There’s only one Illini basketball topic that any fan really cares to discuss right now and you know exactly what it is.
Just about every member of the Illinois basketball community has one question on their mind, and then the natural follow-up:
“Will John Groce be relieved of his duties, and if so, could it happen before the season ends?”
After that, the natural query is “who could Illinois get to replace Groce?”
ESPN college basketball analysts Dick Vitale and Seth Greenberg participated in a media conference call Wednesday, and I asked them about the current state and direction of the program.
The answers, which were way off-the-point at times, were also extremely out of touch with the feelings and moods within the base.
These four tweets below perfectly reflect the current mood and mindset within the Illini basketball community.
Yes, it’s a small sample size, but these guys are basically saying the exact same thing that the rest of Illini basketball Twitter is saying, and it’s the same type of conversation you hear in sports bars when an Illinois game is on.
The #Illini basketball program under John Groce. https://t.co/P4Wto9xb8U
— The Tomfoolery of Professor John Frink (@Frustrated_Fan) January 18, 2017
but, his chance is done with me this year. I am ready to move on, again, from John Groce as the head coach. #Illini
— Writing Illini (@WritingIlliniFS) January 18, 2017
Illinois Basketball pic.twitter.com/FnUa5Guipz
— JP ??? (@jjhparker) January 18, 2017
I'm watching Illinois play at Purdue because I like to torture myself
— FullCountTommy (@FullCountTommy) January 18, 2017
This fifth Tweet below, by Bret Beherns of WCIA, pretty much sums up what this season, and more or less, the Groce era of Illini basketball has been.
Groce’s Coachey McCoachington Coachspeak cliches, which didn’t even answer Beherns’ question, is pretty much par for the course with all Groce pressers.
After hearing from numerous upset #Illini fans, I asked John Groce what his message to the fanbase is after a 25-point loss at Maryland… pic.twitter.com/qyGMEt3BYI
— Bret Beherns (@WCIA3Bret) December 30, 2016
You won’t get real answers out of Groce, a truth I realized several years ago, so asking him questions has been rendered pointless for awhile now. Thus, I took the big picture question to the ESPN national call and find my query relegated to dead last in the conference call’s order:
Q: Illinois, another tough road loss yesterday, the alumni, fans are getting pretty upset, clamoring for change. Where do you see the future of the Illinois program going?
You can read the full transcript at this link, but there was so much unnecessary rambling and off-topic banter, that we have to chop it down to what’s actually coherent and relevant here for you. (No, this wasn’t exactly the most valuable conference call of all time)
Seth Greenberg: “I think it’s a tough deal. One, Chicago basketball is not as good as it’s been. Number two, because of the global nature of our game, per se, it’s the Kentuckys and the North Carolinas and the Dukes and everyone else coming into Chicago or suburban Chicago and getting the best player out of Chicago, which is — who beats Duke and Kentucky for players?”
“I mean, that’s difficult.”
“I think the concern that people are having is he’s dealt with a ton of injuries last year, and look, you have no control over injuries. It’s the inconsistency of their team. I mean, obviously they’ve played well enough in certain games, but they haven’t been consistent.”
“It takes time and takes multiple classes and takes player development. He didn’t forget how to coach, but they do need to be a little bit more consistent and they’ve got to continue to recruit and put classes on top of each other.”
“They’ve had some situations where they’ve lost guys, and you can’t do that when you’re building a program. When you’re building a program, the one thing you can’t do is lose momentum, and unfortunately right now they’ve lost a little momentum, and it’s hard to get back.”
He’s spot on about losing out on the best players in Chicago to Kentucky, Duke, Kansas etc. and how that is an extremely difficult thing to change (I doubt it ever will). However, Greenberg also brought up the old injuries excuse, espoused by Groce proponents everywhere, from last season. That idea has proven to be a fallacy this season as Groce has had a healthy, veteran team, and his team is still losing road games by an average of 21.3 points per game.
Also, Greenberg’s praise for Groce’s coaching abilities aren’t exactly a sentiment echoed by very many out there right now.
Additionally, Groce does indeed have a lot of high caliber talent on his roster right now. While he’s missed out on the five-star, blue chip recruits, he has still landed a lot of talent on this roster. The recruiting rankings for Leron Black, Jalen Coleman-Lands, D.J. Williams and several others were very stellar.
Thus, recruiting is not really the problem, developing and maximizing that talent is.
Most importantly, Greenberg completely ignored my question about Groce’s future with the program, and that was a bit unprofessional and rude. All in all, it seems Greenberg really isn’t paying much attention to the Illini basketball program. It’s quite apparent, and it’s very understandable given how Illinois is not nationally relevant right now.
I can’t blame him for that.
Why should Seth Greenberg study up on Illinois when he has the entire nation (filled with teams that are actually relevant) to scout and analyze? He’s a sharp guy, and he truly knows his stuff, it’s just that he’s proverbially got bigger fish to fry right now than Illinois.
Still I learned absolutely nothing from this media conference call, and Dickie V’s take on Illini basketball didn’t really offer much. He rambled on about the Flyin Illini of 1989 and Bill Belichick, and overall he didn’t really say much that contained any value.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, Bold and the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication, appears regularly as a guest on CGTN America, WGN CLTV News and KOZN 1620 The Zone.
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