Arrogance: Hurley pulled a Tubby this year

[yoshukai]

Only if his wife likes San Antonio.

I know most people think of Tubby Smith as a humble person but when it comes to his basketball system he was anything but humble. After his '98 championship he seemed to get it in his mind that he was such a great coach that he didn't need elite talent to win, leading to guys like Bobby Perry, Sheray Thomas, Michael Porter, and Saul Smith in the starting lineup.

This year Hurley, who is a better coach than Tubby from an Xs and Os standpoint, did the same thing. He could have brought in more talent but he just didn't think he needed it; look for them to be a force next year if he brings in some more talent and doesn't take the NBA boatload of $ waiting on him(which he will do in the next couple years...I think he's waiting on Popovich to step down from coaching to take over a dynasty).

People close to the situation say an NBA job in the northeast is his dream job . I’m wondering if some of his antics this year might have a negative effect on how he’s viewed by the nba .

 

[yoshukai]

Tubby’s biggest misstep here was losing his assistant coaches and replacing them with garbage. His first staff here had 3 guys go on to be head coaches and relied on those guys to get his type of players his first few years.

It wasn’t arrogance at all. He hated the dirtiest of the AAU and his assistant coaches gave him some really bad advice on the guys he didn’t bring in.

I had some great seats back in that time and I swear…..a lot of time it seemed like Hobbs was the one coaching the team . Seemed like Tubby deferred to him WAY too much.

 

[Creed Bratton]

Hurley is not going to win it every year. I think he is counting on many of this years team coming back for a run next year. If he loses a bunch of guys to the portal or draft, he might start looking for another NBA gig. He is just too arrogant to continue losing.

Well to be fair until 2023 & 2024 he had done quite a bit of it. He has the same or worst career win percentage than Chris Jans from Miss St, Mark Byington from Vandy and Mike White from UGA.

 

[saxonburgcat]

Tubby Smith's 2005 UK team lost to Michigan State in the regional final in double overtime. That is one bounce of the ball from a Final Four, so it's not like Tubby never had a chance in hell of getting there.

There were two words that were common on this board during the Tubby years. Those two words were "parity" and "luck." Every year that we didn't make the FF, it was either because there was parity in college basketball and/or because of bad luck. It is interesting that you referred to luck indirectly when you said, "...once bounce of the ball from a Final Four."

As an observation, I have never heard those two excuses used much at all since the Tubby years. Having said that, I do think that NIL has changed the landscape. There does finally seem to be more parity in college bball than there was back when Tubby was here.