FBCB: Learning the System
 

So nearly 20 seasons into our online league, I'm finally taking the time to learn how to dominate this game in single player mode so that I'll have the knowledge to be able to consistantly build a winner in our multiplayer league. I've had some success in single player over the past week but want to give myself a good challenge here to see what else I can learn.


I'm going to start at a small school in a prestige 1 conference, using the old, default conference alignments that existed when the game came out. I'll create a level 0 coach and try to claw my way up.

Human coach firing will be turned on, and conference movement is turned off. The goal for this career is to work my way up to the top as a coach, not to take a specific team up to the top. Coach firing is on b/c, if I suck at implementing the system, I want to get kicked back down to the bottom until I get it right.


House Rules


I only have two rules that I'm going to use to limit my play in any way. One is that I will space out my scheduling. We know there is no fatigue in between games, and there are some advantages to playing all your non conference games in the first 2 weeks of November, I'm going to avoid that and force myself to schedule at least two days between games, preferably three.

The other rule is with recruiting. I will not take advantage of the ease of recruiting foreign players. I will not offer any blind scholarships to foreign players in the hopes of landing players that the CPU fails to recruit properly that I would normally not have a chance at. If I find foreign talent through the 'normal' methods I use to search for players(searching based on stats primarily), I must spend money on them every month if I wish to recruit them.



The System


I want to play a pressing/trapping system, to force as many turnovers as possible. My teams may not otherwise have the best talent in the world, but if I can force 30 turnovers a game and take 15-20 more shots than my opponent, I can negate the talent disadvantage. I can also minimize much of the randomness in the game, if I'm taking that many more shots than my opponent, I can survive 'off nights' when my team inexplicably shoots 35% from the field.


Recruiting

Big Men: I favor traditionally good big men. INS, Rebounding, and PSD are the primary traits I care about. I would prefer to get guys that can block shots, and guys whose hands are not made of stone as well, but those concerns are secondary.


Perimeter Players: Steals and Ball Handling are the primary traits I require. At higher level schools I refuse to touch anyone who isn't 'C' or higher in handling, and 'B' or higher in steals. I may have to relax that at a level 1 school. For SF, rebounding and scoring and defense are all secondary skills I worry about. For SG/PG, PRD and scoring are the secondary traits I'm looking for.

I'm generally looking for guys that can shoot free throws, and guys that aren't dumb. The disadvantages of 60% FT shooters, and guys that require tons of academic training are very noticible.


Scheduling

I don't ever want to have a losing season. Keeping the prestige going up is the most important thing. I will not schedule a single non conference opponent with a prestige above 10 until I am 100% sure my team can handle it. I don't care about my RPI until I'm ready to compete for at large NCAA bids. One exception is that as I improve I will find a bigger team to pick on, most likely Duke if they remain a top program, that I try to schedule every year.


Redshirting

Unless my job is on the line and I have a stud freshman coming in, I will redshirt everyone.


Gameplanning

I will rely on the recommend button a lot early in my career, and wlil eventually force my depth chart to support my system. I will always play man to man defense. I know the CPU usually recommends 3P shooting too high for my liking, and pressing/trapping lower than my liking. I'll be hitting the recommend button and making minimal adjustments here, until I have the system in place to force a 10 press/10 trap setting all the time.




I have a history of starting dynasties and not finishing them. In part that's because I've always preferred to play games slightly slower and focus on more detalis. This dynasty will have less details, my goal is to get through a large number of seasons relatively quickly here.

Initial Team

I'm taking over Chicago State in the Mid-Continent Conference. Chicago State's prestige is 7, there are worse teams out there, but this one seems like one of the tougher challenges. The reason is that the rest of the MCC seems pretty stacked, as far as prestige 1 conferences go. Valparaiso has a starting prestige over 50, two teams have prestige over 40, and 2 more over 30. Only Western Illinois, with a prestige of 13, is anywhere close to Chicago State's sorry level. So this seems like a good place to start for a tough challenge.


The Coach



I actually like having good scouting, but with a level 0 coach, there's just no way. Getting 3* players that have the stats I am looking for should be enough to get me started.

2003/04 Season

We have $100,500 to spend on coaches, so we're picking 30k guys from the bottom of the food chain. I get a scout, recruiter, and assistant that all have skills in the 30-35 range for their relevant positions.


The initial roster is bad. I have a guard who has an A in steals and another guard who can handle and defend, but this season will be awful. I don't redshirt any of these guys, lets get them out and start funneling my guys in ASAP instead.


I have 9 road games, 5 home games to schedule. The highlight of my schedule is a road trip to Liberty, whose prestige of 7 dwarfs that of the other teams i look to schedule.



Recruiting

I have four scholarships to fill this year. Going into this if I can get two guys that look like they'll fit my system, I'll be thrilled. With $7,750 to spend each month in recruiting, I have to stay local. As long as a player is a 3* guy, I'm wliling to look at him(while I don't care greatly about ratings, there are things I try to avoid later on down the road... guys who aren't in the top 50 at their position, etc, but not at this point).

My initial contacts consist of the players with high and up interest in me, who are all local and thus cheap. After that I sort by high school stats/steals and contact anyone near the top of the list who is local to Chicago State. I only manage 12 total contacts.

I quickly fall behind on a couple of my targets, and only end up landing two players. It looks like its going to be a big struggle, even staying local. It may be 3-4 seasons before I can field a full starting squad of my system guys, so lets hope our AD understands how shitty a 7 prestige school is supposed to be.


So who is coming in? Two steals guys




This guy has a good A/T ratio(I generally try to pull in guys who have more assists than turnovers in high school, espicially for PG's. I don't do this religously but i do shy away from guys with absurdly low ratios). He had 2.3 steals/game in high school, and scouts solidly in handling and steals. My scout sucks so I cna't wait to see how he comes in. If its anywhere close to this, the guy will be a 4 year starter after a redshirt season.





Another obvious 4 year starter if he comes in anywhere close to this. I don't expect it though. He did average 3.2 steals/game in HS so I'm optimistic for that, and hope he's just half the scorer my scout suggests he could be.




My season actually is pretty darn good for my first year. Just some stat dumps here, as there isn't much worth discussing since I just hit recommend and let it ride.





I lose in the first round of the conference tourney to Oral Roberts. Valparaiso upsets Southern Utah to win the conference tournament. Valpo earns a 16 seed and loses to Cincinnati in the big dance. Kentucky beats Iowa State to win the national title. Kentucky goes 40-1. I'm not sure I've ever seen a 40 win season before.

2004 Offseason

My prestige goes up from 7 to 8 after my 15-14 season last year. My goals are to finish .500 in conference play, and my AD is "delighted" with me.


Roster Overview

I have 4 scholarship seniors on the roster this year. So I only filled 2 out of 4 scholarships last season and am losing 4 guys this year, I'm going to be behind the 8 ball for awhile in terms of scholarship numbers. I'm only returning one starter from last year's team, and am planning on redshirting my freshmen, so expect a lot of crap this year.

Incoming Recruits

We have the 70th ranked recruiting class. Sounds good to me.




I'm *thrilled* with this. This guy is going to be a stud at a prestige one conference. The 11 academics rating is a problem, he'll lose some training b/c he'll need a lot of training in academics every year to try to avoid suspensions, but this guy will win me some games.





Bringing in two top 200 guys is a major coup for Chicago State. Good ball handling, acceptable defense and steals if we can get those raw ratings up towards his potentials.



Coaching

I lose my scout and recruiter to other schools. My new recruiter has a 29 recruiting rating, and my new scout has 33 scouting.


Scheduling

Scheduling is the same as last year. I picked up a couple 6 prestige schools for non conference play, that's as challenging as it goes for us this year.

2004/05 Season


Recruiting

We again have 4 scholarsihps to fill. I need to get a big man this year for sure. 2 big men and a SF type would be ideal. 2 very high/2 high interest players going into this season. I land one very solid big man in the initial signing period, and I thought I was in great shape to land a second, but one of the bigger schools swooped in and grabbed my #2 guy from me. I similarly took the lead on a couple good steals PGs in November and December and lost them in January to bigger schools swooping in after losing their own recruits.

At the very end of the year I land a guy from Alaska, towards the end the guys I'm trying to evaluate are gone by the time the next month rolls around, this guy was a last ditch grab in March.



An acceptable scorer, good rebounder and defender. He'll be good vs the crap I want to play hopefully.





I don't like the D in steals, but if he comes in as scouted I'll be happy, espicially given that he was such a late grab. His stats(2.3 steals/game) have me hoping i've underscouted him there, but if he can defend and handle the ball he'll have a place on my team.



Results

This season was what I expected from my early teams. We struggled against the awful non conference teams we scheduled and got worked over badly by the better conference teams.




We actually pull the upset in the first round of the conference tournament, upsetting UMKC before falling to Southern Utah in the semifinals. Valparaiso wins its 2nd straight conference tournament, earning another 16 seed, and this time losing to Kentucky in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Wake Forest defeats Oklahoma State to win the NCAA Tournament. Cincinnati and St John's also make the final four.




Ugly, ugly, ugly.





There was a nice 11 game losing streak from December 15th to January 27th.

2005 Offseason


My prestige rises from 8 to 9. I guess it doesn't take much when you're this terrible. My goal remains a .500 Conference finish, and my AD is now simply satisfied with me.


Roster Overview


Again there are 4 seniors on the way out here. Two of them were starters last year, though that isn't saying much right now. My first two recruits, Ned Finger and David Sanders, will be out on the floor for me this season, a lot I would imagine.


Incoming Recruits

This recruiting class is ranked 155th in the country, not all that good.




Consistant defense and rebounding will be enough for Evans to start after a redshirt season for sure.





Sanders isn't nearly as good as scouted, which doesn't suprise me, but it is nice to see that his potential in steals is a C instead of the D that I scouted him as. But I really need to do better than this to fully implement a pressing/trapping system, even at this level.



I make it through the offseason without losing any of my coaches, and there is no change in the scheduling of course.

2005/06 Season


Recruiting

Again there are 4 scholarships to fill. The ideal here is 1 big man and 2 steals guys, but since we get to contact so few people most of this is dictated by our initial evaluations. Only one recruit has high interest in me initially this year.

My budget has increased slightly, up to $7,819/mo now to go after recruits. I find 3 good system guys in my initial scouting. One of them I drop off of early on as UNC Greensboro swoops in, and I don't land anyone in the initial signing period, which always scares me.

