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94duke
03-10-2009, 04:53 PM
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/basketball/ncaa/03/10/acc.ap/index.html

chrisheery
03-10-2009, 04:58 PM
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/basketball/ncaa/03/10/acc.ap/index.html

How could Coach K not get a vote? He took a team that everyone thought was not that great and finished second in the ACC. Roy Williams took an unbeleivably talented team and did what it was supposed to do. I think Hamilton deserves to be COY, but Coach K without a single vote? After altering the way this team ran 3 different times to keep them in contention? Wow.

feldspar
03-10-2009, 05:01 PM
How could Coach K not get a vote? He took a team that everyone thought was not that great and finished second in the ACC. Roy Williams took an unbeleivably talented team and did what it was supposed to do. I think Hamilton deserves to be COY, but Coach K without a single vote? After altering the way this team ran 3 different times to keep them in contention? Wow.

It was pretty much consensus among the media that it was going to be first, Carolina, then Duke, then everybody else.

Hamilton was the obvious choice.

pfrduke
03-10-2009, 05:38 PM
It was pretty much consensus among the media that it was going to be first, Carolina, then Duke, then everybody else.

Hamilton was the obvious choice.

In that regard, it's surprising that Roy got any votes. And I find it really amusing that Gary pulled in a vote.

Duvall
03-10-2009, 05:40 PM
In that regard, it's surprising that Roy got any votes. And I find it really amusing that Gary pulled in a vote.

Well, I can see the argument that the Coach of the Year award should always go to the coach of the best team, because he recruited the players, developed the players and selected the schemes for the year. So I can see voting for Roy. Voting for Gary is just laughable, though.

jimsumner
03-10-2009, 05:49 PM
After FSU's ignominious loss to Northwestern in the ACC/Big Ten challenge, I figured Hamilton would spend March talking up FSU's NIT chances and updating his resume.

Instead, I ended up voting for him for ACC COY. Shows my prognosticating prowess.

But he deserved it. A good case could have been made for Skinner, also.

Gary Williams is a bit of a head-scratcher.

rthomas
03-10-2009, 05:59 PM
In that regard, it's surprising that Roy got any votes. And I find it really amusing that Gary pulled in a vote.

Roy did an amazing job considering Lawson's leg fell off midway through the season. He deserved a vote.

DukiesPA
03-11-2009, 09:01 AM
How could Coach K not get a vote? He took a team that everyone thought was not that great and finished second in the ACC. Roy Williams took an unbeleivably talented team and did what it was supposed to do. I think Hamilton deserves to be COY, but Coach K without a single vote? After altering the way this team ran 3 different times to keep them in contention? Wow.

I think Hamilton was far-and-away the best choice -- even that Northwestern loss, though not good, isn't terrible.

Regards to Roy vs. K, I agree with the other poster on why Roy got some votes: He coached the top team in the league to the regular season championship (exactly what he was expected to do). He also did it by brining them back from down two games in the standings after two games to winning the league by two games. And I'm guessing Ginyard being out all season had something to do with it.

On K's front, I think the other poster hit it when he said we were picked to finish 2nd and got that. Actually, I'd bet some of the idiot writers even looked at the preseason predictions of us at 2 then getting the 3 seed as underachieving. While K also made the move of getting EW into the lineup I'm guessing the voters also wondered what took so long to make the change.

Regardless, it went to the right guy.

CDu
03-11-2009, 09:24 AM
On K's front, I think the other poster hit it when he said we were picked to finish 2nd and got that. Actually, I'd bet some of the idiot writers even looked at the preseason predictions of us at 2 then getting the 3 seed as underachieving. While K also made the move of getting EW into the lineup I'm guessing the voters also wondered what took so long to make the change.

This seems like faulty logic. So Coach K is penalized for having the level of talent that the media thought prior to the season, but Williams wasn't?

Ultimately, though, I think it's a silly award. It's generally given to the coach that proves the media's preseason predictions wrong (in a good way). So basically, it's better to have the media misjudge your team negatively at the beginning if you want to win coach of the year. It has little to do with actual coaching ability.

I think Coach K did a pretty good job getting this team back from the "depths" in midseason and leading them emotionally. It's hard to say whether he was too slow in going to Williams in the lineup, though. That probably hurt him, along with the preseason expectations.

I wouldn't say Hamilton is a good coach, but given the nature of the award I think he (or Gary Williams, frustratingly) makes the most sense for the award.

Aziggazoomba
03-11-2009, 09:36 AM
How could Coach K not get a vote? He took a team that everyone thought was not that great and finished second in the ACC. Roy Williams took an unbeleivably talented team and did what it was supposed to do. I think Hamilton deserves to be COY, but Coach K without a single vote? After altering the way this team ran 3 different times to keep them in contention? Wow.

