How does MBB become a truly elite program?
Over the weekend, I was having a conversation with a couple of Michigan fans regarding the "elite" status of our program. All agreed that we are not really an elite program. While we have shown flashes of it lately, we really needed to maintain some level of consistency and sustainability to really be considered elite. Also, we all agreed that we are likely in that second tier below the traditional elite programs (Duke, Kentucky, Kansas, etc).
Where opinions started to differ, was whether we can truly EVER be an elite program given the state of college basketball. One guy was very much like many on this board: we can't be a Duke or Kansas etc. and that just the way it is and there is nothing we can do about it. A couple of us, including myself, we're less satisfied and more bullish about where this program can go. To get to that next level of college programs will largely be dictated by winning more big games on a big stage. And in doing so, we think the following things need to happen (in no particular order):
1. Recruit slightly better talent-wise (i.e. more stars) than what we currently do and more consistantly. There seems to be a high correlation between talent and winning (duh!). Finding diamonds in the rough are great, but seems as though you can't build a sustainable elite program on them.
2. Spearhead a change in NCAA regulations around recruiting. Third hand accounts suggest recruiting is a dirty business, and one in which we will not partake. This obviously hurts our ability to recruit top talent and address the issue in point #1 above. For example, if we can somehow lead an effort to push the NCAA to adopt a hockey type model for recruits (in essence mitigating the one-and-done effect) and implementing tighter regulation around some of the recutiing filth (i.e. bagmen, etc), we can be more competitive regarding recruiting.
3. Coaching profile. I like JB. I think he is one of the best minds in the game. I wish we got him when he was younger. Our opinion: the best model in college basketball is to find a young, talented, hungry coach that will stay ~20+ years in the program, implementing best practices and innovative basketball methodologies (i.e. Coach K, Izzo, Boehiem, etc.). This would give the program an "identity" that resonates well with top recruits across a couple generations. There are obvious excpetions here.
So what are your thoughts? How can Michigan become a truly elite college basketball program? Or perhaps you think we already are an elite program. Would be curious to hear those thoughts too.
and Schilling are more athletic than McGary?
March 30th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^
Tyus Jones, Justise Winslow and Jahlil Okafor?? Grayson Allen sees a lot of time and he's a freshmen too. Matt Jones is a sophomore.
Duke is not experienced either.
Duke Kansas Kentucky are basically running one extreme model of college basketball - turn over the entire team (almost) every 2 years. Except for some underachieving McDonald All Americans who stick around for longer.
The other extreme for success is to get lucky with a superstar who was not one out of HS but develops in college and surround him with a lot of veteran talent - that is what Butler and Wisconsin in the last 7-8 years has done.
In the middle are programs like Zona Louisville Florida and MSU who get "damn good recruits" but not just a parade of 1 and dones and have some experience (veterans) to go along with some high end recruiting. For all this woe is me about MSU recruiting their team from last year had 3 McDonald's All Americans + Adrian Payne who was a 5 star center. That is 4 elite guys. And they all were upperclassmen save for Harris - very unique in college basketball.
This year's MSU is actually atypical for what Izzo normally rolls out - Trice is not a NBA player but basically is playing out of his mind and is surrounded by a veteran cast. So it's a veteran cast surrounding 1 guy having a tremendous run like Kimba Walker or Shabaz last year with UConn. And 3 of the 4 teams MSU has played thus far in this tourney don't feature a single NBA prospect IMO. Some luck there in matchups but they still have to win those games.
Michigan is in its own weird category - the development has been so fast our turnover has been just behind Duke, Kansas Kenucky (we actually lost the most players to the NA the past 2 years - more than UK) but we dont recruit like them. Or even Arizona and Louisville types. Or hell OSU. We are sort of our own category - on paper we are doing the Wisconsin/Butler model - guys like Burke, Nik, THJ are not guys on paper you expect to leave early, they are supposed to be your star seniors leading to you a deep NCAA run. But our departures have messed with that - even if McGary had left (the 1 truly high end prospect) or Mitch and GR3 together this team was supposed to have Nik and Burke on it ... as a junior and a senior. On paper. Nik was rated exactly the same as a Denzel Valentine out of HS, Burke was below both those guys.