I get my two remaining targets in December, and a 3rd decent looking guy in January. I go after some leftover big men but I'm extremely happy with my results this season regardless of the big man.



Hogan could be a star recruit if he can score and comes in with B or better HND and STL ratings. I'm confidant in the steal number, he averaged 4 per game in high school, not so much in the scoring, we shall see.




Again i'm confidant in the steals rating, 3.6 per game in HS, and hopefully he can shoot the 3 as advertised and is acceptably average elsewhere(defense/handles).



Silvia was my secondary recruit, one that i found and went after after the initial recruit signing period. 3.1 steals per game in HS and 5.3 Assists so hopefully those numbers are legit as well.


I really hoped to to land a big man but just whiffed completely on my initial contacts. With only $7,500/mo to recruit its proving really hard to get two differnt types of players. There just isn't that much money to go around to contact enough big men AND steals guys to guarentee good targets in both areas. Next season the focus will turn back to big men.




Results

I'm highly optimistic as I go through the non conference schedule, I have a record of 11-3 on Jan 1, as my best inherited player is putting together an All Conference type season early on, and Ned Finger is a productive starter. That kind of wild success doesn't exactly continue, but an 8-6 conference mark is a great success for me.



Unfortunately, we are beaten by IUPUI in the first round of our conference tournament. Valpo is the 2 seed this year and wins their 3rd straight conference tournament, beating Oral Roberts in the conference finals. They earn another 16 seed and lose to #1 seed Cincinnati for the 2nd time in 3 years.


Wake Forest repeats as National Champions, beating Iowa in the finals. Duke and Kentucky also make the final four.






Some drastic improvements over last year. The RPI is up from 320 to 198. Though I'm not forcing any sort of pressure yet, our 8.9 steals was 54th in the nation and 1st in the MCC, we were last in the conference last year here. We also had a very good 3 point shooting team.






Awards

I am the Mid-Continent Coach of the year.

PG Ned Finger is MCC All Conference.

PG Nicholas Maya is 2nd team All Conference.


Player Review




Maya was an inherited player, far and away the best player on the team in my first 3 seasons. His 2.5 steals per game and 16.7 ppg were highs for Chicago State this year, and he shot 43% from 3. We may be worse next year because there's no one else on the roster like this.


My first two recruits, Ned Finger and David Sanders, are the #2 and #3 scorers on the team. Finger started every game, scoring 9.3 ppg and rackig up 1.9 steals. Sanders was my 6th man, scoring 7.6 ppg and averaging over 1 steal. The two guys i have coming off redshirt next season are nothing exceptional, so I expect a bit of a drop off from last year.


Totals: 19-10 (8-6) - no postseason - RPI 198

2006 Offseason


My prestige rises from 9 to 11. I'm slowly increasing my recruiting budget, but I need a big season to make a big leap here. I'm certainly pleased with slow and steady for now. The board remains satisfied in me, and my goals are still to finish with a .500 conference record.


Incoming Recruits

This recruiting class is ranked 62nd in the country. To compare, Valparaiso has the 2nd best incoming class in the conference, they are ranked ~145th



Silva came in almost exactly as advertised. In fact, his steals potential is better than scouted. This guy will almost certainly be a 4 year starter for me after a redshirt year.



Hogan's Jump Shot is a bit worse than scouted, and his handling is a C instead of a B, but you're not going to see me complain about any of that. He can shoot the 3 big time, will be an adequate defender at this level, and will likely be a 4 year starter as well with that steal rating.




Oh yeah, this recruiting class is exactly what I need to implemnt my system. I cannot wait to get these 3 guys on the court. This is the perfect recruiting class for what I'm trying to do. I am concerned about the academic ratings, suspensions at a bad time will be a serious threat to derail these guys in February/March.



I make it through another offseason without losing any of my coaches, and there is no change in the scheduling of course.


Training!

I make requests to improve the training facilities and the budget every season. For the first time, I had something approved. My training facilities will be improved next season. Chicago State's Training Facilities currently sit at a 5(out of 100) and are of course worst in the conference.


Roster Overview






These guys are sorted in order of the depth chart, 5 starters/top guys off the bench. Of the 8 guys on the depth chart, only Battista is a senior. All of the starters but Bushman are guys I recruited, sophs and freshmen. This is a young team with lots of development ahead of them. Ned Finger is clearly the star of the team.

2006/07 Season


Recruiting

My recruiting budget skyrockets to $8,306/mo, up $500/mo or so from last year. Things are slowly moving in the right direction.


I have only 3 scholarships to fill this year. One player thinks highly of me going into the recruiting season, he's a Center from Illinois, it'd be nice to grab one easily and have some time to focus on secondary guys. I spend my entire initial contact period on big men. Once I get my prestige up into the 20s hopefully I'll have the money to diversify a bit, but with the backcourt players I've recruited over the last 3 seasons, I need to bring in an inside prescence or two this year.

Well, I lose my top target to Binghamton, and my #3 target gets blitzed by mid-majors. I'm throwing all my money at big men and it looks like I'll be lucky to land one going into November. Heading into December I'm still without a signing, I lead on the two guys I'm targeting but could be in trouble if a higher ranked team comes in.

UGGGGH, in January I lose both my targets to bigger schools, so the top 4 big men I shoot for, none of which really seemed all that special, all go to bigger schools. I make an entirely new set of contacts, looking over guys who no one has offered yet, hoping some of them are stlil around next month. A few guys end up on my target list, and finally, in February, someone decides to come to Chicago State.





Another guy who isn't a genius, but at this point my options were extremely limited. I seriously doubt his Post Offense is as good as scouted, but hopefully its a B. His rebounding and defense I'm hopeful for.


I'm pretty disappointed with this. I was hoping to land one guy early and have some money to go after some secondary targets, but every guy I found ended up elsewhere.



Results

Bad news as starting SG David Sanders goes down for 50 days in mid November. Ned Finger suffers a shorter injury, ironically enough a dislocated finger and my backcourt is a mess. I go 6-8 in non conference play this year, and that's the good news. Chicago State loses its first 8 conference games in a row before finally getting a win in early February over Southern Utah. It never really got better.



We lose to Oral Roberts in the first round of the conference tournament. Oral Roberts is upset in the Conference Semis, and 2 seed Southern Utah ends up winning the tournament. In a good sign for the conference overall, Southern Utah earns a 15 seed instead of the usual 16 seed. They lose to Oklahoma in round 1 of the big dance.

Oral Roberts is actually quite a story here. They end up with a 1 seed in the NIT beating UNC Greensboro, UNC Wilmington, SMU, and North Carolina on the way to the NIT Finals, before finally losing to Wisconsin.

Southern Cal wins the national title over Cincinnati. St John's and Kentucky are the other two final four participants. Two time defending champion Wake Forest earned a 1 seed but was upset in the 2nd round.



There's just nothing good at all here. Oral Roberts is the top 50 team that I lost to 3 times. I expect a big turnaround next year, all my starters will be back and some may be displaced with the defensive specialists that are redshirting right now.






Awards

6th man Ross Sanders is named to the Freshman All Conference team. He started 17 games when David Sanders was hurt. Sanders scored 7 ppg, had 2.4 apg and 1.2 spg. He's a very average player whose role will be limited next year.

Player Review

No seniors to review really.

Ned Finger and David Sanders are really all that's worth mentioning here, my first two recruits, they are the only two guys to average in double figure scoring. Finger also had 1.8 steals per game.

Totals: 8-21 (2-12) - no postseason - RPI 316

2007 Offseason

Prestige falls from 11->9, my goals remain the same, finish .500 in conference play, and the board remains satisfied, which is good, I'm not in serious danger if another debacle occurs hopefully. The training facilities double from 5 up to 11, not last in the conference anymore, but nothing to write home about either.

Incoming Recruits

This recruiting class is ranked 180th in the country this year. Not suprising given that we only landed one guy late in the recruiting season.



Damn, I am stunned that Rutan came in with an 'A' in INS, and he's a solid defensive rebounder. I'm still not pleased with only being able to land one player last year, but this is a guy that can play, I'm very pleased with this result.



I make it through yet another offseason without losing any of my coaches, and there is no change in the scheduling of course.


Training!

For the second year in a row the board agrees to improve the training facilities. I can't seem to get any more recruiting money but that's ok.


Roster Overview






With Silva's ball handling ability I seriously considered starting him, but Finger is still my only good half court scorer, and will generate mroe steals, so he's in. I'm going much deeper this year but expect the starters to get the vast majority of the playing time. With 3 very good steals guys starting and one more pretty good one coming off the bench, I'm bumped the pressing/trapping up to 10 to see how it goes at this level.

2007/08 Season


Recruiting

My recruiting budget is back down to $7,819/mo with the slight dip in prestige. I have two scholarships to fill this year. Again in an ideal world i'd grab a big man and a steals type SF, but that's hard to plan at this level.

I land my first target on Dec 1, leaving me the rest of the season to try to find someone else worth bringing in.

Our second recruit signs on Feb 1, and for the first time ever we use all the scholarships we have available to us.



I'm taking a bit of a chance on King, given his horrible post defense. The reason? His stats really stand out, 2 blocks per game, and 20 points/11 rebounds and 52% FG Shooting. I'm hoping his inside ability is better than scouted as a result of that.



You can look at my current lineup and see that I'm playing PGs at SG, and SGs at SF. If I can find a bigger guy that fits my system, a 6'5" + guy that can handle the ball ok, and can steal, I'm going to try to go get him. I'm a bit concerned about the HND rating, 16, but it'll be ok if his steals come in well and he can score.


Results

The results are immediate. 12-2 in non conference play, with a number of 15-25 point wins as we overwhelm bad teams with our pressure defense. Here's a good example when everything goes right, we shoot well and play the posession game well at the same time:



But much, much more importantly are games like this one:


We take 23 more shots from the field, and have teh edge on the boards which won't happen very often. USually we take, and thus miss, a ton more shots than our opponents, so we expect to be outrebounded on the defenseive glass. But here Prairie View shoots 60% from the floor yet we blow them out of the water. This is really the crux of this system. We can survive the 30-40% shooting nights a lot more often than other teams if we're racking up steals like crazy and taking so many more shots than our opponents.

We run away with the division as well, going 11-3, and putting up some 20+ point wins over the likes of Southern Utah and Oral Roberts, teams that had been at the top of the league pretty consistantly in the early years.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Chicago State 74, (8 )UMKC 59 - we take the steals battle 21-6, forcing 30 turnovers. Its hard to lose when you force 30 turnovers. Antwan Hogan puts up 25 points in the win.

