan Wolverines, who would go on to win the Big Ten tournament after some sort of scare with their team airplane beforehand. Nate Mason was first team All Big Ten over Derrick Walton, to the screeching and harping of many Michigan fans.
The 2017 recruiting class involved taking an out of state 4 star recruit over an in state 3 star recruit, and the 3 star recruit ended up being better, and you will never hear the end of it. That class also had 5 or 6 players from Minnesota who ended up playing high major, and the Gophers did not get any of them with the 2 scholarships they had available. This started the whole fervor of how loading up on in state recruits is the path to greatness at Minnesota, and only a total dunce would be unable to see that and make it happen. Wisconsin got a couple more white dudes from Minnesota in that class, one of whom kinda shat on the Gophers in an interview on his way out, the other of whom has now punched 2 or 3 opposing players in the nuts and is one of the biggest villains in college basketball on a national level, and has seen his field goal percentage go down every year he's been there until this year. Not recruiting Brad Davison is one of the most based things Pitino has ever done.
2017-18 Eric Curry was lost for the season in a preseason practice, but the Gophers entered the season with a top 25 ranking for the only time that I can remember. Beat Pitino's alma mater Providence on the road and played a hyped top 15 matchup with Miami in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge, which they lost. Dupree McBrayer got hurt that game, but I think continued to play hobbled for awhile anyway, despite the injury causing him to miss practice. Amir Coffey got hurt early in Big Ten play, and Reggie Lynch was dismissed for the sexual abuse scandal. Season was downhill from there with 3 starters and a 6th man out. They nearly managed to beat Wisconsin in Madison, but with the game tied and Nate Mason driving for a game winning basket, freshman Brad Davison tripped him, no call, game went to overtime and Wisconsin took over and won. Some people saw this season as proof that Pitino would never get it done here and needed to go.
The 2018 recruiting class again contained several high major level players from Minnesota. 5 star Tre Jones followed followed in Tyus's footsteps to Duke, Race Thompson reclassified to 2017 and went to Indiana, and Pitino (and Ben Johnson) got commits from Daniel Oturu, Gabe Kalscheur, and Jarvis Omersa. We also waited on pins and needles to see if stud transfer Marcus Carr would be granted immediate eligibility, a decision that the NCAA would not make until after the season had already started.
The 2018-19 season featured a few close losses on the road in conference, but did include a win over Wisconsin in Madison after the football team had done the same several weeks prior, as well as beating a top 15 Purdue team twice in the final 2 weeks of the season on their way to the Big Ten tournament semifinal. They made the tournament and kind of cruised to victory over 7 seed Louisville in the very first game of the 2019 NCAA tournament, where we actually shot pretty well from deep, including 2 Jordan Murphy 3's. Amir Coffey and Jordan Murphy were both All Big Ten selections.
Amir Coffey would wait until the last minute before declaring for the NBA in the 2019 offseason, while we held a scholarship open for him in case he chose to return. He probably would have been preseason All Big Ten if he had. The 2019 class again included multiple high major players in Minnesota. Zeke Nnaji was a top 30 recruit who went to a quasi blue blood program with a dirty coach where they get top 10 recruiting classes every year. Matthew Hurt went to Duke, despite recent comments that he like totally wanted to come to Minnesota and stuff but just couldn't because reasons. Tyrell Terry went to Stanford where he got to play 30 minutes a game and was a 1 and done, instead of coming to Minnesota to play behind Marcus Carr. Tyler Wahl went to Wisconsin where he is currently averaging under 5 points a game for his career, but someone will act like he was a major recruiting miss for some reason, the sort of player that we couldn't possibly get from anywhere else in the country. David Roddy went to Colorado State where he is vastly outplaying his recruiting ranking and is a star in the Mountain West.
The 2019-20 team wasn't bad as far as efficiency metrics, finishing 27th nationally in Kenpom, despite their 15-16 record. They blew leads late and lost a very high percentage of 1 and 2 possession games. Reactionary fans dismissed Marcus Carr as a waste of a scholarship after a rough first game or two. Daniel Oturu was incredible though and was second team All Big Ten, and probably should have been first team. The Gophers beat Northwestern in the Big Ten tournament and had an exciting game against Iowa ahead of them, a team they nearly beat at home before giving up like an 8 point lead in the last 2 minutes, before the rest of the season was canceled due to COVID. Minnesota finished 12th in conference with an 8-12 conference record, but 8 teams finished between 8 and 11 conference wins, putting the Gophers closer to 5th than they were to 13th place Northwestern, who went 3-17.
The 2020 recruiting class yet again featured several high major players from the Minnesota high school scene, including 5 star Jalen Suggs, who also recently lied about wanting to come to Minnesota to play both football and basketball, if only Pitino had recruited him harder. Top 40 Dawson Garcia committed to guy-who-recruits-well-but-underachieves-on-the-court Steve Wojciechowski at Marquette, who was fired this offseason. Dain Dainja, who may not have qualified academically at Minnesota, committed to eventual 2021 national champion Baylor. Ben Carlson turned down Ben Johnson at Xavier to commit to Wisconsin, where he is currently playing about 11 minutes and averaging under 3 points per game. Kerwin Walton's recruitment went down to the wire, with him saying he would announce his decision between Minnesota and North Carolina, and then waiting like 2 more days after his scheduled announcement to actually state his commitment to UNC. Steven Crowl was ranked outside the top 200 and didn't really play last year, but appears to be contributing now, averaging over 20 minutes and 8 points.
Things that could have made a difference:
Former top 50 recruit Rakeem Buckles wins his NCAA transfer roulette wheel spin and gets into Minnesota for 2013-14.
Wisconsin doesn't injure Andre Hollins on the first play of the game, causing him to miss the next 3 games, which we would lose by a total of 8 points, in a season where one more win or two could have gotten us to the tournament.
Gophers hit on a couple of 3-4 star recruits who went on to be all conference players or go to the NBA: Wade Baldwin, Tyrese Haliburton, Marcus Zegarowski, Shamorie Ponds. Hell Johnny Davis, who is scoring 20 a game for Wisconsin right now, was a 3 star with an offer from the Gophers.
I think I'll leave it at that for now. I've spent over an hour on this post and I wanna go to bed lol