Michigan had them in 2012 and 2013, which led directly to the sweet 16 runs. I don't think it's accurate to describe us following the Wisconsin/Butler model. Sure, Trey and Caris are true anomolies, but if you recruit 4-star players regularly some of them are going to turn pro after 2 or 3 years. That's just college basketball, and no one is immune from it.
Michigan may not be in the Duke, Kentucky, UNC, Kansas sphere, but it absolutely can be at or above the Arizona, Florida, OSU tier. We've been there recently and we were there in the late 80s and 90s. There's nothing to prevent Michigan from being a top 10 prestige program in basketball that consistently gets top 10 talent.
Just not true on the 4 star players leaving en masse after 2-3 years. There are about 25 five stars in any 1 year and 90 or so 4 stars! The math simply doesnt work to allow most 4 stars to leave - in any 4 year cycle there are 350+ 4 stars.
http://247sports.com/Season/2016-Basketball/RecruitRankings?Institution…
The NBA draft (1st round) is 32 slots. Of which freshman and Europeans take up 8-12 slots every year. So you are left with 20ish slots for EVERYONE else. Of which actual seniors will probably take 4-5. So you have 15 slots for guys who leave after their sophomore or junior years. That leaves a ton of 4 stars who stay. 90-15 in any year = 75 out of 90 remain in college. That's for 1 year and its really sophomores and juniors combined angling for those spots so more like 15 out of 180 sophomores/juniors who were 4 stars out of HS go into any 1 draft.
It is certainly not "an expectation."
Denzel Valentine is a 4 star who will play 4 years for MSU - Nik was a 4 star who left after 2. They were ranked identical (1-2 slots difference). There are 20 guys just above and below Nik and Valentine, and without looking I bet 35+ are still in the NCAA of those 40 guys.
I said "some", not all. Which has been the Michigan experience as well. Brundidge, Donnal, Smotrycz, and probably Walton did/will not leave early for the NBA. Robinson, Stauskas, Hardaway, Morris did. Irvin might. as Michigan "outperformed" the norm here? Probably it has, but it's not some great tragedy the program has to overcome.
If your program succeeds, you have to expect attrition to the NBA. It is not only expected but desired. In the same way that a healthy economically growing city will probably have some traffic jams and rising rents and so on.
As for your analysis -- people can and do leave who are not selected in the 1st round every year. Last year there were 45 early entrants from college - 11 of those were freshman, leaving 34 sophomores or juniors. This is far more than the 32 total spots you are granting for round 1 and more than double the 15 you estimate as reasonable.
March 30th, 2015 at 10:07 PM ^
all of those defections turned out to be tragic. had just one of those guys stayed or if we had one less injury this year, we could have easily been 12-6 or 13-5 in the BIG and looking at a likely sweet 16. instead, here we are with an OP questioning Beilein's success.
March 30th, 2015 at 11:07 PM ^
Beilein has made several young men very rich and made the final 8 in consecutive seasons. The situation seems like the opposite of a tragedy to me.
His point was some leave - Michigan has just been snake-bitten recently with a number of them doing so en masse. I mean, Michigan had 3 4* kids leave last year; that rarely happens ever outside of your UK/Duke sphere, and even there it's probably not that common.
Yes, nationally it is rare. But the success Beilein had in 2012 and 2013 were also anomalies.
March 30th, 2015 at 11:20 PM ^
If you invest in a stock and reap an enormous windfall when it skyrockets are you "snake-bitten" by having to pay capital gains? Most would say not.
Michigan has had a bunch of NBA-caliber players come through and was wildly successful with them. I don't see the bad luck in this.
I also don't see it as an anomoly. Beilein is a great coach and he he had great talent. While it's true that we didn't KNOW the level of talent he had, the results are predictable if you look back in hindsight (JB + 5-7 NBA players = Final Four).
The only anomoly is that Michigan has found more than it's fair share of 5-star performers out of 3-star caliber recruits in landing Burke and LeVert. But even that is something Beilein has proven he can do with some consistency.
