Enough with the Lebo

[AURainman 6]

The "it just doesn't take that long" argument is tired.

At Auburn it just DOES take that long. Given that approximately 8 scholarship players have transferred in 3 years, it DOES take that long. Given that the entire inside presence of the team was cut down with freakish injuries, it DOES take that long.

We are not Tennessee. We are not Ole Miss.

-We are the only SEC program without even a practice facility for basketball.

-We have an arena that smells like a toilet, and is hardly bearable to sit through a 1 hour graduation ceremony, much less a basketball game.

-We have a fanbase that would rather pull weeds in the garden than even flip the radio on to hear if the basketball team won.

-We have the core of our fanbase centered at least 2 hours away from campus, making weeknight games look like a derelict and weekend games hard to justify a 2+ hour drive.

Lets face it. If you are a hot-shot recruit, you have NO interest in Auburn. And yet, Josh Dollard, Vot Barber, Boubacar Sylla, Dwayne Reed, Tez Robertson, and Quan Prowell all decided to sign with Auburn. These guys are SEC caliber. And Lebo recruited them with NOTHING to pitch. Now, we're handing him a new basketball facility, and a promise of a REAL commitment to basketball. He now has a base from which to recruit. He now has the tables turned in his favor.

Coming into this year, I expected no less than an NCAA bid, because of these good fortunes. Have my expectations dropped? Abso-frickin-lutely! And I think they've dropped for good reason (80% of our post-players gone for most of the season).

It's clear you won't change your mind. We've plead our case. You won't see it our way. For that, I am a little sad for you.

I mean, when I have kids, I expect them to succeed in life. But (God forbid) if one were to suffer a hideous car crash, have both legs and an arm broken, and have to be wheeled into class every morning, I'd forgive him/her if she got a "C" on his/her term paper. But that's just me.

[TitanTiger 20,483]

And trust me, I'm sure if UNC lost their top couple of players, they would still be a good team (a lot better than Auburn).

I didn't say "lose a couple of top players." I said put them in the exact same situation: take away their big men so that no one on scholarship is over 6-7. Take away their top scorer. Have them lose their next leading scorer for six games. Leave them with only six scholarship players and a line up that forces you to start 4 guards and a small forward. Then see how they do.

I'll guarantee you they would struggle. ANY team would struggle. Given that UNC hasn't been down lately and the overall talent level per player would be higher than Auburn right now, they'd probably do a little better. But they'd lose a lot of games.

If you're going to take issue with my examples, at least do so accurately instead of punching strawmen to make your argument sound better.

[GalensGhost 0]

We are not Tennessee. We are not Ole Miss.

And therein lies the disgrace.

[TitanTiger 20,483]

We are not Tennessee. We are not Ole Miss.

And therein lies the disgrace.

Unfortunately, this didn't start with the Lebo era. Historically, Tennessee has had a much better basketball program than us (I believe they are third all time in the conference after Kentucky and Alabama...difficult to evaluate Arkansas since they've only been in the last 15 years). Auburn is in the bottom half of the SEC all time in winning percentage. It just is a bigger struggle and much of it's our own fault for lack of attention and investment.

Now that said, I believe the building of a practice facility and new arena will signal to recruits and coaching prospects that we intend to be more than a football school and can change that trend around. But firing coaches for things that aren't their fault isn't going to help anything.

[AURainman 6]

We are not Tennessee. We are not Ole Miss.

And therein lies the disgrace.

Care to pick at any of the other letters I typed? Are you saying that we are not Tennessee, and we are not Ole Miss BECAUSE of Lebo?

[PChamp119 96]

-We are the only SEC program without even a practice facility for basketball.

-We have an arena that smells like a toilet, and is hardly bearable to sit through a 1 hour graduation ceremony, much less a basketball game.

-We have a fanbase that would rather pull weeds in the garden than even flip the radio on to hear if the basketball team won.

-We have the core of our fanbase centered at least 2 hours away from campus, making weeknight games look like a derelict and weekend games hard to justify a 2+ hour drive.

Lets face it. If you are a hot-shot recruit, you have NO interest in Auburn. And yet, Josh Dollard, Vot Barber, Boubacar Sylla, Dwayne Reed, Tez Robertson, and Quan Prowell all decided to sign with Auburn. These guys are SEC caliber. And Lebo recruited them with NOTHING to pitch. Now, we're handing him a new basketball facility, and a promise of a REAL commitment to basketball. He now has a base from which to recruit. He now has the tables turned in his favor.

Quit the excuses please.