I'm not suggesting K shouldn't have gotten a vote (he probably should have), and I'm not trying to start a row, but, in the unlikely event you're interested, the point raised above is one of the things that drives some Carolina fans nuts (not me so much as a lot of my light blue brethren).

I'm referring to the "Duke has relatively little talent and look at what Coach K is able to do with them" point. This is something we hear a lot, and is seen by many as just a lot of spin designed to further aggrandize Coach K. Duke has plenty of talent, and I'm sure a lot of ACC teams would be delighted to have several of your players. So this point just isn't too persuasive.

When more than midway through the season you can pluck an Elliott Williams off the bench and miraculously change the team's prospects, well, that says something. (One of the things it maybe doesn't say is "Wow, what great coaching.")

Again---I say all this with all due respect to Coach K. He's a great coach, and everyone knows that (and no one in their right mind would challenge that.) His over-the-top resume and credentials speak for themselves. I'm just saying that it isn't necessary to suggest he's working with inferior tools in order to establish that point.

Anyway, I'd say the coach of the year choice was the right one.

Tom B.
03-11-2009, 01:00 PM
Roy did an amazing job considering Lawson's leg fell off midway through the season. He deserved a vote.


And we have our winner for Post of the Week.

oso diablo
03-11-2009, 01:13 PM
i would have voted for Wake's Guadio. I love what he's done in the wake (no pun intended) of Skip Prosser's death. The Deacons have improved from 5 wins to 2nd place in the last two years. And he's kept the program not only afloat, but thriving.

jipops
03-11-2009, 01:27 PM
I'm not suggesting K shouldn't have gotten a vote (he probably should have), and I'm not trying to start a row, but, in the unlikely event you're interested, the point raised above is one of the things that drives some Carolina fans nuts (not me so much as a lot of my light blue brethren).

I'm referring to the "Duke has relatively little talent and look at what Coach K is able to do with them" point. This is something we hear a lot, and is seen by many as just a lot of spin designed to further aggrandize Coach K. Duke has plenty of talent, and I'm sure a lot of ACC teams would be delighted to have several of your players. So this point just isn't too persuasive.

When more than midway through the season you can pluck an Elliott Williams off the bench and miraculously change the team's prospects, well, that says something. (One of the things it maybe doesn't say is "Wow, what great coaching.")

Again---I say all this with all due respect to Coach K. He's a great coach, and everyone knows that (and no one in their right mind would challenge that.) His over-the-top resume and credentials speak for themselves. I'm just saying that it isn't necessary to suggest he's working with inferior tools in order to establish that point.

Anyway, I'd say the coach of the year choice was the right one.

While you make an excellent point, I do think there is a counter point to this. And no one in their right mind would claim Duke has accomplished something with 'relatively little talent'. However, despite the fact that K has a good amount of McD All-Americans at his disposal, there are enormous weaknesses that still exist as far as personnel. As has been noted exhaustively throughout the season Duke lacks a reliable post presence and strength inside. To go along with this, there have been issues at pg such as trying to fit Nolan into a spot he has never played in and then plugging Scheyer into the role. So though there are talented guys to work with, K has had to make the pieces fit. This has not been a team that has had reliable answers from every position, many teams don't. But pretty much all the top teams do including UNC.


So for Duke to be in the position they are in with holes at the pg spot and inside, this season's work has been a very nice accomplishment. It would have been very easy for the Clemson game to have repeated itself... more than once.

Having said that, Hamilton is the logical choice for coach of the year. I'm not disputing this.

elvis14
03-11-2009, 01:34 PM
Hamilton 55 of a possible 76 votes
Al Skinner 10
Dino Gaudio 6
Oliver Purnell 2
'Ol Roy 2 (would have been 0 but it turns out Lawson only has 1 leg and he had had a hang nail on his shooting hand)
Sweat Gary Sweat 1

Based on what I've seen this year, FSU exceeded expectations and Hamilton was the right choice. I would have liked to see K get a few votes. If you look at the way this season has gone, he did a good job and the transition to Williams as a starter has been great. Nice to see Oliver get some votes. I have no idea what's up with the votes for Roy except that UNC is everyone's darling right now.

BTW, who are the 76 voters?

pfrduke
03-11-2009, 01:43 PM
When more than midway through the season you can pluck an Elliott Williams off the bench and miraculously change the team's prospects, well, that says something. (One of the things it maybe doesn't say is "Wow, what great coaching.")

I'm not sure how many Duke games you watched this year, but Elliot Williams was not a very good player for the first half of the season. He looked lost on the court both offensively and defensively. He certainly didn't look like someone who could be relied on for 38 minutes of solid play against the best the ACC has to offer.

