Ranking Big Ten men’s basketball coaches (#18. Ben Johnson, Minnesota)

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Surprised izzo still in the two spot
 

golfing18now said:
It's probably about right, but it speaks as much to the depth and accomplishment of the coaches in the B1G as it does about Ben Johnson.
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Yeah, outside of Diebler, everyone else has at least accomplished something. Johnson just hasn't yet. Although if we would have been good last year, I could have seen him ahead Rhodes, Woodson and Diebler.
 

BleedGopher said:

Go Gophers!!
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This is comically bad. And there is not a single comment on the post that thinks this is a good list. Even non-Minnesota fans think having Johnson 18th is bad. If this list is all-time quality, Izzo should be #1 but if this list is current state, Cronin should be nowhere near 4, Muss shouldn't be 3 at USC, Hoiberg and Collins should be ahead of May, Fran, and Gard. I don't know if there is a single coach on that list that I think is in the right position
 




Piekell and Collins should be in the top 10. Like Painter, do more with less. Woodson should be 2nd to last, Indy got to the tourney despite his coaching in 22 and 23. Izzo is overated. Underwood is not top 5. Diebler who has potential to be good, should be last, for now, he's a rookie. Ben at #16, I'm OK with until proven otherwise.
 


Gilthorp57 said:
Piekell and Collins should be in the top 10. Like Painter, do more with less. Woodson should be 2nd to last, Indy got to the tourney despite his coaching in 22 and 23. Izzo is overated. Underwood is not top 5. Diebler who has potential to be good, should be last, for now, he's a rookie. Ben at #16, I'm OK with until proven otherwise.
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Dude, Ben is last. Even Diebler has a win over a ranked teams and he's only coached like 10 games.
 



leib0039 said:
Obviously they didn't listen to Izzo, he would've put CBJ #1!

He is absolutely 18th as of today. No history, bad record and no real recruiting prowess. Diebler is at least pulling in huge names in the portal.
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⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️👀👀👀👀
 


bga1 said:
Ben is at or near last-so far. I think I'd rather have Ben than Woodson.
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Well, yeah if he has a good year and makes the tournament it will change. But he hasn't really come close to that. I don't think Woodson has been good at IU, but at least he's done something. His worst team beat Ben's best team handily in both games last year.
 

bga1 said:
Ben is at or near last-so far. I think I'd rather have Ben than Woodson.
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Why? Woodson actually recruited players back out of the portal in year 1 and made the NCAA tournament in his first two seasons. Last season was a rebuilding year and he was still 10-10 in the conference.

Not only is he an upgrade over Ben, he's an upgrade over Archie Miller who never made the NCAA tournament in 4 years prior to Woodson. I'm a little surprised at how much hate he gets.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Why? Woodson actually recruited players back out of the portal in year 1 and made the NCAA tournament in his first two seasons. Last season was a rebuilding year and he was still 10-10 in the conference.

Not only is he an upgrade over Ben, he's an upgrade over Archie Miller who never made the NCAA tournament in 4 years prior to Woodson. I'm a little surprised at how much hate he gets.
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I think relative to the talent he's had he's underachieved. The 2023 team with TJD and JHS should have been better than what they were(finished 30 at KenPom). They've actually finished lower than their starting KenPom rating in all 3 of his years. He was able to upgrade their talent from what they were getting with Archie, so credit to him for that. And he has made the tournament, even if he has underachieved, at least IMO.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
Why? Woodson actually recruited players back out of the portal in year 1 and made the NCAA tournament in his first two seasons. Last season was a rebuilding year and he was still 10-10 in the conference.

Not only is he an upgrade over Ben, he's an upgrade over Archie Miller who never made the NCAA tournament in 4 years prior to Woodson. I'm a little surprised at how much hate he gets.
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Indiana is still viewed as a near blue blood school. If we had the kind of support and history IU has, I guarantee you that Ben would do better than Woodson has. Add to that there is tons of talent within 150 miles of IU and I am betting that NIL is at a more advanced level there as well.
 

bga1 said:
Indiana is still viewed as a near blue blood school. If we had the kind of support and history IU has, I guarantee you that Ben would do better than Woodson has. Add to that there is tons of talent within 150 miles of IU and I am betting that NIL is at a more advanced level there as well.
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My impression about NIL/portal as it pertains to the Big Ten is Illinois & Indiana appear to have access to a lot of moolah. Seems like they're the schools who've beeen most active and in on high-level talent. Ohio State, probably, too.
 

bga1 said:
Indiana is still viewed as a near blue blood school. If we had the kind of support and history IU has, I guarantee you that Ben would do better than Woodson has. Add to that there is tons of talent within 150 miles of IU and I am betting that NIL is at a more advanced level there as well.
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I guarantee Ben wouldn't. Just having talent doesn't mean anything when it comes to success. You have to be able to lead and coach them, and Woodson has a lot more success doing that over his career than Ben does.

IU is similar to Nebraska. All the resources in the world yet it's been a revolving door of coaches since Osborne/Knight. Thinking BJ would be able to do a better job then some of the past coaches at IU is really funny.
 

SelectionSunday said:
My impression about NIL/portal as it pertains to the Big Ten is Illinois & Indiana appear to have access to a lot of moolah. Seems like they're the schools who've beeen most active and in on high-level talent. Ohio State, probably, too.
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I am wondering if Rutgers has some sugar daddies as well since they rolled in a rather unlikely recruiting class....
 

Ben is about the only guy in the right spot for me. I don't like Wisconsin but if your coach finishes
5,11,one,6,one,4,9 and two in the conference standings in his 8 years...that is not 9th.
He wins the Big Ten 25% of the time. Add it up, divide it out and at worst he's 5th even if you give him no weight for the championships.

Izzo has been to 26 consecutive NCAA Tournaments and has a higher Big Ten winning percentage than Painter. Izzo has won parts of nine Big Ten titles.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
I guarantee Ben wouldn't. Just having talent doesn't mean anything when it comes to success. You have to be able to lead and coach them, and Woodson has a lot more success doing that over his career than Ben does.

IU is similar to Nebraska. All the resources in the world yet it's been a revolving door of coaches since Osborne/Knight. Thinking BJ would be able to do a better job then some of the past coaches at IU is really funny.
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Not so funny. I actually think that if Ben could accumulate and keep high end talent he would compete well. Do you think he had 9 win talent in the Big Ten this year? I know that you didn't when the season started. I think he did and he won at about that level. There are a lot of things I think he has to learn to be a better coach, but right now I think his single biggest deficit is that few believe he will ever win here- thus a self fulfilling prophesy.

The transfers he has brought here moved up a level in class and he had them performing just as well at Big Ten level as they did at the lower level. Look at the ratings of Indiana's players out of HS versus ours. Without looking them up, I feel pretty confident that theirs were the higher rated players.
Christie was barely top 100 and now is getting NBA looks. Payne maybe just over 100 and about to cash checks. Howard zero stars. Mitchell on the border of top 100. Only Garcia was top 50.

My view has always been that Ben was a bad hire because he wasn't prepared for the job in terms of history or experience and that this is a job with a high degree of difficulty to get over the hump. I still feel that way, but also I believe if he could catch a break with the right group of players- he could break through. As it stands - by the record he is one of the worst in the Big Ten.
 
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