Semifinals: (1) Chicago State 70, (4) Oakland 53 - Both teams shoot poorly, 37% for both of us. We only get 12 steals today, compared to 6 for Oakland. The turnover battle is 21/13, which is a big enough edge for us to come out on top nicely. Antwan Hogan leads us with 19 points today.

Finals: (1) Chicago State 78, (7) Southern Utah 61 - Again the steals battle is close, 14 for us to 9 for S. Utah, we force 24 turnovers, only giving it up 14 times ourselves, and we shoot 16-22 from the FT line to pull away in this one. Ned Finger puts up 18 points in the win. We earn our first automatic bid to the NCAA tournament!!


NCAA Tournament

We go into the NCAA Tournament with a 26-5 record and easily put up the best seed seen by the MCC to date. We earn a 13 seed in the Midwest Region and will play 4 seed Illinois.

I watch the play by play, which I like to do in big games. I really don't expect to win but I know we can with a good shooting performance. We come out hot, taking a 5-0 lead and leading for the first 7 minutes of the game. Illinois takes their first lead with 13 minutes to go. We're just outplaying them really, we dont' get a steal for the first 11 minutes of the game and are actually at a disadvantage most of the first half. A little flurry near the end of the half though has us in it. Illinois 34, Chicago State 33 at the half. We're outshooting them 52%-46%, each team has 5 steals and the turnover totals are about the same. We're hanging in there with the big boys, at least for a half.

We hang in there for another 12 minutes or so, but the magic goes away with about 10 minutes left in the game. We lead 42-41 with about 10 minutes left and very quickly Illinois goes on a 13-0 run, leading 54-42 with 8 minutes to go. We hang in there and come back a bit, only trailing by 5 with 2 minutes left, but we're not quite there yet.








This is the trend that I expect to become more pronounced as we go on. Our point production went up dramatically, we led the nation in steals and were 26th in FG %. Those are the numbers that really skyrocket when i have the right players in place, with better half court players i'd expect to lead the nation in all 3 categories. Right now we have a team that forces a lot of turnovers, creates more posessions, but if they don't get a breakaway, they really aren't that good in a half court set. As I get better and can recruit better players that will change.






Awards

Oh yes, there are awards to be had:

I am the MCC Coach of the year.

SG Antwan Hogan is the National Freshman of the year, Freshman All-American, Conference Freshman of the year, freshman all conference, and 2nd team all conference

PG Ned Finger is the Conference Player of the year, 1st team all-conference

PG Merle Lewis is a Freshman All-American, and Freshman All-Conference

Player Review

All 5 starters will be returning next year. We lose basically nothing.


Totals: 26-6 (11-3) - MCC Tournament Champion, NCAA 1st Round - RPI 72

2008 Offseason

Our prestige has doubled. Its up to 18. The training Facilities are up to 17, triple what they were 2 years ago. Our AD is still just 'satisfied' wtih me, but their expectations haven't gone up either, I still just need to finish .500 in conference play.


Coaching Skill

I am now a level 1 coach. 10 points into offense, 10 more into defense:



Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is ranked 152nd in the country this year.



Well, Shotwell will get some playing time as I lose some of my initial recruits, but I was hoping to see better scoring. The steals are awesome and with Hogan as a scoring SG Shotwell might be able to start at SF, it just depends on what else is out there. At this point i'm starting to expect some other abilities in addition to being able to steal the ball.




The rebounding is nice, but not a scorer, or a defender, and he'll be a turnover machine. The blocked shots are intriguing and he'll certainly spend some time on the court, but I'd hope for a little bit more out of a starter.

Coaches

My budget is starting to increase, and i lose my coaching assistant. I choose to stay cheap though, hiring another 30k assistant with 35 offense/31 defense instead of trying to spend more.


Scheduling

I'm making a very, very slight boost in the scheduling that i'm doing. I'm looking for teams with prestige between 5-12 or so, instead of simply as low as humanly possible.


Training

The board is annoyed with me as i request training upgrades this season. "Their opinion of me has dropped." Hey, don't worry guys, my goal isn't to win a national title at Chicago State. By the time this first round of recruits is gone I may be at a prestige 2 or 3 conference.

Roster Overview






4 of my starters are the same as last year. Rutan wlil start as a freshman, obviously, with his 82 INS and decent defense. My offense is better as a whole, I should generate more steals than last year, and I expect to be at least as good as last season. Ned Finger is graduating after this year, as is David Sanders

2008/09 Season


Recruiting

I'm losing my own recruits for the first time after this season. We have a much improved budget to play with, $10,988/mo to spend. I try to diversify a bit, spending half my budget evalutaing big me, and half evaluating steals guys.

I go after 2 big men and 2 steals guys but that stretches me a little thin. I do land a center in the first signing period in November which helps immensely.

OOF. All three of my other targets go elsewhere in December. Where? North Carolina, NC State, Mississippi. Ok, so maybe I was aiming a little high there.

Secondary targets start coming in later in the season, I land a PG in February, and we close out the recruiting season with another PG from out west in March.


I expect this guy to come in as a good rebounder, but he didn't put up a lot of points in high school so i'm a little wary of his INS potential, but as usual, I am hopeful.



This is someone to get excited about if his actual ratings come in anywhere near his scouted ratings. Handling, Defense, Steals, some inside scoring ability? His stats give me some hope that his handling/steals are accurate, the INS/PRD would be major bonuses if they come through.




A handles, A steals, A jump shot is basically a wet dream for me. We'll see how accurate it is, this guy is ranked really lowly, but his steals and Assists stats are really solid.


Results

The non conference schedule goes as expected, we're 13-1, dropping only a game on the road where we just couldn't force any turnovers, only 8 steals. 30 point+ wins over Savannah State, Texas State, Ark-Pine Bluff, IPFW make me feel pretty good though.

We lose two conference games in early January but go crazy the rest of the year, finishing 12-2 and on top of the conference again. We go 25-3 in the regular season.

Our final regular season matchup is just a soul crushing dominating performand vs Southern Utah, a team that finished 7-7 in conference play and 15-11 overall. We beat them 104-38, 24 steals, we force 40 turnovers(40!), shoot 58% and only allow Southern Utah to shoot 29%. A nice way to enter the conference tournament.



Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Chicago State 85, (8 )Western Illinois 43 - This just isn't fair. We're 25-3, they're 4-24. Freshman center Henry Rutan puts up 20 points and 15 rebounds in this one.

Semifinals: (1) Chicago State 65, (4) Southern Utah 63 - I guess they weren't going to let us win by 66 again. We get 14 steals here but allow 10. We actually have more turnovers, 24 for us, 21 for them. Rutan saves us with a double double and helping us get a 40-31 edge on the boards as we escape into the conference finals.

Finals: (1) Chicago State 70, (7) IUPUI 47 - For the second season in a row we face the 7 seed in the finals, and for the second year in a row we put them down to earn the automatic bid to the big dance! Only 9 steals today, and looking at the box score SG stud Merle Lewis only played 3 minutes, its injury time.


Yup. SG Merle Lewis is out for the rest of the season, 38 days. Lewis has started every game for me, putting up 11 points and picking up 3.3 steals per game, 101 of them on the season. We have some depth in the steals department and will actually be putting a better ball handler on the court in Booker Silvia.



NCAA Tournament

We earn our second straight 13 seed, taking our 28-3 record up against Utah, 4th seed out West.

We come out strong, simply outplaying Utah early. We have some worries as Rutan and Evans, my starting C and PF both have 2 fouls in th efirst 3 minutes of the game, but we are just starting this game on fire. We make our first 9 field goals and have a 25-14 lead 9 minutes into the game. We cool off though and Utah makes a comeback, taking the lead for the first time in the last minute of the first half. Utah leads 49-44 at the half, we have serious foul trouble across the board, 3 fouls on 3 of our starters. We're shooting 61%, Utah 62%. Utah has 5 steals and we only have 4, we know against better teams we're going to get a couple flurries of steals but we don't expect to roll off 20 steals against a 4 seed very often in the NCAA Tournament... we need to outplay them.

In the second half we come back and only trail 60-58 with about 14 minutes to go, but both our big men pick up their 4th fouls and miss a signifgant percentage of the 2nd half. Without the big men to rebound and without Rutan to score in the half court set, we quickly fall behind by 10 and don't have it in us to come back.









A solid continuation from last year. Shooting improves a bit, we're #2 in steals but we have more steals per game this year than last.






Awards

Its time to soak up some more awards.

I am the MCC Coach of the year again.

C Henry Rutan is Conference Freshman of the year and of course on the freshman all conference team.

SG Antwan Hogan is 2nd team all conference

PG Ned Finger is the Conference Player of the year, 1st team all-conference


Player Review


Its time to say goodbye to some of my first recruits.



Sanders was a decent backup for me for 4 years, starting some in 2006 after injuries elsewhere.





Finger is a solid 4 year starter, setting the bar for some of the guys to come after him. I rarely have superstars scoring 20 a game, double figures is solid, and he really turned it on with 3.6 steals per game in his senior season. Some of Finger's records won't last long at all, but Finger sets the initial bar for career scoring(1366 points), assists(432), and steals(321). There is no one close to his assist mark just yet, steals and scoring will only last for another season or two at best.


Totals: 28-4 (12-2) - MCC Tournament Champion, NCAA 1st Round - RPI 51

2009 Offseason

Another huge prestige jump, from 18->25. We're expected to compete for the conference championship, and the board is satisfied with me.


Coaching Skill

I am now a level 2 coach. 10 more points into offense, 10 more into defense. 2 coaching improvements in two seasons is pretty awesome.


Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is ranked 108th in the country this year.



Sellers scouted as a B INS, but i'm not going to complain about this one much at all. C in ball handling means he won't be giving it away in the half court set, he's an average scorer and defender and a very good rebounder. This guy will start for me, possibly for 4 years in a row, after a redshirt year.


Slusher is a *massive* disappointment. Everything is worse than scouted, steals was an A, comes in a C, and he's a terrible student. Keeping him on the floor will be nearly impossible.



Lorenzo is a very nice suprise. A handles/A steals, this guy has a chance at breaking whatever steals records are set before him.


Coaches

My budget is up to $130,000 for coaches. I spend $60,000 on an assistant after losing my previous guy. He's a defensive specialist, 16 ofense/54 defense. My scout/recruiter remain 30k cheap guys.


