re: How similar is Rick Ray's situation to Croom's situation?

I don't even know how this thread ended up like this. I think it was a combination of both on and off the court performances. Stans was a great coach, but unless you are a complacent fan, then you must have wanted to get someone new in there to try to get us over the hump.

I want a new face in there because I think it is evident that Ray was not the correct hire. Why waste another year letting Ray dig us in a deeper hole rather than bring someone new in now and maybe make a splash in the next year with recruiting to get us back to relevance?

I have mixed feelings. He obviously didn't recruit that amazingly or we would have more players in the league to show for it. I would say he did a good job of finding talent that could be successful at the college level and getting the most of their abilities. In 14 years we had 3 5 star recruits who made it to campus. Mario Austin, who we got amazing productivity out of. Renardo Sidney, . Then Rodney Hood, really doesn't even count because Stans was let go and he transferred. What you do see is him taking a lot of decent recruits and making it work with them. Bost, Zimmerman, Moultrie, Varnado, Bowers, Gordon, Roberts, Frazier, Johnson, etc...

But the Stansbury stall was bad. I suspect it's not as bad as the Ray stall will be if we ever actually have big leads that late in a game though. It's happened every time we've gotten a sizable lead so far this season (Ole Miss), the long droughts with no scoring are lethal.

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This was true for a specific period of his history. Not for his full tenure. It certainly wasn't true for the last 7 years of his run at MSU.

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Actually, it was. 2002-2012 to be specific. Along with 6 of our program's total 10 NCAA bids. 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2008, and 2009 in that decade.

So, in his last 7 years. We won the division 3 times, the SEC Tournament once, and made 3 NCAA appearances.

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He obviously didn't recruit that amazingly or we would have more players in the league to show for it.

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The reason we didn't have more players in the league is because he let them do whatever the frick they wanted to off the court and they had zero discipline.

That's the whole point.

Yeah I'm going to be real with you. That was a typo that was supposed to say 3 5 star recruits.

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You may be the most ignorant poster on here if you are still hooked on the fact that what happened on the court was the reason Stans is gone.

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So please don't act like we didn't have the talent. All of that talent wasted cause they'd get to campus and progressed nowhere.

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Contradicting yourself after calling me "ignorant". This was my point all along.

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This was true for a specific period of his history. Not for his full tenure. It certainly wasn't true for the last 7 years of his run at MSU.

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Ah well. Ok. I think the point remains we were a good team, which is the only point I was trying to make.

You said nothing on the court had anything to do with getting rid of Stansbury. You then talked of all the wasted talent that came through because they did not progress under Stansbury. If you don't think that played a role in State's decision to part ways with him, then you're kidding yourself.

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Ray on doing an above average job with the cards he was dealt.

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On the court, maybe.

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seems to have the bball program headed in the right direction.

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Disagree. His recruiting has been far from impressive. After next year, we might digress to as bad as we are this year.

He'll have to hit the recruiting trail hard not to. We'll have IJ, Black, Fallou, Houston, and Quinndary. Unless Dunlap shows a lot of improvement and Zuppardo comes back strong from injury, we could be in some trouble.

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Again, we are pretty much on the same page

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To be honest, I think I probably just get taken wrong about a lot of stuff I say when we talk about Stansbury.

1) I look back very fondly of the time Stansbury was here. I was a student during part of that time and basketball games were very much something I loved going to.

2) I hold Mississippi State above any single person, player, coach at any time, period. So it pissed me off to see large groups of people completely turn their back on the basketball program because they loved Stansbury. It is why I want Rick Ray to succeed so much, along with just seeing the program do well. He was never given a shot so I will be in his corner until the end, partly because it seems even still that the majority of people that want him gone were the same people that didn't want anything to do with the program when Stansbury left.

3) Ultimately I just want to see our program thriving. That is all. Don't care who does it, where it comes from, I just want it done. That being said I wish we would nutt up just one time and go after a big fish. Throw out the ultimate money, something no one could refuse and reel in a 2500 lbs Marlin like Shaka Smart. Now I understand the feasibility of said move but it doesn't make me want it any less.