Men's Basketball tonight Austin Peay at Youngstown State

[ItalianPenguin]

Slocum.... Choking early in the season

Unlike Wolford who chokes late in the season

[rayI09]

last year Wolford choked in the middle of the season.

[ysubigred]

We are a mid major team without any inside game and this has been the norm for the past upteen years.  I find it hard to believe we cannot get any inside help being a mid major team.  Kent St. and now Austin Peay beat us up inside and won.  All teams are going to do that now against us.  What is our solution?  We have none.  We are 3-3 against Div. 1 teams.  Maybe we need to schedule more of the Thiel college variety so we can get those wins.

I hate this for the YSU faithful that love round ball   Just like the football team.. Load up a cup cake schedule in the front end to build hope then when it gets to the real schedule the teams bit the dust 

[ysubigred]

last year Wolford choked in the middle of the season.

Wolford chokes when the schedule is tough... beginning, middle, end it don't matter 

[Penguin Nick]

YSU should not have lost this game...period! 
On a side note there is no crowd support at Beeghly, fans are quiet and non-existent...really just a bad atmosphere...no excitement.  The bleachers are pathetic, they look so old and outdated, look so cheap.   

[ysufan0505]

YSU should not have lost this game...period! 
On a side note there is no crowd support at Beeghly, fans are quiet and non-existent...really just a bad atmosphere...no excitement.  The bleachers are pathetic, they look so old and outdated, look so cheap.

Yep. Pitiful. Good luck trying to get the athletic department to do anything about it tho..l

[A Penguin-Husky]

For the record we dropped our season Basketball tickets this year.  Reason was the crappy cupcake division 3 schedule for Nov and Dec last year and again this year.  Why pay full price for these types of games?  Not winning league championships is not reason we left.  Too late for us now as we are committing our dollars somewhere else.

Still keeping FB tickets and tailgating, but I can see us dropping these in a few years if we don't improve and continue with the 3 high school pre-league games.

I understand Strollo's strategy in trying to get early wins too qualify for post season, but these cupcakes do not build the necessary toughness needed for full season competition.

[Lets_Talk]

Have not posted in a long time, but reading the non-sense on this board has become too much

1)The continual Strollo bashing - I confess, I have known Ron since middle school. He is far from perfect as an AD, but alot of people overlook all of the improvements made to facilities with him as AD. They also overlook the success of some of the "Olympic Sports". As for hiring of Hill and Martin, peole who pay attention will know Hill was not the first choice. And, on paper, her resume looked pretty good. Just turned out she is a much better assistant than HC. With Martin, on paper she seemed like a very good hire. While that turned out not to be the case, she did recruit Brandi Brown. How good would the Boldon teams have been without Brandi Brown? My guess is not very good.

2) As far as Slocum the guy can coach. He may or may not be at the top of D1 HC's, but with the piddly budget, and insistence on YSU as a football school, not sure Rick Pitino could do much better. Slocum is doing the best he can with a limited budget. YSU is unlikely to get quality inside players, unless they find a diamond in the rough, and those do not come along often. So, he is doing the best he can do. Run an up tempo style with guards who are athletic and can score. When the team is on, they are as good as any team in the HC, many top mid-majors, and even bottom tier "BCS" conferences. When off, they can be hard to watch. But, they play hard EVERY game, and the program is light year improved from the Robic days.

3)Getting back to Strollo, at the time he was hired, he was the most qualified candidate. The pool of aplicants was pretty slim. And, I really do not see anyone being willing to come to YSU and deal with all the garbage for the salary Strollo is paid. Are there better AD's, sure. But, none of them are going to be interested in a job at YSU, and none will work harder than Strollo.

4)As long as basketball is an afterthought at YSU, then it is hard to expect more than 4th or 5th place finishes in the HL, and plenty of disappointing losses. I saw a discussion about YSU changing conferences for football. So, how about this? Join the NEC for football only, but with the reduced scholarship level of the NEC. Play the same kind of OOC conference as YSU has been playing, then set the goal of winning the NEC and making the playoffs? YSU can schedule 7 home games, which makes the lodge holders happy. YSU gets in the playoffs, and most fans only care if YSU wins, not who they play. Then, with the money saved from less football scholarships, use the money on basketball. YSU is not far from being a legitimate top 2-3 team in the HL, but it is going to require more money and emphasis from the administration. I know Ron fights for this with basketball, but it falls on deaf ears at the top

5)Losses to KENT and APU were disappointing, but they just had overall more athletic teams, and much more strength inside. YSU has a solid starting 5. Marcus Keen and Kyle Steward have alot of upside, but they are guards. Hahan, Webber and Belin are nice players, but none of them are truly suite for playing inside. And, YSU has nothing off the bench inside. No offense to Larson and Chojnaki, as they seem like great kids, and play hard. But, they are not D1 players in terms of basketball talent.