Scheduling

I'm not changing anything right now. Silvia should be able to come in and be a quality PG after losing Ned Finger, but my offense may be weaker, and my depth isn't as good as far as bringing in steals guys to keep the pressure on from the bench.


Training

For the 3rd time in 4 years, we get a training facility upgrade approved. With the prestige and the training facilities soon to be up over 20, we're turning into quite a respectable level 1 program.

Roster Overview






The depth just isn't there this year, so I'm curious to see how this team will hold up.

Early Departure??

Antwan Hogan and Merle Lewis BOTH declare early for the pros. Surely they'll re-think and return.

2009/10 Season


Recruiting

Because we spent more on coaching this year, our recruiting budget acually decreases, $9,781/mo this year.

We're losing our starting PF this year, but the big hit is coming after next season, when we'll be losing Hogan, Lewis, and Silvia, the first two being guys that will be 4 year starters and near perfect steals guys out of our best recruiting class. I feel some pressure to replace them, as I don't have a full stock of players at their caliber coming up behind them.

I land a SF in November, as always, landing someone in the first signing period is a huge relief. two more guards follow in December and January and I pull in a full recruiting class.


I have no clue what to make of this. 0/C PRD is not something I've ever seen before, but he has good rebounding, 3 point, steals, and acceptable ball handling, so I'm curious to see how this one comes in.




Gatlin is someone I'm very excited about. His stats pretty much back up his ratings, he was a very good scorer, assist man and steals man in high school. The 0 stamina will take some work, but if he comes in as scouted, clearly he'll be worth it.




This isn't someone I'd normally recruit. D handles/C steals, but I'm taking a flier on him for a few reasons. One is that his 3.2 steals per game and the scouting showing a raw steals number of 57 has me hoping that he's better than a C. The other is that he put up 28.2 ppg in high school and if he does come in as a decent steals guy he could be a dominant scorer for me.


Results

We're still good in non conference play, but not as dominant. There is a noticible lack of giant blowouts, and I don't expect us to be *as* dominant in conference play. I still expect us to win the league though.

We lose our first conference game, at Southern Utah, before going on a roll and winning our remaining 7 games in January. We lose a couple more games but roll to another 1st place conference finish but we don't come through unscathed.

Antwan Hogan and Merle Lewis both come into the conference tournament injured. Hogan is out altogether, while Lewis isn't 100%. This situation is made worse by the fact that backup SF Joel Shotwell is out for 30+ days with an injury. Given all that I don't expect us to win the conference tournament this year.



Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (8 ) Western Illinois 79, (1) Chicago State 71 - Wow. I didn't expect to win but this is just bad. On top of 3 of our top 8 being injured, we run into signifgant foul trouble and struggle to stay close in this one.

Thanks to our dominant 23-6 overall record, we earn a bid to the NIT as a 7 seed. Hogan and Lewis are both back for the NIt, though we're short a backup.

Western Illinois comes out of the 8 seed in the conference to win the tournament, and not suprisingly, plays in the play-in game, losing to Southern.


NIT First Round


We have a home game vs 10 seed Tulane, but we fall way, way short.

(10) Tulane 81, (7) Chicago State 64

We shoot 29% from the floor, Tulane shoots 55%. We only have a 13-7 steals edge and 18-23 turnover edge, not nearly enough to overcome a sub-30% shooting night.





Our team shooting % comes down a bit, but the points and steals continue to work their way up. We need to shoot 2 to 3 % better. Our RPI took a big hit compared to previous seasons as well. Still, 23-7, we should see another prestige jump even without the automatic bid.





Awards

I'm the MCC Coach of the year for the 3rd year in a row.

PG Merle Lewis is 1st team All-Conference.

C Henry Rutan 2nd team all conference.

SG Antwan Hogan is 1st team all conference


Draft Update

Merle Lewis and Antwan Hogan both quickly find out that they just arne't NBA ready, and decide to return to college for their senior season's.


Player Review




Evans isn't the type of guy that you get really excited about, but he was a good, consistant rebounder and defender for 4 years for me. I have some very good young big men coming up, but Evans was just what I needed in my early years with Chicago State.




There really isn't anything to say about Ross Sanders. He was a good passer!

Totals: 23-7 (11-3) - MCC Quarterfinals, NIT 1st Round - RPI 113

Keep it up. This is great read. I like the ideas you are trying, and you are going to make me fire up my FBCB again. :P

2010 Offseason

We get a smaller prestige jump this year, from 25->28. Our AD is finally delighted with my perforamnce, and i'm expected to compete for the conference title. My training facilities are up to 21, 6th in the conference.


Coaching Skill

I am now a level 3 coach. I decide to put 5 points into every category this year. Here's what we're looking at now:



Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is ranked 95th in the country this year.



I feel exceptionally good about Vanhoose. He scouted as a D in handling and C in steals, and I brought him in anyway based on his stats, and the fact that he was a big time scorer. I got pretty much exactly what I was hoping to get.



Kennedy scouted as 0/C in PRD. Apparently that translates to F, really shitty at defense. But its ok, he can handle the ball, rebound, and steal, plus has the added benefit of being able to shoot the 3. He's a pretty ideal SF.



Gatlin is an interesting player. His ball handling potential is awful in a D, but, his actual number is a 49, which really isn't that terrible for a prestige 1 school. It'll probably be bad enough to prevent him from being a starter, but this guy could be the type that really adds depth and pressure off the bench.

Coaches

All my coaches stay. I should also point out that I have never received a job offer from another team, despite 3 dominant years in a row at a lower school.

Scheduling

We see a change this year for the first time. I still have 14 total non conference games available, but I now have 6 home games instead of just 5. I feel like I have an incredibly good team this year, and bump the scheduling up a bit. All teams this year are between 10-20 prestige.



Training

4 training approvals in 5 years. No more money for recruiting though.

Roster Overview





Silvia started at PG last year but Lorenzo is just too perfect at the point, A/A in HND and STL. Rutan and Sellers are both great defensive rebounders, as is backup King. Rutan is a great inside scorer, Hogan, Lewis, Lorenzo, Shotwell are all studs when it comes to stealing the ball, and Silvia is going to be a great backup. This team should be unstoppable.

Thanks for the comments :) I should point out that none of the ideas here are mine, I'm just making sure I really know how to implement them myself.

Radii, one of the things I found in sp fbcb is that it if you can find a way to make sure you have 2 good point guards on the floor at all times, you will win a lot of games. I often had 2 natural points in my starting rotation, and sometimes even had 3.

2009/10 Season


Recruiting

We're losing a lot this year and have four scholarships available. We must get a big man, two would be ok with the high quality steals recruits we've pulled in the past two years. Our budget hops back up over $10k/mo, to $10,550.

I go all out after big men. I offer 4 big men scholarships and try to find ones that seem likely to come my way. By November and the initial signing period though, I'm not making a lot of progress. A couple of my targets fall to the wayside in Decmember and I'm really hoping to land someone soon.

We finally do land a big man in January, and the slate is clean as we go make some new contacts trying to find a secondary big man or a steals guy to pull in to add to the class... but we have no luck. A second round of contacts doesn't pan out at all and this is a 1 man recruiting class.



I finally land a center, another big rebounder who may not be much of a scorer. This guy has a great SAT score and hopefully will be able to maximize his training, and has the intriguing blocked shot stat. F/0 HND is going to be intersting though.




Results

I sufffer a couple unexpected losses in non conference play but overall things look extremely good. My steals and scoring numbers should be at excellent high's, I'm easily leading the nation in both in non-conference play, but both of those numbers usually come down a little in January.

We come out on fire, 8-0 in conference play in January, but we actually have a bit of a race here. Valpo is 7-1, and Oral Roberts 6-2 at the halfway point.

We continue to roll and in mid february enter the top 25 for the first time! We're ranked 23rd for 2 weeks in a row, before being upset by Western Illinois and falling back out of the top 25. That loss ends up being our only conference loss, and we go into the conference tornament 25-3, 13-1 in conference play.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Chicago State 86, (8 ) IUPUI 45 - 25 steals, we force 33 turnovers. Antwan Hogan scores 36, Merle Lewis scores 20. These guys want to go out on top.

Semifinals: (1) Chicago State 66, (4) Southern Utah 62 - another close matchup vs Southern Utah. We get 17 steals to their 2, but we don't shoot well at all and they keep it close, and we're lucky to be in the finals.

Finals: (1) Chicago State 96, (6) Oakland 65 - This is our 3rd Conference Tournament Championship, and for the 3rd time, we face a heavy underdog in the finals, we've never had the 2 or 3 seed make it all the way to us. We get 20 steals, they turn it over 36 times total, and this is just a blowout. Henry Rutan owns the game in the half court set, putting up 31 points and 7 rebounds. Hogan scores 19, Lewis 14. Hogan has 7 steals too for quite a finals.



NCAA Tournament

Our RPI is in the 40s and its good enough to earn us a 10 seed in the NCAA Tournament. We're going to be taking on 7 seed Missouri.

We start off cold vs Missouri, trailing 10-2 after 5 minutes. A couple steals/easy buckets gets us going a bit, and we go on a tear, taking a 16-15 lead at the 12 minute mark. Its back and forth til about 5 minutes left in the first half when Missouri goes on a big run and takes a 12 point lead. A 3 point play by Henry Rutan on our last posession gives us a little momentum, but we trail 45-36 at the half.

We have 9 steals, Missouri 5, but the turnover battle is even, 13 each, and Missouri is outshooting us and outrebounding us.

We also have signifigant foul issues, I'm pretty sure I saw two technical fouls in that half which couldn't have helped.

In the second half we get a few steals and get hot from 3, taking a 50-49 lead with about 14 minutes to play. We stay hot, keep pushing the steals, and lead by 12 with 8 minutes left in the game. We end up playing a great second half and win by 11, our first NCAA Tournament win!





NCAA Second Round (2) #6 California vs (10) Chicago State


Wow, I'm shocked, we absolutely hang with Cal for the first half. Its entirely the shooting % though, if Cal recovers they'll crush us. Chicago State 46, Cal 44 at the half. We haev 8 steals to their 3, which has given us some easy buckets, but we're making unforced errors and actually have more turnovers overall. The difference? We're shooting 53%, Cal 40%.

The second half remains close. We're really pressing them hard, and around the 5 minute mark we pull ahead with a few 3 pointers and fast break opportunities, and in the end we hang on and beat the #6 team in the nation!!!