One of the things Coach K said when Williams was inserted into the lineup for the St. John's game is that in the practices leading up to that week, the light bulb went off for him, and he finally "got it." From my point of view, he was a visibly different player on the court. He played more within himself, less rushed, and less lost. He still has lapses, but he looks more and more like he knows exactly where he should be and exactly what he has to do in the offensive and defensive schemes Duke runs.

Now obviously, none of us (well, maybe jimsumner) are inside practice. K's comments may have been coach-speak, and nothing more. And there may be a chicken/egg argument (i.e., did he get more time because he played well, or did he play well because he got more time and a longer leash). But from a viewer's perspective, the improvement Williams has shown from even game 15 of this season to game 30 was dramatic, and suggestive of very good coaching and player development.

I guess the short version of my point is that it would be wrong to simply assume that Williams could have been doing this all year, and it was poor coaching to chain him to the bench until mid-February; a potentially more valid assumption (based on the visual evidence of Williams' play) is that it was good coaching that enabled him to become a huge contributor on this team by mid-February.

jipops
03-11-2009, 01:59 PM
I guess the short version of my point is that it would be wrong to simply assume that Williams could have been doing this all year, and it was poor coaching to chain him to the bench until mid-February; a potentially more valid assumption (based on the visual evidence of Williams' play) is that it was good coaching that enabled him to become a huge contributor on this team by mid-February.


And from published accounts it appears Nate James deserves a lot of credit for working with Williams to be able to contribute when called upon.

gw67
03-11-2009, 02:08 PM
Hamilton is deserving of the honor and Skinner would be my second choice if I had a vote.

My preseason prediction for the ACC is below and was fairly consistent with posters on this board. Based on this prediction, Duke, Miami, Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech did worse than many expected and Florida State and BC did better. As I recall, Olympic Fan was one poster who pointed out that although the Noles lost several players and were young, they also had some talent.

Elite Teams: UNC and Duke (13-14 wins)
Good Teams: Miami, Wake, Clemson and Virginia Tech (9-12 wins)
On the edge: Georgia Tech, Maryland and Florida State (6-7 wins)
Bringing up the rear: N.C.State, BC and Virginia (4-5 wins)

gw67

Aziggazoomba
03-11-2009, 02:25 PM
Those are all good points. 'Tis true---it's not like I've watched every Duke game since November (and I don't really have any recollections of him from early in the season).

Oh--this too, to clarify---I wouldn't want you to think I was suggesting that there had been affirmatively "bad coaching" in not having EW involved earlier in the season. I've certainly not ever been in a position (i.e., I don't have the facts, haven't seen him in practice, generally don't have the necessary exposure) to make a judgment like that. (I may be an insufferably arrogant Tar Heel, but my insufferable arrogance does have at least some limits!)

I kind of agree with the suggestion that Gaudio would have been a good choice (except that I have a few Wake friends, and they are pretty down on him as a coach, from a XXXs and OOO's, and coaching smart basketball perspective----I dunno---I haven't watched them enough, either.)

Go Heels, and looking forward to this weekend, even if my team's coach doesn't much care about it......

Classof06
03-11-2009, 04:10 PM
FSU was picked to finish 10th in the preseason polls.

Hamilton was the obvious choice. I think that will become more apparent as I believe Florida State will make a very deep run in the NCAAT. This team is no joke whatsoever..

blueprofessor
03-11-2009, 05:50 PM
FSU was picked to finish 10th in the preseason polls.

Hamilton was the obvious choice. I think that will become more apparent as I believe Florida State will make a very deep run in the NCAAT. This team is no joke whatsoever..

FSU played Pitt and UNC tight down the wire weeks before several of their younger players stepped up offensively.
They play great D and ,if they draw a top seed in either tourney not named UNC, they could win any game.
Even with UNC, FSU should have won the game as they had a lead late before an errant pass led to a 3-point play and Douglas's jumpshot (a foul on Hans not called ) seconds before the end of the game was an airball leading to Lawson's winning shot. It is ironic that that shot may have nudged Lawson past Douglas for POY,despite Douglas's heroics all game.
BTW, all the Lawson chatter notwithstanding, Douglas dominated that game vs. UNC.
A timeout by Hamilton earlier in the possession would have led ,perhaps,to a better shot and a win.At least to OT.

In regard to COY, Hamilton deserved it. Everyone knew the team had some talent,but it was young and inexperienced talent(Alabi,Kitchen).Ham is a decent-enough coach, but his teams play their guts out.Unlike Hewitt,Williams, and Skinner,he is not a whiner.
This team now is much better and has a lot of confidence.We could see them in the final of the ACC tourney if Lawson indeed is held out.

Best--Blueprof:)

Carlos
03-11-2009, 08:15 PM
In that regard, it's surprising that Roy got any votes.

Actually, Roy didn't get any votes but John Justus decided to round his vote total up to two.