[guinpen]

Nice post lets_talk - couple of points.

I have not been a big fan of Strollo over the years but I do believe that he has improved quite a bit. At the time I felt that Martin was a great hire, boy was I wrong.

Not sure I remember correctly but wasn't one of the other candidates a former AD from Bowling Green? I thought he was better qualified and when Strollo got the job it looked like a fix.

[Lets_Talk]

guinpen,

Like you, I was totally caught off guard by Martin. She did do a good job of recruiting though, and it's hard to see Boldon having had the success he had without Brandi. Hill was NOT the first choice. It was Jodi Kest(sp?), then the HC at Texas A&M Corpus Christi, and now the HC at Akron. On paper, Tisha seemed like a pretty good hire, but as time wore on it became obvious she is a very good assistant, who was not able to make the transition to HC. One of the reasons both Martin and Slocum were hired, is because Ron felt he had been burnt by hiring assistants with no proven college HC experience(Robic, Hill and to a lesser extent Heacock). As for Heacock, Strollo did not hire him. That was before Ron was AD. Strollo did give Heacock both extensions, but at the time they seemed warranted. Hindsight, however, would prove to be 20/20.

The AD search in 2001 was 12 years ago, and that was a rough summer for me health wise. As I recall, the field was not that deep. And, of the 3 finalists, when intangibles were taken into account, Ron made the best candidate. He is a friend of mine, and while he is a friend, I wanted the best possible hire. It's easy to see why people deem this an inside job, as that has happened way to often at YSU.

But, Ron had intangibles such as being groomed to be AD by Tressel. Ron was first hired as Assistant Business Mgr in 1996, but almost immediately he started taking on duties that were not his responsibility. He did so, because, well, things just were not getting done. And, with Tressel being Ad and head football coach, Ron began assuming more and more responsibilities, many of which people on the outside were not aware of.

There is also the matter of $$$$$. Ron is from Ytown. His wife i from Ytown. Both are YSU grads and former student-athletes. The YSU job was definitely not going to be a stepping stone job for Strollo.

I know from talking with Ron and knowing him since we were 12 or 13, no-one is harder on Ron than Ron. He does not always get the support from the admin that he would like or which is needed, especially for non football matters. I've been out of the area a few years, and am not as close to what goes on as I was at one time.

Ron understood the challenges of being an AD at YSU. He understood the community. He understood the limitations from a $$$$$ perspective. Not sure someone from BG would have been able to adjust to all the BS that goes along with being AD at a school like YSU in an area like Ytown/Warren.

On a side note, I still remember teasing Ron in 97,98,99, telling him when Tressel left he would be  the AD. Ron used to laugh at me and tell me I was crazy. Well, I am crazy, but I was correct with this prediction.

[ItalianPenguin]

Have not posted in a long time, but reading the non-sense on this board has become too much

1)The continual Strollo bashing - I confess, I have known Ron since middle school. He is far from perfect as an AD, but alot of people overlook all of the improvements made to facilities with him as AD. They also overlook the success of some of the "Olympic Sports". As for hiring of Hill and Martin, peole who pay attention will know Hill was not the first choice. And, on paper, her resume looked pretty good. Just turned out she is a much better assistant than HC. With Martin, on paper she seemed like a very good hire. While that turned out not to be the case, she did recruit Brandi Brown. How good would the Boldon teams have been without Brandi Brown? My guess is not very good.

2) As far as Slocum the guy can coach. He may or may not be at the top of D1 HC's, but with the piddly budget, and insistence on YSU as a football school, not sure Rick Pitino could do much better. Slocum is doing the best he can with a limited budget. YSU is unlikely to get quality inside players, unless they find a diamond in the rough, and those do not come along often. So, he is doing the best he can do. Run an up tempo style with guards who are athletic and can score. When the team is on, they are as good as any team in the HC, many top mid-majors, and even bottom tier "BCS" conferences. When off, they can be hard to watch. But, they play hard EVERY game, and the program is light year improved from the Robic days.

3)Getting back to Strollo, at the time he was hired, he was the most qualified candidate. The pool of aplicants was pretty slim. And, I really do not see anyone being willing to come to YSU and deal with all the garbage for the salary Strollo is paid. Are there better AD's, sure. But, none of them are going to be interested in a job at YSU, and none will work harder than Strollo.