NCAA Sweet Sixteen (10) Chicago State vs (3) #13 Illinois

Illinois knocked us out last year, and we get another chance at it.

We play great for 14 minutes or so, but fall apart at the end of the half. Illinois scores the last 16 poitns of the half, and takes a 45-31 lead into the locker room. Rutan picked up 3 fouls and was a non factor and we're very cold. Steals are even at 4, Illinois has better ball handlers than Cal and we cna't exploit them.

The second half is the same and we're blown out, ending a magical season.





Illinois ends up making the final four, losing to UCLA, who wins the national title over Wake Forest.

Just a stellar season.



This is the type of numbers I expect to see at higher levels, I'm suprised it worked so well here. Leading the nation in scoring, steals, and 2nd in FG %.






Awards

I'm the MCC Coach of the year for the 4rd year in a row.

PG Carmelo Lorenzo is a National Freshamn of the year, Freshman All-American, MCC Freshman of the year, and on the MCC

Freshamn team, 2nd team all conference

PG Merle Lewis is 2nd team All-American!! and 1st team All-Conference.

SG Antwan Hogan 1st team All American!! MCC Player of the year, 1st team all conference

C Matthew Sellers is Freshamn all MCC

C Henry Rutan 2nd team all conference.

What a season!


Player Review


So a season like this has its downside. Its full of senior leadership that has to be replaced.


If Silvia was a little better scorer, or A in steals, he'd have been a force for 4 years. As it is, he was an exceptionally important backup, and an argument could be made that we'd have been better with him starting, but I'm forcing the STL rating and I had better.



Hogan was a 4 year starter with a slew of awards, including 1st team all american as a senior, when he proved to be a dominant scorer. Hogan wlil be sorely missed.




Another hard to replace 4 year starter, Hogan and Lewis were a powerful backcourt combo that took this program to heights it might not see again.


Hogan leaves as the all time Chicago State steals leader with 475. Lewis is 2nd with 462. Silvia is 4th with 204, though that won't last. Hogan and Lewis also leave 1/2 in Chicago State history in points. They also lead the nation in career steals, Hogan 1st, Lewis second, the first two guys to play for me in what will become a long line of dominant steals men.

Totals: 30-4 (13-1) - Conference Champion, NCAA Sweet 16 - RPI 42

I'm enjoying this one, as well.

I was going to mention something similar to what st.cronin was saying, basically that you can always switch players around to other positions, like he does by making PGs into SGs. I was going to suggest making Kennedy into a PF, as he is probably strong enough and beefy enough to defend inside and then create mismatches with his shooting on offense.

Also, keep on eye on the athleticism numbers (quickness, strength, jump, stamina) with the type of pressure defense you are running.

2011 Offseason - Jumping Ship

Big prestige jump this year, as expected. 28->36. We're now the top prestige team in the conference. Southern Utah has fallen to 33, and Valpo to 32. Western Illinois has fallen below where we started, they're down to 4.

My best recruiting class just graduated, and I've basically taken Chicago state to the top of the conference. This would be the perfect time to jump ship and move up to a bigger conference... lets see if any offers come in.


Job Offers

I get 8 job offers. Weber State, Vermont, Rider, Montana, Jacksonville State, Furman, Davidson, and Austin Peay.


I considered staying, and holding out for a prestige 3 conference, but Vermont seems like too good a situation. Their budget is $292,000/yr, giving me $15,000/mo, give or take depending on how much I spend on my coaches. Their prestige is 34, and here's the big thing... their training facilities are rated 66, tops in the America East Conference. Combine that with a reasonable job expectation, finishing .500 in conference, and this looks like a situation that can be turned around very quickly with some decent recruiting.


Before I take the job, here's a quick look back:






Onward and upward!



Coaches

My coaches follow me to Vermont, but they won't stay long I dont' think. We have a recommended salary total of $180,000, I was only spending $120,000. Its time to upgrade. I pick up a new assistant, offense 61/defense 58, for $90,000/yr. My recruiting coordinator only has a 47 in recruiting but he's still a 30k coach so I leave it for now.


Scheduling

Since I don't know a lot about this team, I'm just going to schedule the worst teams around, all under 10 prestige, and worry about that sort of thing once I bring in my own recruits.

We have total games to schedule, 6 of them get to be at home.


Training

Despite having the best training facilities in the conference, and way better than i'd expect out of a level 2 conference team(66), I get approval for training improvements for next year, hooray!



Roster Overview

I leave everything on auto this year. There are some decent players on the team but nothing special.

I've done a little position switching, a couple PG->SG and one SG->SF, and of course guys play out of position all the time. I haven't paid much attention to the physical numbers, I notice when a guy has low stamina and adjust their playing time accordingly, now that you mention it though I'm curious if there's a signifigant correlation with quickness and steals.

2010/11 Season


Recruiting

We have 5 scholarships available in year one. Our budget is $12,212/mo. Of course, I'm not going to try to land 5 players this year, but i'm hoping for 3.

Whew, this just isn't going well. I missed some targets by aiming too high, and my initial targets for steals weren't anywhere near the type of guys I want for my system. I did land a SF early, and a PF in January, and another big man in February. I'm not thrilled with any of these guys though.




I'm not thrilled with Wagner, mainly because of his handling rating, but I'm struggling to find good players that I have a shot at here, and I'm basically hoping that the fact that he has good A/T stats means that his handling is better than scouted.



Hopefully a good rebounding and defensive PF. He may be a better scorer than scouted, his FG % is 53% which is usually a solid sign.



Landry looks like another solid defensive PF, perhaps a decent scorer as well.


Results

2-2 in November vs the worst teams in the nation. December is better and we go into conference play with an 8-3 record.

Wow, we actually end up decent, going 9-7 in conference play and finishing 4th.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (4) Vermont 94, (5) Albany 64

Semifinals: (1) Northeastern 93, (4) Vermont 86


Northeastern wins the conference, earning a 10 seed, beating 7 seed Marshall before losing to St John's.

Kentucky beats Arizona for the national title. Alabama and St John's also make the final four.


Not a bad starting point.




Totals: 18-12 (9-7) - America East Semifinals - RPI 173

I don't believe there is. I play on the 1-10 rating scale, and I had a PG who averaged 4.7spg with a quickness rating of 8 (which is probably between 65-75 in the 100 rating scale).

The only noticeable affects of quickness to me have been that quick PGs break the press for easy baskets more frequently, break away for fastbreaks from steals more frequently, and seem to drive to the basket more frequently as well.

No doubt it affects other things as well, but these have been the most noticeable after watching the pbp for hundreds of games.

How'd Chicago State do the year after their greatest coach and graduating class ever left?

Great read, makes me want to fire the game up again.

I think the physical stuff mostly correlates to fouls.

Chicago State went 23-8, 12-2 in conference, but got upset in the MCC Finals so didn't make the big dance. Their prestige continues to rise, to 39.

2012 Offseason

Vermont's Prestige is stagnant at 34. That's ok by me, not dropping is all I hope for the first few seasons.

My AD is Delighted with me, and wants a .500 conference record. The training facilities are up to 73, well above anyone else in this conference.


Coaching Skill

I'm moving up the food chain faster than expected, getting another coaching skill increase. I dump 5 more poitns into each category. Here's my current coaching profile.



Incoming Recruits

My first Vermont Recruiting Class is ranked 106th in the nation.



He comes in similar to how he was scouted, not as good a rebounder, but the scoring/handling/steals all match what i scouted him at. The handling is scary, and having Wagner + two big men coming in this year will delay the pressing/trapping system for a season for sure.




gaaaaaah. Disappointing.





Here's a guy that can play, and he will, believe me. This is a very, very disappointing class, and it'll hold me up a bit, I really need to bring in some quality players this year.



Coaches

I lose my recruiting coordinator, and fire my assistant. I had a $90,000 assistant, which I can't afford now that I've lost my $30K recruiter. I end up with a $50K recruiter and $55K assistant. The recruiter has a skill of 43, assistant 34 offense/50 defense.

Scheduling

There are a lot of teams who have fallen to prestige 0 or 1. They're all playing Vermont this year.

Training/Budget

We get a request for more money approved! $24,000 more for the season to spend on recruiting. This is huge.


Roster Overview

I redshirt the freshmen but other than that i leave everything on auto.

Thanks radii. I spent 4 hours playing this game last night. :P I even took another job and trying your "gameplan" to see how it works. I used to only redshirt great players with low stats their first season.

Please continue. I love it.

2011/12 Season


Recruiting

We have 5 scholarships available again this year, and a budget of $15,908/mo, which is much bigger than last year. We go hard after steals/handles guys, that's all I care about this year. We land our first guy in the initial signing month, a huge win for us. In December we add two more guys and fill out a hopefully solid class.

I spend the rest of the season scouting and trying to land a big man, but have no luck.



The academics may be an issue, but i need this, badly. the jumper, FT's, ball handling, defense, and steals. Now, we've seen 0/C ratings turn out to actually be 'F', so hopefully 19/A doesn't end up being a D. He has good stats which has me hopeful.


A pretty ideal SG if he comes in as scouted, the defense is a weakness but not one that I'm going hold someone off the court because of.


Perlman looks like the worst of the 3 recruits, but really, if these 3 guys have the handling/steals that i'm scouting them at, I'm in great shape.



Results

This team is so, so bad. All those teams with 0 and 1 prestige, the worst teams in the nation? Some of them are beating us. We go 6-6 in our non conference schedule. We manage to go 3-3 in January to open up conference play, and end up 7-9, which is perfectly alright by me.



NOTE: The standings I'm posting now are as of the end of the regular season, just to show the seeding for the conference tourney. I always forget to come back and update the standings after the tournaments, plus the overall record can give stuff away.

Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (2) Boston University 70, (7) Vermont 50

Binghamton wins the conference tournament, earning a 13 seed, and losing to 4 seed Kentucky in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Illinois beats Kentucky to win the national title. Wake Forest and Stanford also make the final four.



bad bad bad. Expect a prestige drop next year.




Totals: 13-16 (7-9) - America East Quarterfinals - RPI 257

2013 Offseason

The prestige does indeed drop, from 34->31. We might see another drop this year, but hopefully not too far and next season is when we should start to turn around. My goals remain the same(finish .500 in conference) and my AD is now just satisfied in me. If he'll hold on for this season, which I expect to be pretty poor, we'll get things fixed up.