We do have a practice facility. It's not great, but we do. But since when does a practice facility determine a teams fortune?

Since when does an old arena determine a teams fortune?

Since When does the fanbase determine a teams fortune?

A team wins games and plays well because they can play well with each other and are coached well. Back in the 50's practice facilities didn't really exist. So should every team be bad? Practice facilities are so over rated. They don't produce results. The players and coaches produce results.

Newsflash! In the game of basketball, there are two baskets and like 94 feet that separate them. There are only like 8-10 players on a team. You dribble, you pass, you make screens, you play defense, and you shoot. And with all that, you run a few plays. You don't need a fancy practice facility to do all that. Does it attract recruits? Absolutely. But when it comes down to it - you have 8-10 kids practicing on some wood with a couple of baskets. It is a very simple game. This isn't like football where there are like 20 different positions. There are 3-4 positions in basketball. You don't have a coach for every position and therefore you don't need a bunch of space to practice with. Football team has 3 fields. Basketball - 1 court is plenty.

[AURainman 6]

Quit the excuses please.

We do have a practice facility. It's not great, but we do. But since when does a practice facility determine a teams fortune? recruiting, and when they can't practice

Since when does an old arena determine a teams fortune? recruiting

Since When does the fanbase determine a teams fortune? recruiting, no attendance

A team wins games and plays well because they can play well with each other and are coached well. Back in the 50's practice facilities didn't really exist. So should every team be bad? Practice facilities are so over rated. They don't produce results. The players and coaches produce results. 50 years ago, my parents were riding bikes and playing with dolls. It'd be really sad if they still were. Things change. The game of basketball has evolved. Unfortunately, not so at Auburn. It's not enough to just "get by" with basketball facilities. You won't keep players, you won't keep coaches.

Newsflash! In the game of basketball, there are two baskets and like 94 feet that separate them. There are only like 8-10 players on a team. You dribble, you pass, you make screens, you play defense, and you shoot. And with all that, you run a few plays. You don't need a fancy practice facility to do all that. Does it attract recruits? Absolutely. But when it comes down to it - you have 8-10 kids practicing on some wood with a couple of baskets. It is a very simple game. This isn't like football where there are like 20 different positions. There are 3-4 positions in basketball. You don't have a coach for every position and therefore you don't need a bunch of space to practice with. Football team has 3 fields. Basketball - 1 court is plenty.

Let me ask you this. If the Gymnastics team has a meet, where does the basketball team practice? If the women's team has a practice, where does the men's team practice? It's either the "hot-box" (a 3/4 court sized, un-air-conditioned building) or NOT AT ALL!!!

So, in your "Newsflash!" above, where do you suppose the team should "dribble, pass, set screens, play defense, and shoot" during practice?

I'll give you this. If I listed one or two things, I'd be asking people to quit complaining, too. I just ask you to concede one thing. Considering ALL the "excuses" I've listed, do you agree that Lebo has had an UNUSUALLY tough hill to climb? Could you concede that it is more difficult to win at Auburn than UT, Ole Miss, UNC, etc.? Could you concede that Lebo deserves a bit more slack than most other coaches around the NCAA? I'm not asking for you to declare him a basketball genius. I'm not asking you to comment on his performance at all.

[autigeremt 6,633]

Galen, I respectfully take back the "loser" statement. And we do agree with Slater. He loses this year, he should be gone! Heck, he should have been gone last season. But there's a big difference in his situation and Lebos, but you will never agree to that, so it's moot.

As for the basketball team. PC, no excuses here! The obvious is clear, and the examples have been made. Players hurt are not excuses, they are FACT! If wins and loses are all you are looking at, then yes: Lebo is 53-52 as the Auburn HC. I guess we should run him out of town and expect the next guy to blow the house down with three NCAA runs out of 10 years like Ellis did. Or maybe even recruit five McDonlds All Americans like Coach K does.

My mind is made up. I attend these games 95% of the time, and I can see it for myself. I'm not a basketball coach. I'm a fan! A DIE HARD FAN! I support Coach Lebo 100%, and Auburn would be making a big mistake if we sent him on his way without a chance to put a full team of experienced players on the floor.

My take. War Damn Eagle! Enough Said!

[TitanTiger 20,483]

When you're not a traditional power in a sport and you're competing for recruits against others in your conference with newer, nicer facilities including nice practice facilities and the like, it matters. If you can't see that, you're just being ridiculous.

