re: Replace This With The Basketball Off-Season Thread

Cautiously optimistic with this hire. I watched their game against Arizona in last year's tournament and like the style they played. I'm excited, but tamping down the excitement after getting excited for Grant and Johnson.

Can’t hurt to have some northeast ties for recruiting. Lot of players there

quote:

---

In terms of watchability, this is about as slam dunk of a hire as they come. Oats’ style of play will intrigue fans. It is not helter skelter, however — he is regarded as an offensive guru running an offense very similar to Thad Matta’s, though perhaps more eclectic. It isolates shooters, frees up slashers, and puts points on the board. Sometimes described as a motion-transition offense, it incorporates a lot of weave, off-ball screens, isos, and some high-low post game. When given the opportunity, the Bulls will run in transition — they look to get up the floor. And in the half-court with emphasis on spacing, the primary goal of the offense is movement and freedom — wings and guards in particular will love it.

---

LINK

I like reading how he raised money for his HS team even while they were successful...speaks to his character.

Roll up his sleeves and get to work rather than spending time to come up with a catch phrase.

Also like reading that his star player last year was a guy he out recruited Prarie View A&M for. Sounds like he can develop players.

He admires Saban. This is from an article in The Athletic back in January...

quote:

---

“You’ll see Nick Saban go crazy when (Alabama is) up three touchdowns in the fourth quarter,” Oats says. “Well, that’s what’s starting to irritate me. We’re up 28, for instance, at St. Bonaventure. We’re supposed to win that game by 35 to 40. Well, we don’t. We won it by 18 because we don’t keep our foot on the gas pedal.”

---

LINK

Yeah the more I read about this guy, the more ok I am with it. He’s not the proven guy Matta is but Matta was just fulfilling a contractual obligation to look for a job yearly. And he might have been consulting for Byrne too.

This hire has some risk but also a very high ceiling. Buffalo went 14-20 the year before Hurley. He got them to 19-10 then left. Then Oats took over. They have 4 NCAA tournament appearances in their history: it’s been the last 4 years under Oats.

Let’s go!

quote:

---

This also sounds a lot like Mountain Brook's style of play

---

Im not an expert on this, but I thought Mountain Brook centered around Defense and ball control on offense. I might be 100% wrong on that though

Been a crazy af day, so I’m way late to the party.

But did anyone say Oats N Hoes yet?

Buffalo Guy on the Rant

quote:

---

For those of you wanting any insight into Oates, this was exactly what we feared would happen at the end of this season. While we were hoping that his recent contract extension would buy us at least one more year, we kind of knew this was coming, as is the life of being one of the poors in Mid Major. So it is no secret that UB kind of floundered around MAC mediocrity before Bobby Hurley arrived in Buffalo. A huge part of his success, however, was the hiring of Nate Oates from Romulus High School who directly brought in Justin Moss, Raheem Johnson, and later, Wes Clark, and indirectly, Nick Perkins. All of these players were critical to the turnaround of the program, and for those claiming they were "Bobby Hurley's players", is sort of misleading because the main reason Bobby had them in the first place was because of Nate Oates. Schematically, assuming he does not do a complete 180, you can expect extremely tough man to man defense that thrives on pressuring the ball handlers into turnovers, and subsequently fast breaks. Offensively, they tend to spread out the court in an effort to create driving lanes and open threes. While we never had particularly good shooters, we shoot them... Alot. Recruiting wise, while I am obviously bummed at his loss, I am really hoping UB is smart enough to retain his assistant coach Brian Hodgson, as he was instrumental in the recruiting of many of our main players on this year's team. UB really found a niche in the JUCO market, and I'll be curious to see if Oates continues that trend, or, since he is at a school with a much larger athletic budget now, does he go after the 4 year players. All in all, I do think Oates is a heck of a coach when it comes to the xs and os, I'll just be curious to see if and how his recruiting strategy changes as he moves to a "power conference". Like I said before, although I hope it does not happen, if he brings along his assistant coach Hodgson, it will be particularly good for you guys, so it'll be interesting to see.

---

quote:

---

Alabama announces it has hired Nate Oats from Buffalo as its men's basketball coach. Under a new set of terms to which Oats and UB agreed on March 13, Oats will owe UB $750,000. Before that new deal, UB would have gotten $250,000 less for Oats' departure.

---

quote:

---

Oats' new terms with UB called for him to get $837,000 annually in basic pay from the school (a $225,000 over what he had been making this season). Alabama had been paying Avery Johnson $3.062 million this season.

---