Then you should know all of Iowa St's current roster was brought in either last year or this year under TJ. Last year, Conditt was the only starter that had played for Iowa St before and he averaged 5 ppg. Hunter had also signed early, and he could have asked for his release with the coaching change, but TJ recruited him to stay for a year. The other 3 he inherited were bench players who averaged 2-3 ppg and are gone now.
What Otz inherited is not different than Ben, and he went to the sweet 16 in year 1. Now in year 2, 100% of the roster TJ inherited has been turned over and they are 5-0 and just beat the #1 team in the country. And that's after losing their top 2 scorers from last season.
Otz has proven he can coach defense, offense, and how to recruit to win now with a brand new roster. There's no excuses about who was lost or time to gel etc. He has run circles around Ben who has yet to proven he knows how to build a competitive roster or coach offense/defense.
We get it, GWG. You have never liked the hire. You can continue to compare and complain but Otzelberger is NOT the coach of the Minnesota Golden Gophers. AD Mark Coyle hired Ben Johnson instead.
Otzelberger had 5 years of head coaching experience before arriving in Ames. Otzelberger had been an assistant for 17 years including at Iowa State for almost a decade before leaving to pursue head coaching opportunities. Otzelberger will likely not be at Iowa State in the next few years. He will either leave for greener pastures for career progression or will be forced to do so as the Big 12 becomes less of a major conference and loses major big boy conference revenue.
Ben Johnson was a first time head coach upon his hire. He had been an assistant for 15 years including 5 years at MN. Johnson is from the state of MN, played for the Gophers, and was hired to help rebuild relationships to the Twin Cities basketball community.
While Otzelberger gained experience as a head coach at other stops, Johnson is getting his head coaching experience on the fly here. Many fans are willing to wait a couple of years to let Johnson grow into the role instead of aimlessly and endlessly comparing the two coaches who are in different places in their career let alone vastly different situations.
If we're going to be selectively comparing coaches, maybe it would be more fair to compare to Coach K who, despite having been a head coach at Army for several years, struggled as head coach at Duke for several more years before getting into the tournament?
To his credit, Johnson has made absolutely no excuses. Fans, admittedly, have been forced to try to explain the facts to other 'fans' who insist on living in the past, being right, or making a point rather than supporting a new coach and a team that has some nice young talent on the roster and some more nationally-ranked talent coming in the next year.