The problem this year came, not because of NBA departures, but a failure to replace them (necessary for sustained success in college basketball, even if you are Duke, UNC, Kansas or Kentucky.) When Michigan couldn't replace the NBA-caliber players and instead went back closer to the Douglass/Novak caliber recruits and away from the McGary/Robinson/Stauskas caliber - they struggled.
Furthermore, I would add that Michigan was pretty damn lucky in getting McGary back after the 12-13 season. That was a huge mistake on his part from a financial perspective and it could be argued that he made the only legitimate mistake out of all the recent early entry decisions in our program.
I mean, sure, it would have been nice for US to have them back, but expecting NBA lottery picks to come back, and even guys like Robinson and Hardaway who are elite athletes who have little to gain from returning for a 3rd or 4th year of college is just unrealistic. There is nothing tragic or unlucky about having really really good basketball players come through our program.
In other words -- you get NBA-caliber performances, you should expect NBA-caliber departures.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:38 PM ^
I don't think Beilein is soft. You don't win 2 big ten titles, go to a final 4, and elite 8 without being tough. There's different ways of playing. Beilein isn't going to have his players mug you every possesion and hope the refs aren't calling a tight game. He feels it's better to have low foul totals so you're not having to deal with guys fouling out or sitting major minutes in the game.
Oh lawd, the "toughness" argument. This is the laziest argument in the world to make. MSU isn't "tougher" than other teams; they are a hell of a lot older, though.
And the athlete talk needs to die. Trice and Dawson aren't going to sniff the NBA in all likelihood; Trey Burke was in that class and is currently a starter for an NBA team. Denzel Valentine seems like a good college player but isn't some amazing athlete; 4 of the five guys recruited in that class by Michigan are currently/going to be in the NBA by next season in all likelihood depending on if Lavert declares. That's your athleticism argument.
UK recruits amazingly well but we all know that isn't going to end with banners hanging in the rafters years from now; Calipari leaves a wake of sanctions behind him everywhere he goes. Duke is Duke; Michigan probably won't ever be that good, but I'm not sure anyone but the cult of Coach K could do that. Wisconsin has one of the oldest teams in the country and a POY in Kaminski - it sucks that Michigan's past two B1G POYs had to up and go to the NBA instead of sticking around.
Michigan wasn't good this year (relative to past successes) because 2 of their 5 starters were lost by the beginning of the year and were rolling out a bunch of true freshmen. And since Beilein isn't going to recruit like UK, that means you might struggle. But looking at this roster you see guys with huge upsides, NBA-level guys with a bit more polish, and that's how you become elite. But looking at one year and trotting out cliches from an SI article from the 90s doesn't mean anything.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:30 PM ^
But what young coach will stay 20 years at a program in this day and age? I understand what that consistency brings, but that's just not realistic anymore unless a large part of that 20 years is as an assistant.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:37 PM ^
that is getting paid a metric fuckton of money. Which Michigan can afford to do.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:41 PM ^
Bill Self has been at Kansas 12 years. He's 52 and I doubt he leaves to take another job in college.
I'm guessing Sean Miller isn't going anywhere else in college unless it's UK or Duke.
Izzo's been at MSU 20 yrs.
Matta's been at OSU 11 years and he's only 47.
Few's been at Gonzaga for 15 yrs.
Donovan's been at Florida for almost 20 yrs.
Rick Barnes has been at Texas 17 yrs (although a lot of Texas fans wish that weren't true).
Yeah, coaches are going to climb the ladder but UM should be a spot pretty high on the ladder.
And Michigan certainly has the institutional strengths to join this list. The key thing will be who replaces Hackett. Hire another Brandon, and it's much harder to retain a great coach's services. Hire someone in the image of Hackett (at least what we've seen so far), and you're cookin' with gas!
