[NU Sports] Dump Carmody - Name Hardy Interim

[Jonathan Hodges]

For Carmody, the main reason is a COMPLETELY different level of
competition.  At Princeton, he was in the Ivy League which remains in Div. I
basketball despite not giving athletic scholarships.  The level of
competition there pales in comparison to even mid-major conferences, let
alone the Big Ten.  While the "system" (i.e. the Princeton offense) was very
effective against relatively equal levels of poor talent, they obviously
haven't worked well against teams with substantially greater talent.  And
although there have been a few bright spots in terms of talent at NU under
him (Shurna is one), overall NU is still far behind others in the
conference.

Also, while he made the NCAA tournament 2 seasons at Princeton, he only won
one tourney game: in 1998 as a #5 seed.  They were knocked out in the second
round by MSU.  Overall he honestly didn't have that much success except
against lower tier competition (Ivy League).

While it seemed like a solid hire at the time (2000), it's pretty clear that
he hasn't been able to transplant his system into a top tier conference.
Not that he hasn't done anything, though, as he's kept NU out of the
basement most seasons and has had NU in contention for the NIT during almost
half of his tenure, which is quite a bit better than most periods in NU
basketball history.  (To compare to football, it would be like NU hiring an
FCS coach who runs a "gimmick" offense and instead of leading them to a
conference title like Barnett & Walker, he would go to 2 low tier bowls
(think Detroit) during a 10 year span - fortunately Barnett, Walker, and
Fitz have been substantially more successful than that).  It's just time to
take it to the next level.

Jonathan

On Fri, Jan 7, 2011 at 2:36 PM, <AJWDBW at aol.com> wrote:

>  Over the years the question has coagulated in my mind: How can a coach
> perform so well at one institution and fail so spectacularly at another?
> Perhaps someone among our group can offer a theory.
> Don Williams
> C55
>
>