4)As long as basketball is an afterthought at YSU, then it is hard to expect more than 4th or 5th place finishes in the HL, and plenty of disappointing losses. I saw a discussion about YSU changing conferences for football. So, how about this? Join the NEC for football only, but with the reduced scholarship level of the NEC. Play the same kind of OOC conference as YSU has been playing, then set the goal of winning the NEC and making the playoffs? YSU can schedule 7 home games, which makes the lodge holders happy. YSU gets in the playoffs, and most fans only care if YSU wins, not who they play. Then, with the money saved from less football scholarships, use the money on basketball. YSU is not far from being a legitimate top 2-3 team in the HL, but it is going to require more money and emphasis from the administration. I know Ron fights for this with basketball, but it falls on deaf ears at the top

5)Losses to KENT and APU were disappointing, but they just had overall more athletic teams, and much more strength inside. YSU has a solid starting 5. Marcus Keen and Kyle Steward have alot of upside, but they are guards. Hahan, Webber and Belin are nice players, but none of them are truly suite for playing inside. And, YSU has nothing off the bench inside. No offense to Larson and Chojnaki, as they seem like great kids, and play hard. But, they are not D1 players in terms of basketball talent.

Good post talk--great to read someone with some common sense and some intelligence. Stick around this time.

[penguinpower]

With the investment in our football facilities why would we step down in scholarships?  That doesn't make any sense to me.  If we would happen to win the NEC and make the playoffs we would never have a chance at winning it all becuase we would be elimiated in the first round. 

I get what you are saying but it is about this for me:  If we are truely a fooltball school as evidence by our fantastic facilities, then don't settle on mediocrity.

Finally, there needs to be a push by the AD's in the MVFC and the conference commisioner to change the entry rules to the playoffs.  Teams like Butler or Layfeyette that spend a thenth of what we do on football should not be allowed into the playoffs  with a losing record or multiple losses to bad teams.  Everyone knew that they would be eliminated in the first round.  It is not fair that schools that put their money into football and have better records and tougher schedules are left our because the NEC gets an autobid.  If YSU was in the playoffs right now  the basketball threads would get little attention by comparison.

[Penguin Nation]

If the AD position were a private sector position, the AD would have been replaced long ago.  Most employers will stomach some errors in judgement, but overall there has to be a record of accomplishment.  Sounds like Strollo was the unluckiest AD in the NCAA.  No one said Strollo hired Heacock, but he renewed his contract after progressive deterioration in the FB program.  Apparently there are plenty of excuses for Heacock's renewal, Tisha Hill, and Cindy Martin's hiring, but at some point the pattern of failure must be accounted for.  I'm glad Cindy Martin recruited Brandi Brown.  That was her job, and it in no way excuses her performance.  If Bolden's success was due largely to a Martin recruit, than that looks even worse for the AD, because that appeared to be one hire he got right. 

There is a difference between "bashing" someone, and factually discussing their record and performance.  Being silent, or a "yes man" is the worst thing a fan could do if he/she wants to see their team succeed.  IMO, the Strollo record is full of red flags, and the lack of accountability is discouraging.

[ysufan0505]

Strollo needs to put more money into the basketball program. Period.

[rayI09]

I agree with penguin power about the NEC. it doesn't make any sense for us to go there. We just built the watts training center and made a big investment in football. You don't make those kinds of investments in a program unless your goal is to be the best program in FCS football or higher. You don't make those kinds of investments and move down to a partial scholarship program.

From what I understand YSU had plans to build the visitor side of stambaugh similar to the original side with the intentions of one day joining the MAC or Conference USA, but when we did not get accepted by the MAC they scaled down these plans and thus built the much smaller version that is there today.  Regardless, they still expanded seating capacity at stambaugh even though on a smaller scale so back then their vision just have been to remain a top FCS program at least. There is now way this program will drop to a partial scholarship program or div II.

What needs to be done and I know some get upset about it, but YSU really needs to get into an FBS conference it order to survive. The problem is is that they do not have the money to do this. How true that is I don't know. But something major like a move to the FBS needs to be done. If YSU wants to be a true football school than they need to play at the highest level possible. I think over time and with the additional recruits in the FBS YSU could become the second best football program in Ohio.

If YSU truly cannot afford to make a move to the FBS then they should drastically cut the football budget and put that money into basketball.  It's better to have one good program than two average/bad ones.

Either move the football program to the FBS or cut funding in the program and make basketball number one. Also, the problems with our sports are not due to Ron Stroll only. The board of trustees have no interest in any sport other than football so even if Strollo wants to give the basketball more money he cannot. More heads need to roll at YSU than just Strollo's.


Joe Scalzo is supposed to interview the new president this month and find out how he feels about the state of our athletic programs. I guess we will find out if the new president will do anything about it or if things will remain status quo