Incoming Recruits

This strikes of similarities to my big stud filled recruit class at Chicago State in my second season. We pull in the 54th best recruiting class in the nation.




Torres is solid. This is the guy that was 19/A in handling when I scouted him. I'm not going to complain about the 31/C actual rating after that. The jump shot and steals is going to make this guy a serious threat for me.



Perlman is a disappoitment, his defense and steals both come in lower than scouted. Perlman will probalby play given the state of the team currently but not much.




Rodriguez is another solid system player for me. I need to pull in a guy at some point who has handling better than a C, but for my initial push to force more turnovers, I'm well on my way now with Rodriguez and Torres.


Coaches

There are no coaching changes this year.

Scheduling

We have no reason to schedule good teams yet, or really, even teams that are less than 'absolutely horrid'


Roster Overview

The freshmen redshirt. I put everything on auto with minimal changes. Two of my recruits will be starting. PF Padgett and SF Wagner will start, while PF Landry is the top big man off the bench.

2012/13 Season


Recruiting

We only have two scholarships to worry about this year. The budget to fill those two slots is $12,600/mo. I make my initial contacts hoping to pull one big man and one steals guy, but it doesn't work out that way. I don't really find any big men anywhere close to what I want, and go hard after some solid looking steals guys instead.



Please, please please come into Vermont with B handling and A steals! This guy was a good scorer and shooter in high school, so hopefully the shooting ratings are accurate as well.



Its very likely that no one will be able to bring the ball all the way up the court against me with some of these guys that are coming in. Vereen isnt' much of a scorer but the fact that some of the other guards are has me not so concerned about the big men, I have rebounders and defenders in the post, but next year i'll have to start bringing in some more for sure.


Results

Things are a little better this year, and we do technically meet our goals, .500 in conference play!


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (4) Binghamton 88, (5) Vermont 80

Binghamton goes on to win their 2nd straight conference tournament.

This is actually a pretty big NCAA Tournament for the America East! Binghamton is a 14 seed, they upset Oklahoma State in round one before falling to 6 seed Mississippi. Additionally, Boston University earns an at large bid, an 11 seed. Boston U upsets the 6 seed UConn, before falling to Cincinnati.


Chicago State goes 24-8 and I see them in the big dance too, a 14 seed, losing to UCLA.



Stanford wins the national title over Notre Dame. Duke and Cincinnati also make the final four.


Awards

SF Justin Wagner is America East Freshman of the year, and also makes the 1st team All Conference!

PF Jack Landry is freshman all conference as well.

Wagner averages 13.7 ppg, 4.7 rebounds, and 1 steal a game.

Landry has 5.2 ppg/6.3 rpg

My other freshman, John Padgett had 5.9 ppg/7.6 rpg before getting hurt 16 games into the season.


Better than last year at least?




Totals: 16-13 (8-8) - America East Quarterfinals - RPI 219

Great read and great work. I would focus way more on the physical attributes, especially when you're looking for a scorer. Stamina and fouls probably aren't important for you since you run such a deep rotation. But quickness and jumping can make a huge difference in a high-pressure defense.

Thanks for the comments :) My budget is slowly increasing, right now i pretty much can get the handling and steals that I care the most about, and for the most part i have to ignore the secondary traits that I'm interested in(defense/scoring) b/c I just don't have that many guys to choose from yet. I'm going to start making a note of how the guys with exceptional quickness/jumping do vs other guys with similar ratings as I find them though.

2014 Offseason

We have another small prestige drop, from 31->29. We expect this number to start going up this year. Our AD remains satisfied with me, and our goals remain .500 in conference play.


Incoming Recruits

We have the 93rd rated recruiting class in the nation. That's 2nd in the conference, Maine pulled in the #57 class.




My scouting on Vereen was fairly accurate, C HND/A PRD/A STL is great for me. He'll be ok at the line and good from 3, this guy will be a big player for me.



And Lajoie is going to be good for me as well, another jump shooter, with defense and steals. I'm veyr pleased with the steals guys in the last two classes, I am a bit disappointed that *all* my guys have a C handling rating, I'd like to pull in someone better than that to run the point, but this will be good enough to get me going.

Coaches

We lose our assistant, the new one we bring in has a 30 offense/49 defense rating, for $55,000. Nothing great at all.

Scheduling

Though I expect us to be better, I'm more interested in winning games now, and worrying about pumping up the schedule for an improved RPI later. Everyone is below 10 prestige on the schedule this season.

Training/Budget

Both requests are denied, and as I request a higher budget the AD's opinion of me lowers.


Roster Overview


I convert Lajoie, one of my freshman who is getting redshirted, to a PG for training camps.





We're not quite there yet. We'll be better this year, but this is a team full of freshmen and sophomores, and the ball handling and even the steals aren't up to snuff quite yet. We'll see how it goes though!

2014/15 Season


Recruiting

Two scholarships, and we need at least one big guy, prefereably two. We go crazy contacting big men in our initial evaluation period. I haven't landed anyone in the first signing period, but I haven't lost any guys either, I have the lead on two good rebounders that I hope will pan out.

The first recruit I land looks like a good scorer and rebounder who can't play a lick of defense. We try to find another big man but nothing pans out over the next couple months and we end up leaving a scholarship on the table.



That'll work out just fine if the scouting is accurate. The defending is horrid of course but A good scorer and rebounder will fit in just fine.


Results

We're not rolling over people, but we do a lot better this year vs the crap non conference teams we scheduled, 10-2 going into conference play. We're tied for first place in the conference at the halfway mark, and we end up tying Boston U for first in the conference.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Vermont 77, (8) Hartford 36 - 18 steals, but mainly Hartford shot 27% from the field. We haven't really been blowing teams out like this, so this is a nice suprise. All 5 of our starters are in double figures.

Semifinals: (1) Vermont 69, (4) Stony Brook 44 - Steals and turnovers are even, but again, Stony Brook barely shoots 30% giving us an easy win.

Finals: (1) Vermont 73, (2) Boston University 65 - WOOHOO. 12 steals for us, 5 for them, we have 8 less turnovers and win a sloppy game where we shoot 35% and Boston U shoots 39%.


We earn the 13 seed in the East Region. We'll play Alabama, 21-11 SEC power.


NCAA Tournament

Alabama tears out to a big lead, 30-13, but we get extremely hot and only trail 40-39 at the half. Its a very close second half, but we fall behind 80-74 with just 50 seconds left. Alabama presses us and fouls, we make two free throws. We get a steal right after the inbounds pass is made and get a breakaway dunk to make it a 2 point game with 41 seconds left. Alabama throws the ball out of bounds. We tie the game up. Alabama scores with 8 seconds left to go up 82-80, but they foul us with no time left on the clock as we try to get off a game tying shot. We make both free throws and its OVERTIME.


A sloppy overtime has us trailing 88-87 with 10 seconds left. We have to foul Bama, they make both FTs, and we get the ball with 5 seconds left on the clock. Dwight Torres takes a 3 pointer, but misses, and we can't force a second OT. But hey, this team isn't nearly as good as I expect to have here, so this is a great first step for Vermont.




Awards

I am the America East Coach of the year.

SG Torres is America East Freshman of the year

PG Perlman is on the Freshman all conference team

SF Justin Wagner is America East First Teamer

PF Jack Landry is America East Second Teamer

PF Josh Padgett is America East First Teamer



We commit a ton of fouls, which will decrease as we improve. The other stats begin trending in the right direction, we score pretty well, get 11 steals a game, and have a baseline FG % to improve from.







My top 8 players all return next year, and we'll have Vereen and Lajoie added into the mix.



Totals: 24-8 (11-5) - America East Champion, NCAA First Round - RPI 97

2015 Offseason

The prestige takes a nice jump, from 29->34, back where it was when I took over the vermont job. Our AD is satisfied, and our .500 Conference record goal is the same.


Job Offers

I get four job offers, all from level 3 conference schools, LA Lafayette, Loyola-Chicago, Drexel, and Denver. I think, though, that I am going to hold out for a bit longer and establish some dominance at Vermont before moving on. If I can get a steady stream of good talent coming in I might hold out for a level 4 school, we'll see. But I definitely want to accomplish a little more here first.


Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is rated 182nd. Not suprising given that we only brought in one recruit.


And I do get what I was hoping for out of Xiong, he can score and rebound. This will work out fine for me.

Coaches

We lose our scout, and bring in one for $60,000 who is about the same talent level, 46 in scouting.

Scheduling

I up the scheduling a little, going after teams in the prestige 8-15 range this season.

Training/Budget

We don't get a training improvement but we do get $22,840 added to our budget for recruiting, which is excellent.


Roster Overview





We make a couple changes here from last season. I bring Lajoie in to play the point, his stamina is an issue and his playing time is set a bit lower than the rest of the starters. Wagner, who is a great scorer, sits in favor of guys who can handle the ball and steal a bit better than him. The bench backcourt of Wagner, Perlman and Vereen is a great second string.

2015/16 Season


Recruiting

We have 3 scholarships available this year and really just want the best players we can find. I'm still looking for a B or beter handler to run the point. In an interesting twist, a top 100 player has high interest in me initially. I expect it to drop but i'm checking him out anyway.

Well, I find the PG I want, A handling/B Steals, not terribly highly ranked, but in October Auburn finds him too and I have to drop off. I do land a SF in the initial recruit signing period and hopefully can land a couple more players before we're done. I land an oddity of a Center in December.



Baskerville looks like a pretty good SF target, he has the average hands I'm accustomed too and is a good steals guy, his rebounds will be a big help from the SF position and he can shoot a bit too.



So Musselman doesn't scout all that great, but I'm extremely curious about him. He averaged 24 points and 7.3 rebounds per game in high school, and shot 52%, all of the stats I look for, so I'm hopeful that my scouting is off and he comes in better. If not, he'll be a backup.

Results

We open going 5-0 in November, our best start yet. We're 11-1 finishing up non-conference play, but suffer a couple injuries and lose our first three conference games. We're 4-4 at the halfway point in the conference season, but we recover very nicely, going 10-6 in conference and finishing 2nd to Boston U.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (2) Vermont 74, (7) New Hampshire 58 - 15 steals, forcing 26 turnovers, and winning the rebounding battle gets us a good win here. C Jack Landry gives us 13 points and 12 boards for the game MVP.