March 30th, 2015 at 12:30 PM ^
March 30th, 2015 at 12:31 PM ^
The answer is players coming back. We don't want to go down the road of recruiting one-and-dones alone - that takes AAU dirt and back-alley cash deals. We simply get guys to develop and come back to lead the team before declaring for the draft. Just like what Wisconsin's done the past couple seasons.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:35 PM ^
I'm under the firm belief that this program was headed in that direction until the sanctions hit. Those sanctions set the program back a minimum of 20 years. And now we are starting over. What we are witnessing are the early stages. We have a great coach getting fine, young talent in resurrecting the program. The next step is going to be CRUCIAL. As others have mentioned, we are going to need someone younger in that's going to stick around for a while.I don't care if that someone is already a part of the program or not. The next coaching hire is going to determine where this program goes.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:42 PM ^
This was something my friends and I were talking about. We think JB has maybe 5 years at most left before he retires. And we think that JB will continue to drive the program upwards and onwards. The next guy we hire might be the biggest more crucial decision in our program to date.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:36 PM ^
No program is going to jump into that level with Kentucky and Duke unless the playing field is evened. Right now, the only way to even it is by using underhanded tactics, circumventing the rules, and hoping the NCAA turns a blind eye. Michigan is not going to do that.
The opportunity for us -- and others -- to make upward strides depends entirely on the way recruiting is conducted and regulated.
Everything you say seems likely to be spot-on w/r/t Kentucky, and esp. Calipari. But as much as Duke and Coach K. make me nauseous on many levels, I'm not sure that I'd label Duke a dirty program.
In fact, with the number of douches associated with that program, it seems to be squeaky clean.
The question of Duke's cleanliness is an interesting one. They could be the 90's/00's equivilant of the 60's/70's UCLA. A probably clean coach with some unclean people around the program. No one will ever come right out and talk bad about Wooden or Coach K because of who they are individually, but there was certainly smoke around the UCLA program after the fact and I have heard little tid-bits' here and there about Duke.
March 31st, 2015 at 11:20 AM ^
I'm not necessarily making any allegations about Duke or Kentucky. Whether those programs are clean or not, they're taking almost all of the elite recruits. Other programs aren't going to rise up and start competing with them for talent without finding some ways around the recruiting rules.
I've seen it posted on other sites but I really like this idea: make scholarships count against a school for four years. So for example if Calipari signs six players in a class, and they all go pro after one year, he's down six scholarships for the next three years. At the very least this would help spread the talent around to different teams so you don't have 95 percent of the All Americans playing for two or three programs.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:37 PM ^
It's tough to nail down the definition of "elite" in MBB. Obviously we consider the likes of Duke, Kentucky, and Michigan State to be elite. But would you consider a team like Wisconsin elite? Bo Ryan has led them to three Big Ten tournament and four regular season championships, yet has no finals appearances and this is his first final four.
It only makes sense to associate elite status with national championships. But by virtue of the insane difficulty of winning the NCAA Tournament (6 consecutive wins against increasingly better competition) we have to define "elite."
I would say regular appearances in the Sweet Sixteen, with deeper forays into the bracket mixed in would be enough to consider Michigan an elite program. It indicates a team that has likely had a successful regular season and earned two consecutive wins against tournament-caliber competition.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:43 PM ^
this is his second FF. Wisky made it last year too.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
He clearly says this is Bo Ryan's first FF.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
Like him or not, there's no denying Izzo's coaching prowess, especially in March. However, MSU is not elite. I define elite basketball programs as those schools that can routinely walk into someone else's backyard (regarless of geographic proximity) and take players of their choosing. Kentucky need not recruit KY or its neighboring states to annually field a championship level team. The same can be said of Duke and Kansas.
There is no way Izzo could do that. It's very rare that MSU will win recruiting battles against the elite schools. He typically gets 4-star talent from within or around Michigan and coaches 'em up. To his credit (similar to Dantonio, unfortunately) he knows his type of player and largely sticks to the same formula - and it works.
I don't see us reaching a Kentucky level anytime soon. Like others have said, I think it's possible but it will fall on the shoulders of the coach that comes after Beilein. However, we are knocking on the door of being at MSU's level. The only real difference is consistency. And I think we are well on our way to this as I consider this year an aberration.
