Bryan Remphrey

[DickerJames]

S&S has us projected #8 in C-USA.

Unless Tubbs signs a marquee player I suspect we will all see more of the same around here.

CUSA coaches picked us to finish behind the six conference members that played in the post season last year. Thats fair, and I think we have a realistic chance to move up and pass Rice and UCF.

As for your "more of the same" comment, Tubbs has made major strides for this program this year just by having us on the LIST of marquee players. It would have been great to sign all of them, but if you were choosing between a traditional basketball power and SMU which hasn't sniffed post season play in years and plays in front of 2,000 comotose fans in a building that needs major renovations, what would you do? Coach Tubbs has a damn hard job trying to turn this thing around, but I personally believe he is the right man for the job and everybody needs to quit moaning about the players he couldn't blindfold and lead to the SMU promise land this year.

[SoCal_Pony]

S&S has us projected #8 in C-USA.

Unless Tubbs signs a marquee player I suspect we will all see more of the same around here.

CUSA coaches picked us to finish behind the six conference members that played in the post season last year. Thats fair, and I think we have a realistic chance to move up and pass Rice and UCF.

As for your "more of the same" comment, Tubbs has made major strides for this program this year just by having us on the LIST of marquee players. It would have been great to sign all of them, but if you were choosing between a traditional basketball power and SMU which hasn't sniffed post season play in years and plays in front of 2,000 comotose fans in a building that needs major renovations, what would you do? Coach Tubbs has a damn hard job trying to turn this thing around, but I personally believe he is the right man for the job and everybody needs to quit moaning about the players he couldn't blindfold and lead to the SMU promise land this year.

Nice job of quoting me and conveniently excluding the most important part.

They ranked us #8 in the conference AND they ranked OUR RECRUITING CLASS #8 IN THE CONFERENCE.

So either you can disagree with that ranking or believe Tubbs coaching ability will elevate us to the next level or agree with my obvious statement.

I doubt we compete for the conference title this year. Next year we lose BHop, one of the best players we’ve had here in years, so tell me again how we should expect more without Tubbs signing better players????

[DickerJames]

Nice job of quoting me and conveniently excluding the most important part.


I doubt we compete for the conference title this year. Next year we lose BHop, one of the best players we’ve had here in years, so tell me again how we should expect more without Tubbs signing better players????

I wasn't excluding anything, you said where S&S picked us to finish and I responded with where CUSA coaches voted us to finish. I didn't address recruiting rankings. My post was really about us being picked behind the 6 teams that played in the post season last year out of 12 teams, and I think with our history that is fair. I certainly didn't say we would compete for the conference title this year, but I do think we can move up a couple of spots if some of the new players pan out. Everybody knows we have to land some real studs to take this thing to the next level, but it is foolish to slam Tubbs on recruiting after 1 year. I don't know how many games you got to watch last year if you live in California, but I expect more this year from what I saw last year.

[abezontar]

How can anyone claim that Bhop is one of the greatest basketball players to ever come through SMU? He may have been the highest ranking recruit that we have ever gotten, but I would argue that there have been quite a few players that have done more to actually improve the team and carry it to better records. Maybe that will change this year, but I seriously doubt it.

[jtstang]

Unless Tubbs signs a marquee player I suspect we will all see more of the same around here.

Don't know if his name is "marquee" worthy or not, but as some of you folks like to put a lot of stock in those recruit rankings, I believe Dez Willingham was recruited by Tubbs and was pretty highly regarded. So there's one you seem to be dismissing out of hand for some reason.

[SMU Football Blog]

Unless Tubbs signs a marquee player I suspect we will all see more of the same around here.

Don't know if his name is "marquee" worthy or not, but as some of you folks like to put a lot of stock in those recruit rankings, I believe Dez Willingham was recruited by Tubbs and was pretty highly regarded. So there's one you seem to be dismissing out of hand for some reason.

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy. Sunshine...

[SoCal_Pony]

JT..please don’t go sunshine of me.

