Just popping in to give my opinion of the whole thing. Nothing particularly new, but I want to type it out.
Just as he appears to have been for most of us, Smith was by far the least exciting of the four finalists to me. Sure he has real D-I coaching experience, but that experience is leading Canisius to a bad-to-mediocre record year after year. This past year should be considered an aberration driven by spectacular goaltending, not the norm. It's lovely that he helped turn around Canisius 11 years ago, but I don't think the problems he fixed there are the problems we face as a program now. I don't mean to really put Smith down here, and choosing him was not his own fault, but the administrations. Maybe Ben Barr didn't want to coach here, whether due to lack of funds or resources or just because he thinks he has a shot at higher-profile programs. Maybe Riga and Gosek thought they had better gigs currently. But until I'm shown otherwise, I will assume that Smith was chosen because he was the cheapest and easiest option, not because he was the best.
I'm still going to cheer for RPI, and I hope Smith proves us all wrong, but I have a hard time imagining the program improving significantly with him at the helm, simply because the administration really just doesn't seem to give a ****.