Semifinals: (2) Vermont 75, (3) Maine 61 - This one feels good. Maine embarrassed us 86-60 at their place and beat us 91-90 at home, avoiding a 3rd loss to them is excellent. Steals are even, 7/8 for us/them, and we actually turn it over more than they do, we only forced 13 turnovers total. But we shoot 75% from the line and have a big 41-30 rebounding edge in the win. Landry gives us 12 poitns/16 boards, while Torres gives us 26 points.

Finals: (1) Boston U 79, (2) Vermont 72 - Boston U shoots 53%, including 9-19 from 3, which is enough to offset 24 turnovers, including 17 steals that we picked up today. A disappointing loss, but there is a postseason in our future!

Our RPI is 49 this year, good enough to qualify for a NIT bid. We're a 2 seed in the NIT

NIT First Round: (7) Georgia Tech 89, (2) Vermont 70

Ga Tech shoots 55% against us and I lose to my alma mater to end our season.



Awards

I am the America East Coach of the year for the second season in a row.

PG Merle Lajoie: Conference Freshman of the Year

PF Josh Padgett: 1st Team All-conference

SG Dwight Torres: 1st Team All-Conference

SG Brian Rodriguez: 2nd Team All-Conference

PF Jack Landry: 2nd Team All Conference




We're turning the ball over way too much. Looking at our best Chicago State teams we were around 14.5-15.5 turnovers a game. 19 is just way too much, and we have got to find a ball handling PG. The other numbers are looking good, our scoring, steals, and FG% are all looking solid.







Center Michael Riedel is the only guy in the top 9 of our rotation that graduates.


Totals: 23-9 (10-6) - America East Runner Up, NIT First Round - RPI 49

good read :) I´ve long read in the forums about various FBCB dynasties and the strategy topics (it´s crazy that a FOFC forum offers more than the original FBCB forums ever did) . I´ve also done your approach to the game multiple times, basically i allways do with small exceptions follow 1 rule : Can´t score without the ball. So basically i had my biggest success not with teams with polished star players all arround but with "possession players" (good ball handlers, steals guys, rebounders and shot blockers) with a couple exception players thrown in (mostly a great shooter, an inside scoring big or a versatile Small Forward)
In fact, my favourite players allways have been Small Forwards that can steal and rebound. Just currently i am at Long Island (7th season) started 10-1 with a 6´8 SF who averages 11 points but also 8+ rebounds, 3,5 steals and 3 assists (on 2,4 TOs) .

Great dynasty Radii, you made me wanted to start to play FBCB in solo mode again. This game is really great, i wish Heavyreign were working in a new version instead of in the pro game.

2016 Offseason

Prestige is up from 34->38 this year, up 9 points in the last two seasons, and Vermont is moving in the right direction for sure now. Our goals have risen, we now are expected to compete for the conference championship, and the board is delighted in me.


Job Offers

Job offers come from Toledo, Akron, Kent State and Arkansas State, out of the MAC and Sun Belt. We decline both.


Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is rated 101st, tops in the America East.


Well this is an interesting development. I finally have someone with a 'B' in ball handling. He's a 6'7" SF though, and he can't defend the perimeter. i'll have to debate whether to try to turn him into Magic Johnson or not next year.




Our first High School all-American, rated so low b/c of the defense I suppose. He'll need some work on his stamina, but he can score and rebound, so we have a use for him in the paint for sure.


Coaches

No coaching changes this year.

Scheduling

I bump up the scheduling again, scheduling teams in the 15-25 prestige range, this should be a banner year for us and its worth it to have a slightly more consistant non-conference schdeule.

Training/Budget

The board is pissed when I ask for training upgrade, and they deny a budget increase as well. I have 5 scholarships to fill, I need more money!

Roster Overview





Padgett, Landry, and Wagner graduate after this season. Lajoie's ball handling is slowly increasing and the steals these guys can generate should be really impressive this year.


Early Departure

SG Dwight Torres plans on leaving early. I'd hate to see him go, and hopefully he's not quite good enough yet to get drafted.

2016/17 Season


Recruiting

Our budget is up to $13,738/mo (without getting any extra money), and we have 5 scholarships available. That's quite a bit obviously, and I hope to just fill 3 of them. A pure PG is the top goal this year. arrrgggh. I make 5 scholarship ofers, 5 local guys that look like solid fits, focusing on two guards that I scout as A and B handles, they get everything thrown at them that i am allowed... and by October, I have to drop off. B handles is just hard to find and land here it seems.

I land a SG in November that looks like a very good fit for me. I pick up a PF who had very high interest in me that scouted well, and a PG in December, but i don't land the top handles guy that I wanted.


A good shooter, average ball handler, and a good steals guy. Assuming the steals comes in alright, he'll be set to be a good scorer for me. I am a little worried about that, 31/B seems like one of those ratings that might end up being 30/C once it comes in, but I'm not confidant enough in that judgement yet to lay off him, so we'll see how he comes in next year.




A good inside game, rebounding and blocked shots, not someone i would have gone real hard after normally, but when he showed up at my doorstep with very high interest, he's certainly good enough to open the door and let him in.


EDIT: Oops, pasted the wrong guy for our 3rd recruit. See the next offseason for the final recruit, another average handler/good steals guy.


Results

We win our first game and earn the #21 ranking in the nation, and immediately lose our next two games. We're 3-3 through November and 8-4 after non conference play, I actually expected to do better. We come on strong in conference play, 7-1 halfway through the conference season. We go 7-1 in the 2nd half as well and end quite nicely.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Vermont 91, (8) Albany 62 - We get 17 steals, but we allow 11. Torres and Rodriguez both put up 20 points, and Landry and Padgett both get 10 boards in this win.

Semifinals: (1) Vermont 77, (5) New Hampshire 62 - 18 steals for us, but again, they get 9 steals. Torres puts up a double double, 17 points, 11 rebounds, from the SF spot, and we're 1 game away from the big dance.


Starting PF John Padgett suffers an injury in the semifinals that will have him out for 41 games, the end of his college career. Freshman John Xiong comes in to hold down the fort.


Finals: (1) Vermont 52, (6) Maine 43 - Its an ugly game. We shoot 33%, Maine shoots 27%. We take 23 3 poitners(WHY), going 1-23 from 3. We only get 4 steals which is just horrible, but, shooting as poorly as we did and being unable to score, we didn't get the chance to put on the press enough. But hey, we win, and we're in the NCAA Tournament!


NCAA Tournament

Whoa, we have a solid RPI of 41, and we earn a 9 seed in the big dance! We get St Louis in the first round. Stanford(27-7) is the 1 seed in our region. We actually earn a ranking, #21, with the tournament win.


We know we can't shoot 33% and win here, so here's hoping for a stronger offensive performance. Ugh... 10 minutes into the game we're trailing 20-6, and shooting 20% from the floor. Boy, this is ugly. We trail 33-18 at the half. St Louis has 7 steals, we have 5. We're shooting 30%, St Louis 45%... it'll take quite a run to get back into this.

I'll let the box score speak for itself.



Sad, sad sad. But, its a stepping stone, we need to be in the NCAA Tournament consistantly.


Awards

I am the America East Coach of the year for the third season in a row.


SG Dwight Torres: Conference Player of the Year

SG Brian Rodriguez: 2nd Team All-Conference

PF Josh Padgett: 2nd Team All-conference



I love the RPI, 25-7 is great, but 13.7 steals is less than I expect, and 43.5% shooting is horrible. They probalby correlate, shooting poorly means we couldn't put on the full court press as often. This needs to improve, and I believe it wlil, as we'll start to improve in the half court set with the inside scorers we've recruited recently. Its entirley personal preference, but I really prefer to be able to pound the ball inside when I'm playing a half court game.




Landry, Padgett, and Wagner graduate, so we'll be relying on youth in the post next year.

Early Departure

SG Dwight Torres will return for his senior season, he wouldn't be drafted.


Player Review



Never quite a double double guy, he came close, and was a valuable player for me out of my first recruiting class.



Another solid big man out of my first recruiting class, he couldn't score much, but he did shoot over 50% and was a good rebounder down low.


An offensive stud, he lost his starting job because of his ball handling and because i had better steals guys. I have to wonder if I would have been better with him in the lineup those last two years, but not too much, as my results were really very good.

Totals: 25-7 (14-2) - America East Champion, NCAA First Round - RPI 41, Final Poll Ranking #21

2017 Offseason

We get another big prestige jump, from 38->43. Nothing else changes, we need to compete for the conference championship, and the board is delighted with us.

Coaching Skill

I'm now a level 5 coach, and I keep with my pattern of putting 5 poitns into each stat. 45 recruiting/15 scouting/45 offense/95 defense.


Job Offers

Looots of job offers:

Youngstown State, Townson, Old Dominion, Jacksonville, George Mason, Eastern Michigan, Cleveland State. They're all from level 3 schools and I continue to hold out for a bigger jump. In a later round I get offered William & Mary, Western Michigan, Virginia Commonwealth, Pepperdine and Ohio... no thanks!

In round 3 I get a very interesting offer... Gonzaga. Training facilities 96, prestige 66, one of the best teams in a prestige 3 conference in the country. I'd have huge advantages coaching them vs the West Coast Conference, but I really want to take Vermont a bit further unless I get a jump to a prestige 4 conference, so no dice.


Incoming Recruits

Our recruiting class is rated 74th, tops in the America East.


His physical skills are a little better than scouted, and his handling/stelas came in as scouted, so I'm pleased. A good jump shooter who will be a nice SG for me.


Back looks as good as advertised as well. In fact his defense has better potential than scouted, which is a great result. His strength could be an issue perhaps?


Given the lack of ball handling on this team, this guy might be my point guard for a few seasons. He can shoot free throws and defend, both talents that I value a bit more from my PG than my other backcourt players.

Coaches

All three of my coaches want a raise. My recruiter and assistant have both shown some skill improvement and I go ahead and give them their raises. All my coaches end up staying, including the scout I didn't give a raise to.


Scheduling

I keep the scheduling range where it was last year. We weren't the dominant force I expected to be at times, and we lost our Center and Power Forward, so I'm going to be a little conservative here.

Training/Budget

No training or budget help this year.

Roster Overview





Everyone on the floor can shoot, this is actually quite the offensive team if I can get them open jump shots, and Rodriguez/Lajoie should be a serious force in the press.

2017/18 Season


Recruiting

I gave out a couple raises to my coaches this year and despite the prestige jump my budget is way down, $11k/mo to recruit with. I have four scholarships available, but I need to concentrate on landing two guys really.