Below is a post I did from last season:

Here are our 14 wins this year with our opponents RPI rankings in parenthesis:

Hawaii (140), LA Tech (155), Fresno State (166), Montana State (257), 2 wins against Boise State (259), 2 wins against Tulsa (261), Texas State (269), Baylor (273), 2 wins against SJS (293), Ark Pine Bluff (314) and UT Tyler non-division 1 (no ranking).

So now matter how much you want to Rah-Rah-Rah it…we ended up a .500 team by defeating some really pathetic BB teams, almost always at home.

S&S ranked our recruiting class #8. They mentioned Dez in their article so I can only assume he was included in their ranking.

I don’t believe this past recruiting class * 4 gets us to post-season play. That is how I gauge improvement. It has worked pretty well for me over the past 18 years.

Maybe LA Mustang, XtC or Friarwolf would like to give their opinion. Can this class * 4 win us a championship or get us to post-season play? Because if they can't...expect more of the same around here.

[SoCal_Pony]

How can anyone claim that Bhop is one of the greatest basketball players to ever come through SMU?

Who said that?

[The Q]

.... There are cases of walk on players making good college players. The cases are rare, though....

So in other words, ClassOf81 was right. All he said was that a back-up JV player COULD develop into a real player, in which case it doesn't matter where he came from. I didn't see anywhere in his post where he said "don't recruit all-Americas .... go get the backups."
And as for the current team .... I'm very cautious with my optimism this year. I saw Dez W play in high school, but not since. He's a very smart, deliberate PG. He'll never score like Hop, and therefore won't get the same headlines and accolades, I expect. But he will run the offense efficiently. I'm concerned about him on the defensive end, though, because he's not very big at all.
Like the rest of the PonyFans, I'm eager to see Hop back on the floor, but from what I've heard from folks who have seen practice (I haven't gotten over there yet), Derrick Roberts might well be our best player this year, even after Hop gets back. I know -- it's only practice so far, so we'll see once the games start. But he's healthy now, and rumor has it he's stepped it up several notches since last season.
But the lack of proven producers in the low post has me very nervous. I think this team could play well and still not reach the number of wins we'd like to see. Hope I'm wrong.

[jtstang]

JT..please don’t go sunshine of me.

Okay, let me be clear. I have admitted and do so again now that I am the biggest Tubbs apologist out there. I have more hope for men's hoops than I'll ever have for football, but that makes me far from a sunshiner. When we don't win I'm the first to point out the problems I see.

Pointing out that Tubbs landed Willingham was just in response to your "marquee player" statement, and nothing else. I even admitted that he may not be a "marquee player" just a highly regarded recruit. Maybe you should define what you mean by "marquee player" since he obviously doesn't fall into that category for you, and I'll be able to respond more appropriately for you next time.

[abezontar]

sorry, you said he was one of the greatest to come through here in years, not ever....what kind of limitation are you putting on time? I would say, Q, and Sasser are definitely better, as were Jay Poerner, and maybe Damon Hancock. All BHop has been so far is a big name with a lot of hype, he hasn't converted the hype to performance in my opinion.

[SoCal_Pony]

sorry, you said he was one of the greatest to come through here in years, not ever....

Abezontar, I said BHop is one of the best players...not greatest...those are your words...Over the past ~10 years, I place him behind Sasser and Q, better than Damon, near Poerner, probably better....but we are splitting hairs here...apparently you also believe he is one of the best.

And JT...Dez * 4 may very well make us competitive, but I don't think this class as a whole * 4 does.

[jtstang]

And JT...Dez * 4 may very well make us competitive, but I don't think this class as a whole * 4 does.

Well, I gather that now, but you were originally asking for a marquee player, singular, or so I thought. BTW, what's with the "* 4" business?

[Buckethead]

I would take Butch Moore or Kato Armstrong over BHop any day.

[jtstang]

Damn straight, Butch Moore knew how to run an offense. Kato had the same problems making grades as Hopkins, though...