If Levert comes back, we compete for the B1G title and are easily in the tourney. Couple that with getting Brown and we're in a position to do real damage come this time next year.
you are talking about elite recruiting coaches. You could argue that Crean and Matta are elite recruiters, but are they at elite schools?
And are you really stating that Matta and Crean recruit on the same level as Calipari and Coach K? The schools that I mentioned have a consistent floor product to go along with elite recruiting. To me, that defines an elite basketball program: a consistently great floor product and consistent excellence in recruiting.
The key word is consistent. Yes, there are programs that occassionally pull in great classes. Certainly Crean and Matta have done that on occasion. But, again, neither one of them is regularly doing so on a national level. Further, neither Crean nor Matta is consistently winning floor or recruiting battles against the programs I mentioned.
Crean and Matta are closer to Izzo in recruiting (though they aren't as consistent in level of teams they field): most of their talent is in-state/regional with the occasional national recruit. Remember, the jewel of Crean's best team at Indiana was Cody Zeller, an Indiana product.
Sorry, my friend. There's no comparing Indiana and OSU to Duke and Kentucky. Whether in recruiting or floor product.
March 31st, 2015 at 11:35 AM ^
This seems like a weird criteria for "elite" status to me.
Recruiting depends heavily on the coach. Cuonzo Martin is an elite recruiter. He's at Cal right now and he's already landed a four star guy from Indiana, he's the favorite to land a consensus five star, All-American, Top-10 player who has offers from Kentucky, Duke, Arizona, Kansas, UCLA, you name it, and he's in the finals list for a five star from Illinois, a four star from Louisiana, and another four star from Indiana. Cal is not an elite basketball program in any sense of the word, and that won't change if Martin lands all of those players - unless of course he starts winning.
Maybe recruiting makes sense to look at if you take it across coaches. Duke is an elite program and because of that I imagine they'll continue to recruit at extremely high levels for a few years after Coach K retires no matter who comes in as the replacement. But winning - not recruiting - is central to the idea of what it means to be "elite." Recruiting well is just something that tends to happen when a program reaches elite status, and even then there are a lot of variables that determine how the recruiting game goes.
March 30th, 2015 at 10:15 PM ^
is another gene keady. wins BIG titles but doesn't make a lot of deep ncaa tourny runs unless they have a POY player like kaminski (or big dog for keady).
March 30th, 2015 at 12:38 PM ^
@OP Define, in a measurable way, elite. It's hard to answer your question without knowing exactly what you mean by the term.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:37 PM ^
It takes a really long time to be a historically elite program like Kentucky, Kansas, UNC, etc. But Michigan has two Big Ten titles, a final appearance, another Elite Eight appearance, two Big Ten POYs, and four first round draft picks in the last four years. Only Kentucky and Louisville come to mind as having had a better run during that time, and that's despite Michigan's terrible luck this year.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:44 PM ^
March 30th, 2015 at 12:56 PM ^
I think you are right of course, but I don't think we can chalk up this season to JUST bad luck. The early season struggles were embarrasing for the program, no matter how you slice it.
When you recruit 5 kids, and none of them are top 50 players (and/or the one that is in the area is clearly going to be very very raw), you have to do better. I know Beilein is a magician who finds diamonds in the rough, but it's not a sustainable strategy for contending for national championships. You have to land some bluechips for the excellent supporting cast types to play around.
There's no question that staying the course has to include bringing in McGarys and GRIIIs every couple of years.
includes losing 3 guys to the draft and one to transfer in addition to the season ending injuries to the two best players.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:38 PM ^
Just curious who your tier 2s are? I will take the arrows but a team that has won 1-2 conf championships in 25 years is difficult to place in tier 2 to me. We had 10-12 years of awful to mediocre with Ellerbe and Amaker. If you only have a 3 year window I would call us a tier 1 but being realistic over the long run I'd like to see who your tier 2s are to see how we compare.
As to your questions, winning over a long period changes perception. What Beilein did in 2012-2014 is fine to be considered elite - he has conf championships and final 4s/elite 8s. You can even miss a tourney once every 6-7 years but you need Sweet 16s or better 4-5 years out of 10 to be elite. And to actually win your conference more than once in a generation. If Beilein did this for 20 years and won 1 NCAA championship he'd be considered elite per the MSU playbook.
