[NU Sports] Northwestern State

[Mark Ament]

Paul,
I share your frustration but not your cure.  I remain convinced that 
Carmody is the right man for the job and that he found a program that 
was in far worse shape when he arrived than he ever dreamed.  He has 
done a good job overhauling what was probably the worst major college 
program in the country to a point where it is now competitive on a 
regular basis, at least at home and, in the process, has built up a 
significant home court advantage at Welsh Ryan that never existed before 
he arrived.

The building process is far from over.  it will take several years of 
recruiting with classes that remain substantially intact and healthy for 
their entire four/five  careers before he will be able to build a 
consistent winner.  The breakthrough season that will take us the 
tournament is not too far away.  I don't know if it's next year or the 
year after.  I'm doubtful, frankly about next year given the loss of 
senior leadership.  However, the incoming class is good and should he 
follow that up with another good class, with maturing leadership from 
the young guys on the team this year, I see potential.

As to your colleague at work, ask him how he feels about his alma mater 
admitting athletes from high schools that are unaccredited and can be 
called high schools in only the most generous sense of the term.  It is 
unfortunate that GW's breakthrough season will be forever tainted by 
Hobbs' recruiting players from "academies" that the NY Times and the 
Washington Post have found don't really exist in any real sense and were 
formed solely to gain collegiate eligibility for the high school 
students and money for the sponsors.  Hobbs is not the only coach 
involved but GW has been mysteriously quiet since the stories were 
published.  See:   story here 
<http://thesportsbizblog.blogspot.com/2006/02/so-you-want-to-go-to-school-and-play.html>

Mark
Sports Biz <http:%5C%5Cthesportsbizblog.blogspot.com>

NEONRye at aol.com wrote:

>Is it just me, or does anyone else on the List get annoyed seeing that that  
>well-known academic and athletic institution of higher learning, Northwestern  
>State, located in Natchitoches, Louisiana, in the NCAA Brackets, while our  
>obscure alma mater, lingers in the netherworld of college hoops?  As much  as I 
>respect Bill Carmody and the way he seems to handle NU hoops, I think I  have 
>reluctantly reached the conclusion that we need a change--perhaps in the  
>nature of hiring a high-visibility former NBA player who wants to coach in  
>college.  I look at BC's success with Al Skinner (whom I remember as a  teammate of 
>"Dr. J." on the NETS) as perhaps a paradigm for the direction  NU may have to 
>go.  We need a dramatic move to break the cycle of  consistency (i.e., never 
>making the NCAA's) that is the sad hallmark of our  basketball program.  There 
>is just no longer any excuse for our abjet  inability to show up--for at 
>least one year--at the "Dance".  March Madness  to me is the frustration I feel at 
>seeing one of my colleagues at work reveling  in his George Washington team's 
>run this year.  Just once I want to see us  among the 64 teams that make it 
>and to take off from work and go to a  "regional".  And when I see Seton Hall 
>(whom I, along with President  Bienen, saw the 'Cats beat in their own house in 
>NJ) make it, and then go  out with a whimper, it just adds to my frustration.
> 
>Paul Levinson
>_______________________________________________
>nwu-sports site list
>nwu-sports at tssi.com
>http://romaine.tssi.com/mailman/listinfo/nwu-sports
>
>
>  
>