[PChamp119 96]

I will be the first to admit that I don't know exactly how good our recruiting classes have been. Do we have good classes? Do we sign good athletes? I really don't know. I recall reading an article here and there that made it appear as if the recruited player was pretty good. But I'm not positive. Anyways, AURainman made it appear as if we are "getting good athletes despite poor facilities." I take that from this excerpt:

Lets face it. If you are a hot-shot recruit, you have NO interest in Auburn. And yet, Josh Dollard, Vot Barber, Boubacar Sylla, Dwayne Reed, Tez Robertson, and Quan Prowell all decided to sign with Auburn. These guys are SEC caliber. And Lebo recruited them with NOTHING to pitch.

So if I interpreted that correctly (which I may have been wrong), we have the athletes. So knocking facilities as not being able to get recruits - I'm not buying that argument if we are in fact getting recruits.

If we were getting crapola players purely because of no facilities - then I would completely agree with you. But I just don't think that is the case. Once you have the players - facilities mean VERY little, if anything. See argument on two baskets separated by 94 feet. And there are a lot more to facilities than the basketball court. If I'm a recruit, the court I practice on isn't the most important thing to me. Playing time, location, the school, academics, the program, the coaches, etc all play in to in addition to facilities. Facilities that matter, IMO, are rehab. I honestly feel that rehab and the gym to lift weights and other aspects of facilities are what really matter. When you think of Oregon facilities, you don't think of their basketball arena and football stadium. You think of their high class area to relax and be rehabbed.

When the gymnastics team has a meet - yea the hotbox is fine. But how many meets do the girls have? Not many. And most I believe are on Friday nights. Team doesn't practice on many Fridays I believe. And if they did, they probably practice in the morning. And if they are on the road, then they definitely don't practice. So I don't like that excuse either. How many practices are really affected by the gymnastics team? Maybe 1 or 2 a year? Just another excuse.

I will agree that Lebo has to go through a lot. I mean a lot. But that is the duty of a coach. That is his job. I never said Lebo was not a good coach. I think he is a good coach. But there are still a lot of aspects of the game of basketball that Auburn needs to improve on. And blaming it on facilities and fan support is just silly. Fans and facilities don't affect our players missing free throws. And I am not judging him purely based on Wins and Losses. I think it is a factor, but you can judge a team on a lot more than the W/L.

[AURainman 6]

I will be the first to admit that I don't know exactly how good our recruiting classes have been. Do we have good classes? Do we sign good athletes? I really don't know. I recall reading an article here and there that made it appear as if the recruited player was pretty good. But I'm not positive. Anyways, AURainman made it appear as if we are "getting good athletes despite poor facilities." I take that from this excerpt:

Lets face it. If you are a hot-shot recruit, you have NO interest in Auburn. And yet, Josh Dollard, Vot Barber, Boubacar Sylla, Dwayne Reed, Tez Robertson, and Quan Prowell all decided to sign with Auburn. These guys are SEC caliber. And Lebo recruited them with NOTHING to pitch.

So if I interpreted that correctly (which I may have been wrong), we have the athletes. So knocking facilities as not being able to get recruits - I'm not buying that argument if we are in fact getting recruits.

If we were getting crapola players purely because of no facilities - then I would completely agree with you. But I just don't think that is the case. Once you have the players - facilities mean VERY little, if anything....

My argument has never been that we cannot recruit SEC caliber players. I say that Lebo has done so in SPITE of the hand he was dealt. In fact, when you talk about "Five deep" this year, we may have one of the most well-rounded teams in the west with talent and experience. However, the team has lost its potency because of things outside of Lebo's control. Losing our top PF for the year to a mysterious medical redshirt hurts. Losing our best inside scorer for most of the year with a broken wrist hurts. Where Auburn differs from the other programs you've mentioned is that we don't have another Josh Dollard waiting for his chance to shine. We've got Boubacar Sylla. Oh wait, he had a stress fracture in game 2. We've got Matt Heramb. Yeah, that's it. Matt Heramb.

You've got 13 available scholarships for basketball. Prior to the season Kelvin Lewis G transferred, leaving Lebo w/ 12.

Post position

Dollard Medical Redshirt

Sylla Stress Fracture Game 2, possible Medical Redshirt

Barber Broken Wrist Game 10, maybe out for rest of year?

Combo

Heramb

Hargrove Broken Wrist Game 6-ish, missed 4-5 weeks.

Prowell Violation of team rules, missed first 6 games.

Guard

Barrett

Reed

Miaway

Robertson

Tolbert

I don't care what names you put in that list, it's pretty devastating.