I'd currently put (over 20 years) Kentucky, UConn, Louisville, Florida, NC, MSU, Kansas, Arizona into tier 1.
In tier 2 I'd put Indiana (barely), Syracuse, UCLA, OSU. That's a very small group.
The pickings get slim after that I suppose - but aside from that period 89 to 92 has UM been much different then Butler, Villanova, Gonzaga, Maryland? Illinois? That is sort of a tier 3 to me.
Georgetown, Villanova, Oklahoma, UNLV?
Yes I missed Duke - obviously tier 1. UNLV is a lost program - they are tier 3, just like Arkansas and I'd put Michigan in there too. They have all had periods of immense success but a lot of not so good years too. I do think if you go back 50 years UM has had more success than UNLV and Arkansas but I mean from the 80s forward each of these programs was elite for short periods and then down quite a bit.
Nova I think is tier 2 - they just suck in the tourney. If this was regular season success they'd be judged differently.
Oklahoma and Georgetown are more or less like UM IMO.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:39 PM ^
Yes, Michigan can compete at the elite level. We can say this as a fact, because they have done it. When Michigan landed consecutive classes with multiple top 50 players they made final 8 in consecutive years. When they didn't, they...didn't. There is a direct correlation here under Beilein, who is clearly an excellent on-court coach, perhaps the best in the nation.
Recruit like a top 10 team and we will play like one. It really is that simple and there are no rule changes that are necessary to change this (though, clearly, they would help.)
As to the 3rd point, I'm not sure I really get it. It takes time to develop an identity whether you change coaches (Kansas, North Carolina, Arizona, UCLA) or not (Duke, MSU, Kentucky, Louisville). Michigan had to dig itself out of a pit after the sanctions and Ellerbe debacle. Amaker did a lot of the heavy lifting to get Michigan back to the ground level. Beilein's a far better basketballl coach but I don't know if Michigan would necessarily be in a better place if he had been hired 5 years earlier or not. Even if some of it was pure Duke-copying, Amaker did a lot of good and necessary things to reestablish the foundation of the program for Beilein. In other words, Michigan needed a Program Manager as much as it needed a Basketball Coach. But now we're past all that...
Michigan is already on the cusp of having a national identity as a guard-driven high-efficiency offense. We're out in front of the trend/evolution toward smaller-lineups, lots of outside shooting, and passing versatility. That's an identity, even if it's not a nationally recognized household one.
If Michigan had landed Blackmon, Booker, Looney, or some of the other elite 2014 targets they whiffed on Michigan is probably back in the tournament and probably in the sweet 16 again. You saw us go toe-to-toe with two of these final 4 teams with 2 and 3 star recruits. You saw us beat them when we had 4 and 5 star recruits.
Recruit better. That's all we need.
March 30th, 2015 at 12:41 PM ^
Beilein teams seem to live or die by the 3.
I get jealous when I watch other teams with effective layups and jumpers.
Didn't we win against a good OSU squad a year or 2 ago with something like 1 made 3-pointer?
March 30th, 2015 at 12:42 PM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
March 30th, 2015 at 12:44 PM ^
March 30th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^
1. WIN.. Can't be easier said than that. We can't be missing the NCAA Tournament or NIT for that matter. We have to be making NCAA runs every year.
2. Long Tenured Coach.. JB is excellent. I couldn't ask for anyone better, but how long will he be here before he retires. We need someone following him that knows how to progress his players and win the damn game. A lot of these other elite programs have the same coach for many many years.
3. Recruit blue-chip players.. If you want to be elite than you need elite players who can come in and make plays within their first 2 years, so there is no re-building. Also it would be nice to get players who are good and keep them for 3 years plus. Kinda like MSU, it seems they get good players to stick around.
Michigan can become elite in my opinion, and we have an excellent start. Just need to keep what we have going and make sure our next coach can do what JB does. We are definitely on our way. Just might take a couple more big time recruits and couple more Sweet 16/Elite 8 runs.