Chuck Murray
WIS & Effingwoods Hockey Almanac
UVM Men's Hoops ends up with "tourney-worthy teams" for two reasons: (1) they play in a relatively weak America East conference, and (2) they have developed a winning tradition, which in all likelihood is coach-centric. It's really not all that different to what UNH Men's Soccer has become in the same conference/different sport, where ironically UVM has been providing their main competition. We can thank Coach Herrion at least for turning Hoops into a higher level of competitiveness for the new guy to build on, as opposed to the abject perennial failures they used to be.
NCAA College Basketball RPI Rankings (updated today) (teamrankings.com)
So looking at the improvement over the better part of the last generation or so ... and in its current competitive setting, the biggest opportunity that presents itself to UNH and AD Rich is to push forward in Men's Hoops. You just hired a new coach who has experienced modest success at a comparable level. Your program has been hanging around just south of the top of the AE for the last few years. I would daresay that competing and recruiting to succeed in AE Men's Hoops is a full few notches below what's necessary to succeed at the same things for UNH in Hockey East (not that I'm ever giving up on that, mind you). And while we're piling at least $10.0MM into improvements at the "Key Auto Group Complex", why not set aside a few hundred thousand of those dollars for spring for a new floor, two hoops stanchions, and all the other logistical doo-dads necessary to host Hoops - including a couple of sets of auxilliary locker rooms while they're at it?? Or just build new state of the art locker room facilities for Hockey, and let Hoops use the old Hockey space(s), until we know they will be staying permanently??
The other option would be to give Hoops a transitional year at The Whitt, and drop a pile of money and resources into turning Lundholm into a proverbial old-style pit or "cage", with permanent non-bleacher seating right up close and personal, and make it into a fan-friendly experience?
The current thinking on Hoops seems to be that, "Let them earn their keep and first start drawing real crowds, and until then you play in a high school gym", just like Football did, for WAY too long. How about you start acting like a real D-1 Hoops program first, and then maybe you will not only get some real D-1 players, but you may be able to develop a following. Just like they have so improbably done with Men's Soccer.
This is NOT at odds with the way Hockey has whined about missing some features here and there. Hockey has been in a legitimate D-1 building since Fall 1995. The downturn over the last decade plus has had nothing to do with scoreboards, ad panels, or the size of the ice sheet. It's all been about the failure of quality coaching, whether it's been due to age (Umile) or lack of ability (Souza). Charlie Holt and eventually a young Umile got The Whitt built, which was transformative. Look what it did to the program's fortunes in the decade that followed, before the "new building smell" started to wear off, when places like Agganis appeared. MacDonnell and Santos (as player and coach) got the Wildcat Stadium built, and now Santos and Hubbard will reap the benefits with their programs. Hoops is the only revenue sport currently left out of that mix. If you adhere to "a rising tide lifts all boats", then let's push Hoops under the new guy, and really push Hockey when their new guy arrives???
We're not even asking UNH to do a ground-up Hoops palace - just some minor upgrades across the street OR a major renovation at the current home, fused with a relatively young, successful and ambitious HC. Play in the biggest AE games regularly for a few seasons, and eventually you break through, and even if you get the AE autobid once every 3-5 years, you're at the dance ... and when you just miss out, you probably get an NIT invite. Your games get seen well beyond the 03824, and suddenly you're this interesting little D-1 underdog that starts seeing recruiting interest from all corners. It's happened before, why not happen again ... here?? Butler. Gonzaga. Villanova. And dare I suggest ... UConn?!?
If you've never been to Storrs, please go check it out in your travels someday. Then ask yourself, "What about this place screams Hoops, any more than Durham does as a community?" Answer: not much. But somehow, some of the best college hoops, Men's AND Women's, has been played in Storrs. That in turn has parlayed itself into the state's DNA, and now they even host a team in the top Women's league in the world - something that neither Boston (home of the Celtics) nor Providence (home of the Friars, or UConn before UConn) can claim.
50 years ago, UConn and UNH were both competing in the Yankee Conference - UConn at or near the top, UNH at or near the bottom. UConn was a latter day UVM, a big fish in a small pond, and nowhere near a National Title. But UConn took opportunities, hired visionary coaches, and a few decades later, a school based in a very comparable burgh to Durham is dripping in National Titles, and is a perennial D-1 powerhouse.
I'm not sure many of us would be around to see it come to fruition, but wouldn't it be cool if UNH took a swipe at something really special like this, rather than always taking the "safe way" and using unimaginative budgetary policy to justify keeping substandard coaches and/or facilities in a State that's just waiting to be even a small fraction as relevant as Connecticut. New Hampshire was beginning to trend the same way back in the late '90's with both Men's and Women's Hockey in nationally prominent positions, and were still in pretty good shape a decade later, but non-visionary leadership from "Blue Skies" didn't dare to push things further out. If you're not constantly in improvement mode, then you are gradually falling behind others who are. And if you do that long enough, you end up where UNH Hockey - all of it - currently sits. At the bottom.