I know, I know. Excuses. Bleh. I'd agree 110% with you if we had one or two major instances. However, this year has been freakish. Add these all up, and it's absolutely devastating. If you can't see that, I'm done with this conversation.

[PChamp119 96]

AURainman, I completely agree with everything you said.

So my question in general is - how do facilities affect all this? How does the fan support affect all this?

We have the players (hurt or not). We have the coaches. I'm not talking about wins and losses. But everyone keeps saying facilities and lack of fan support is why we have no program (which leads to losing). I disagree with that statement and waiting for someone to support that argument. My point is - facilities and fan support do not directly affect a program (and thus win and lose). I can take great talent and great coaching with no facilities and not a fan to watch, and still produce a good team.

[AURainman 6]

The problem doesn't live with the starters. The problem is much more with the lack of depth. Galen's argument is that we shouldn't be pitching excuses Lebo's way after 4 years. I say that we're lucky to be in the position in which we currently are. When you're hamstrung the way Lebo's been, you're lucky to have a winning season, much less make the postseason. On top of that, we're already behind the "8 ball" in that Lebo has nothing to sell but academics and playing time.

If you've got an attractive program (facilities, winning tradition, good coaching, good fan support, etc. All things Auburn does NOT have), you can recruit elite athletes consistently to build depth. With depth its much easier to weather a storm where you lose 40% of your starters and 80% of your post game.

[AUesquire 1]

I fall somewhere in the middle of all this. Not completely sold on Lebo because the jury is still out. We haven't had the chance to see what he can do with a full compliment of players. Still, I've seen plenty of games where they sucked monkey balls in all phases of the game that had little or nothing to do with facilities, fan support etc. Like no clue on defense, shooting free throws like my 7 year old, consistently poor decisions on fast breaks and so on. Much of it directly attributable to coaching.

But, one thing you can never deny is the effort these guys give, which is also directly related to coaching and what keeps them in most games. I'm willing to go one more year and see what he can do with most of these guys back and healthy. Then, no more excuses.

As for facilities, that will definitely help with recruiting and fan excitement. It's needed and long overdue, no matter who is coaching at Auburn. But we will still have 3500 in the stands if we aren't winning. We'd fill up BEC just like 99'-00' if we were winning. The new arena just won't look nearly as empty.

[TitanTiger 20,483]

I'm fine with judging someone on wins and losses when there aren't other factors to consider. But in this case there are. Big time. No one has faced the kinds of problems that are out of his control that Lebo has faced. And he wasn't facing them at Kentucky or UNC or Kansas where the reputation in basketball can overcome some of those problems.

And that makes recruiting tough. He's done a bang up job all things considered, but for Auburn to take the next step up, we've got to attract a slightly higher talent level or at least get a bona fide star every other class. That's hard to do with our current level of fan support and facilities compared to other successful programs.

[BZ770 2]

You guys sound like the Mike Shula crowd give him one more year and they'll be back whatever. Like I have said before if this were the Auburn football team we were talking about, then he would have been booted last season.

[TitanTiger 20,483]

And if basketball had all the tradition of success and fan support and money thrown at it that football has had over the years, you might have a point. As it stand here in reality, you don't.

[Auburnfan91 1,407]

I never remember reading of specific allegation just that AU got scholarships taken away. They never said what he did exactly. Like did he pay players or something?

It says members of the men's basketball staff provided significant recruiting inducements either directly or indirectly through the members of a couple of AAU teams. The infractions at Clemson were improper recruiting inducements, improper recruiting transportation and unethical conduct. They also got the dreaded "lack of institutional control."

So if I understand correctly, Cliff was a cheater and trouble maker at Clemson? Then why was he hired to come to Auburn if he was so bad? It's amazing that we name a field after a guy that got us on probation like Pat Dye. Heck Auburn was on probation in 1957 when they won the NC, yet it seems like Auburn is trying to act like Cliff never coached at Auburn. I mean you never hear Cliff's name mentioned during AU b-ball games.

[TitanTiger 20,483]

I think it's that Cliff was able to explain it away to the satisfaction of the powers that be and assure them he didn't cheat. I think they wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. But when it happens again at a second school, that's when you begin to question his explanation.

[PChamp119 96]

You guys sound like the Mike Shula crowd give him one more year and they'll be back whatever. Like I have said before if this were the Auburn football team we were talking about, then he would have been booted last season.

Perhaps. But Lebo did defeat Alabama twice

[smokeshow 0]

Don't hold back, tell us how you really feel!