I land a recruit in the first signing period, a good ball handler who may or may not fit my system with the steals. A SF signs in December, and we close out recruiting in February with a solid looking big guy.


Puryear has a lot of steals in HS and a reasonably solid actual rating, and I'm taking a chance that he comes in better than scouted in the steals department. I can land C handling/B steals guys at will, so I feel like I can take a little risk here.



I like the INS at the SF position, and he can defend the perimeter and steal the ball. His rebounding has me thinking he might make a better SG, but then I look at his quickness and wonder if he'll really fit there or not...


I'm pretty excited about McCroy. This guy is ranked a little low(280 overall, 82nd in his region/60th ranked Center), but his stats are awesome. 25 points, 10 rebounds, 2.5 blocks, and a 57.5% shooter from the field. He scouts excellently as well, and I hope to have pulled a gem towards the end of the recruiting season.

Results

We're 5-1 after November and appear to be putting up better numbers overall. We jump into the top 25 in mid-december, actually earning the #17 ranking in the country. We're 11-1 going into conference play and things are looking good. We do well in conference play, going 11-5 and taking 1st place, but the dominance is just a little off still. We suffer a 19 point loss to Albany and while we do get some solid blowout wins, we just don't get as many, or as consistantly, as I was expecting by now.


Conference Tournament

Quarterfinals: (1) Vermont 71, (8) Hartford 39 - See, this is why I complain about not having as many dominant wins, I didn't do anything like this in the regular season, but here we go. We get 19 steals, hartford actually gets 10, we turn it over too much, but we shoot well from 3, board well and just shut down Hartford.

Semifinals: (1) Vermont 84, (4) Binghamton 33 - WHOA. We definitely didn't do anything close to this in the regular season. 51 poitns, really? We get 23 steals(we stlil allow 11 steals... TOO MANY), binghamton turns it over 34 times overall, shoots terribly, and wow... Halftime Score: Vermont 35, Binghamton 9. Dwight Torres has one of the best games I've ever seen. 16-23 from the field, 7-8 from the line, 5-7 from 3 point land. 44 points, 6 rebounds, 8 steals.

Finals: (1) Vermont 88, (2) Northeastern 68 - This is what I expected in the regular season.. if I lose, its close, and I can beat my closest competition by 20+. Its a turnover fest. I get 21 steals and force 38 turnovers. Unfortunately N'eastern gets 16 steals and forces us into 32 turnovers. Embarrassing. We dominate the boards and shoot well from 3(12-28) in the win. Merle Lajoie comes close to a triple-double with 11 points, 9 assists, and 7 steals in this one.


NCAA Tournament

Our RPI is lower this year and we get a 13 seed in the big dance. We're taking on Wake Forest, in a down year for them. They're 24-7 this year, and their RPI of 19 is their 'worst' ever. They have 2 NCAA Championships, have made the finals and lost 3 times and have one additional final four. Clearly, I'm a little in awe of the Demon Deacons.

We come out on fire, getting 4 early steals on the way to a 12-0 lead 3 minutes into the game. Wake calls a timeout and their offense warms up, tkaing a 20-19 lead with 14 minutes left in the first half, this is going to be quite a game at this rate. We cool off and Wake threatens to run away with the game. A flurry of steals(3 in the final 45 seconds of the half) has us cut the lead under 10. Wake Forest 52, Vermont 45 at the half. We have 9 steals, Wake has 6. We have 9 turnovers, Wake 13. The big problem? Wake is shooting 66% from the floor... we can't win that way.

Yeah, Wake Forest is just too good for us. they push the lead up over 10 right away and just run away with it.



Another good season, another NCAA Tournament Bid. Wake Forest wins theird 3rd national title, beating UCLA in the finals, while Illinois and Stanford make the Final four.


Awards

I am the America East Coach of the year for the fourth season in a row.

C Olen Mussleman: Conference Freshman of the Year

SG Dwight Torres: Conference Player of the Year, 2nd Team All-American

PG Merle Lajoie: 2nd Team All-Conference

SG Brian Rodriguez: 2nd Team All-Conference

SF David Baskerville: Freshman All-Conference



This is a drastic improvement over last year. The steals are up, the FG% is up 2%, we're decent from 3 and good from the line. We need to improve on tihs, but its going to be pretty damn difficult.





Three guys average over 3 steals a game, Rodriguez and Lajoie almost hit 4 steals a game, Torres is a scoring machine and the big men are off to a decent start given that they were the young guys in the lineup. Replacing the stars will be the challenge here.


Player Review


A solid backup, I was disappoited in how Perlman came in not really good at anything, but he was a good backup PG.




Rodriguez really came through as a senior, shooting 52.6%, he was part of the turnover problem but he more than made up for it with the steals and pressure on D.




Torres will be very difficult to replace. A solid steals guy, great scoring, a decent rebounder(he played most of his career at SF).


Torres and Rodriguez are record breakers for me. Torres leaves college with 2043 points, far and away more than anyone else in Vermont history. In fact, Rodriguez is 2nd with 1480.

Rodriguez leaves with 381 steals, Torres leaves with 349, first and second in school history. Lajoie should eclipse that next year.

Rodriguez is 7th all time in the NCAA in steals, Torres is 18th. 3 of my Chicago State players are in the top 10.

Totals: 25-7 (11-5) - America East Champion, NCAA First Round - RPI 64

2018 Offseason

Prestige goes from 43->48, despite the fact that i haven't gotten out of the first round yet,we are flying upwards still. Our goal is now "Win the conference championship." instead of just 'competing for' the title. Our AD is of course delighted.


Job Offers

Its time to leave Vermont. I get tons of job offers, but two offers for level 4 conference teams. Fordham from the A-10, and Nevada from the WAC.

Fordham has a prestige of 43, and a team budget of $400,969. Fordham has a very mediocre history. Their prestige was 50 at one point but never went below 41. They've only been to the NCAA tournament twice. The A-10 is a strong conference. Temple has a prestige of 79, Dayton 84, George Washington 82, St Bonaventure is in the 70s, and a couple teams in the 60s. Fordham would be a legitimate challenge to take to the top of the A-10.


Nevada has a prestige of 41, and a budget of $403,750. They've never made the postseason, and have been very static, prestige ranging from 38-41 over the last 14 seasons. Boise State and San Jose State both have prestige's in the 80s, and Nevada has the lowest prestige at 41, but many more teams are in the 50-60 range here.



I decide to take the Fordham job. The reason is that I expect to be here for awhile, and I like the idea of being able to compete with some top teams assuming I can succeed at Fordham. So why do I expect this stop to be a long one? When I start getting level 5 offers, I'm going to hold out for a team in the bottom half of the ACC. Right now the only level 5 jobs I would take are NC State, Georgia Tech, Florida State, or Clemson. I would love to see Georgia Tech struggle while I'm at Fordham, taking over my Alma Mater would be kinda nice :)


So as I join Fordham, lets review the my coaching career to this point:



I've only won two postseason games ever. This needs to be a place where I build up to legitimate postseason success. I will jump ship for the ACC if I get an early offer, but I'm ready to stay here 10+ seasons if I need to.


Incoming Recruits

Nothing to see here on a new team.

Coaches

My coaches follow me from Vermont, but my recruiter and assistant leave for head coaching jobs. My coaching budget is $260,630. I'd like to skimp a bit on scouting and get good assistants and recruiters. The assistant is the most important.

I pull in a 71 skill recruiter for 90,000, and an assistant with 36 offense/73 defense for 95,000. the assistant was difficult to land, it took 4 rounds to get one for a price I could afford.

Scheduling

We have 12 games, 7 of them at home. As is my standard at a new team, no one over 10 prestige, yes, even at a level 4 school. I'll do it in the ACC too until I'm sure I'll win. Just all my Jim John Thompson Boheim Calhoun ;)

Training/Budget

This is interesting. Fordham's training facilities are rated 37, 11th in the A-10. That's about half the training facilities that Vermont had available to them. We do get a training improvement approved.

Roster Overview

We're not worried about this at Fordham either.

Still the best sports text sim out there. Your dynasty reads exactly why this game was designed nearly perfectly, flowing from one stage to another without getting bogged down in any one aspect. Nice work

Thanks Bucc. I still love this game, obviously. FM is the only sports sim to hold my attention as strongly, but that was for a much shorter period of time.

2018/19 Season


Recruiting

We have 4 scholarships this year. Unlike my stint at Vermont, I'm going to make sure I get steals guys in year one(at Vermont i ended up with big men and a SF initially).

I find 4 guys I like, one of them an international recruit, who I now have enough money to legitimately go after. I also find TWO A handles/A steals guy, but mississippi finds one of them too and I have to drop off. I don't land anyone by November but I am confidant in my remaining targets.

In December we grab our first recruit, and in January we land our A HND/A STL guy! In February the hits keep coming as our international recruit signs as well. I scout big men as I can afford to but nothing pans out.


Warren is ranked a bit low and I'll probably stop scouting guys who aren't in the top 50 at their position fairly soon. I chose to go after Warren anyway because he had more steals in HS than any other recruit in the nation. If his handles are a B as well he'll be a godsend.




Please please please be as good as scouted.



More ball handling and stealing. This guy is a potential scorer as well. If these 3 guys come in as scouted we're going to be very good very fast.

Results

We go undefeated in non conference play, but then again, we're a level 4 school playing 12 of the worst teams in the nation. We also beat a ranked Temple team in January, and we actually go 4-1 in January, 2nd in the Eastern half of the A10. We actually turn out fairly decent. Its a nice advantage for me, not having to recover from an early drop in prestige, but I'm not really proud of this team or anything, none of the players are mine.


Conference Tournament

First Round: (E3) Fordham 64, (W6) Duquesne 58

Quarterfinals: (W2) Dayton 81, (E3) Fordham 70


NIT

We earn a 4 seed in the NIT

NIT First Round: (5) Southern Cal 90, (4) Fordham 85


Awards

Oh good. I put my team on complete auto, finish in the middle of the A-10, schedule literally the worst teams I can find for every single non conference game, and go to the NIT. So clearly:

I am the National coach of the year. I am, however, not the conference coach of the year.





We had a great steals guy as a senior leader on the team that helped push those numbers in this direction. Expect a dropoff next year as we lose our senior PG and redshirt our freshmen.





Totals: 22-9 (9-7) - Atlantic 10 Quarterfinals, NIT First Round - RPI 77