OK, I'll pile on a little more. I just scanned all the responses and some partially mentioned things I'm concerned about. I don't know how to prioritize them, because they often work together-- one problem making another worse, which worsens the first problem and a couple others, etc.
1. The past two seasons, there didn't seem to be a hard correlation between attendance and winning, but I think there was one this year. Both anecdotally and statistically we played much better at home when we had 1700+. That shouldn't be impossible to do, even when the students aren't on campus. Some schools would get 1700 per game during winter break if the building was on fire. There's no excuse for the crowds under 1500 under any circumstances, and we had several of them-- even for conference games.
2. We can't be Gonzaga or Butler in a year or two. Those programs took a generation to become national powers, even through coaching changes. When Wichita State had down years, it didn't last 20-plus years like our decline, and when they had a good run of winning and NCAA appearances, it lasted longer. That may be from being in a stronger league than Horizon or West Coast, but it's also a testament to their administration to not let things go to hell during lean years. So we have to be building all parts of the puzzle all the time, even if we have down recruiting years.
3. Recruiting and attendance/game day atmosphere ARE connected. If I'm a recruit coming to campus and see the Cleveland State or Missouri State games, I'm looking elsewhere. That was just sad... 1100 people or less, spaced out and sitting far apart in small groups, looking more like budget night at the movie theater than a Division I basketball game. I don't know what was the deciding factor for Sean O'Mara, but I can imagine a few that even make up for having to live in Cincinnati.
4. The worst thing specifically about yesterday was how it highlighted that we haven't eliminated the half-assed effort problem from repeatedly cropping up. Call it "a trap game" or whatever you want, you can look back at this season and see a lot of squandered games that shouldn't have been-- the Bradley home game basically ruined the season in a 23-second stretch of the game. The Drake game was ANOTHER game against a last place team where we had a lead with under 30 and a defended three pointer was able to ruin it because we didn't really keep our foot on the gas. There was no excuse losing to Missouri State or Cleveland State. After the first win in Alaska, we basically turned it into a leisure vacation. We climbed all the way back from 19 points down to take a lead in the final minute over Evansville, but that was apparently enough for us-- we proved we could THEORETICALLY win. We climbed back to have a chance to win in the final seconds at Illinois State, but a tying layup was blocked. If ONLY HALF of those games go the other way, we're a 5 seed. If ALL of them go the other way, we're a 3 or 4 seed. How you sweep Northern Iowa, win on the road at SIU, win on the road to Missouri State, but lose a home game to Bradley and a seed-deciding year end game to Drake is enough proof that MOTIVATION (or lack of it) was a huge part of this year's FAIL. I don't know how much this creeps in to programs we should look to as a model--- how often does Gonzaga or Butler or Wichita State phone it in?-- because I'm not that keenly aware of their subtleties, but I imagine it's VERY rare.
5. I hope the big man argument doesn't distract from these other issues, because we've proved we can win without a big man. If we let lack of a big man be the excuse for not winning, then we don't put forth effort. If we don't put forth effort, we don't win. If we don't win and don't put forth effort, people don't show up in the stands. If people don't show up in the stands, the team doesn't put forth as full effort. If we don't get people in the stands and we don't win, we don't get to land a big man recruit. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
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