[AUChizad 0]

You guys sound like the Mike Shula crowd give him one more year and they'll be back whatever. Like I have said before if this were the Auburn football team we were talking about, then he would have been booted last season.

Perhaps. But Lebo did defeat Alabama twice

Hasn't he beaten them more than that?

What's the current streak? Three games?

[Aubie16 1]

You guys sound like the Mike Shula crowd give him one more year and they'll be back whatever. Like I have said before if this were the Auburn football team we were talking about, then he would have been booted last season.

Perhaps. But Lebo did defeat Alabama twice

Hasn't he beaten them more than that?

What's the current streak? Three games?

No, we lost to them both times 2005-2006. We are going for number 3 on Saturday.

We've won 6 straight in football, 2 straight in basketball, and won last years series in Baseball.

Not bad for the three major sports.

[PChamp119 96]

You guys sound like the Mike Shula crowd give him one more year and they'll be back whatever. Like I have said before if this were the Auburn football team we were talking about, then he would have been booted last season.

Perhaps. But Lebo did defeat Alabama twice

Hasn't he beaten them more than that?

What's the current streak? Three games?

No, we lost to them both times 2005-2006. We are going for number 3 on Saturday.

We've won 6 straight in football, 2 straight in basketball, and won last years series in Baseball.

Not bad for the three major sports.

Don't you know? The only major sport at Bama is gymnastics

[tgr4lfe 220]

-We are the only SEC program without even a practice facility for basketball.

-We have an arena that smells like a toilet, and is hardly bearable to sit through a 1 hour graduation ceremony, much less a basketball game.

-We have a fanbase that would rather pull weeds in the garden than even flip the radio on to hear if the basketball team won.

-We have the core of our fanbase centered at least 2 hours away from campus, making weeknight games look like a derelict and weekend games hard to justify a 2+ hour drive.

Lets face it. If you are a hot-shot recruit, you have NO interest in Auburn. And yet, Josh Dollard, Vot Barber, Boubacar Sylla, Dwayne Reed, Tez Robertson, and Quan Prowell all decided to sign with Auburn. These guys are SEC caliber. And Lebo recruited them with NOTHING to pitch. Now, we're handing him a new basketball facility, and a promise of a REAL commitment to basketball. He now has a base from which to recruit. He now has the tables turned in his favor.

Quit the excuses please.

We do have a practice facility. It's not great, but we do. But since when does a practice facility determine a teams fortune?

Since when does an old arena determine a teams fortune?

Since When does the fanbase determine a teams fortune?

A team wins games and plays well because they can play well with each other and are coached well. Back in the 50's practice facilities didn't really exist. So should every team be bad? Practice facilities are so over rated. They don't produce results. The players and coaches produce results.

Newsflash! In the game of basketball, there are two baskets and like 94 feet that separate them. There are only like 8-10 players on a team. You dribble, you pass, you make screens, you play defense, and you shoot. And with all that, you run a few plays. You don't need a fancy practice facility to do all that. Does it attract recruits? Absolutely. But when it comes down to it - you have 8-10 kids practicing on some wood with a couple of baskets. It is a very simple game. This isn't like football where there are like 20 different positions. There are 3-4 positions in basketball. You don't have a coach for every position and therefore you don't need a bunch of space to practice with. Football team has 3 fields. Basketball - 1 court is plenty.

PC, you have absolutely no freaking CLUE!! Basketball is a simple game? if are playing the 13 & under league, middle school, maybe even high school, but sophisticated offensive and defensive schemes are utilized in collegiate basketball. There are more than 8 to 10 on a FULL collegiate basketball roster. Yes, facilities, playing time, historical significance, etc all attract recruits. There are usually at least 3 coaches, so just about a coach per position.

Recruitng in the 50s was nothing like it is today. These are things that matter to kids coming into collegiate athletics. Practice does produce results, without a quality facility to accomodate, the team suffers!! Of course, facilities in and of themselves do not affect a team, but combined with many other factors it is critical. Wouldn't the football team be adversely affected if they only had 3/4, or even just 1 1/2 of a field to practice on?

I have watched Lebo and the Tigers play many, many times. I was in school at AU during the Ellis years. AU is not a huge basketball fan attraction. IT is not a program like UK, UNC, Kansas, now UF. It took Donovan a few years at UF to get the recruits in there. I would love for AU to be one of those type teams. I think AU has a good shot at an NIT bid this year, which all things considered, would be a huge accomplishment!! I believe Lebo is a very good coach, as I have seen his adjustments and coaching abilities during games. He is good for AU.