is it going to be brutal? last second win over Lees-McRae? I realize it was just an exhibition but dang!

bigdaddyg wrote:is it going to be brutal? last second win over Lees-McRae? I realize it was just an exhibition but dang!

Last season was brutal. This season will be brutal, but with promise for improvement.

#firecapel

We were 5-21 against D1 teams last year, half the roster is freshmen, the returning players were poorly coached and recruited for a different system, and we're moving to a tougher league. I thought we all kind of understood what that likely means for this year.

EastHallApp wrote:We were 5-21 against D1 teams last year, half the roster is freshmen, the returning players were poorly coached and recruited for a different system, and we're moving to a tougher league. I thought we all kind of understood what that likely means for this year.

Huh! Are you talking about the football team in a basketball thread? Sounds like we have heard this before. Hope the fire Fox crowd is a little more forgiving than they were for the football team.

AppSt94 wrote:

EastHallApp wrote:We were 5-21 against D1 teams last year, half the roster is freshmen, the returning players were poorly coached and recruited for a different system, and we're moving to a tougher league. I thought we all kind of understood what that likely means for this year.

Huh! Are you talking about the football team in a basketball thread? Sounds like we have heard this before. Hope the fire Fox crowd is a little more forgiving than they were for the football team.

No comparison between the two. Fox has taken over a TOTAL train wreck. He is starting from zero. He will need time and any talk of firing would be even more stupid than the talk of canning Scott this year.

bcoach wrote:

AppSt94 wrote:

EastHallApp wrote:We were 5-21 against D1 teams last year, half the roster is freshmen, the returning players were poorly coached and recruited for a different system, and we're moving to a tougher league. I thought we all kind of understood what that likely means for this year.

Huh! Are you talking about the football team in a basketball thread? Sounds like we have heard this before. Hope the fire Fox crowd is a little more forgiving than they were for the football team.

No comparison between the two. Fox has taken over a TOTAL train wreck. He is starting from zero. He will need time and any talk of firing would be even more stupid than the talk of canning Scott this year.

Given the post season ban and the totality of everything else I'd even say he's starting from less than zero. He would have had an easier time if this were a startup basketball program.

It will be rough, but at least we know that going in. Fox deserves a hall pass for the next few years as long as the the team is disciplined and gives their best effort. There will no doubt be some ugly nights. The good thing about basketball is that a couple of home run recruits can turn a program around quickly. Fox is our guy, and we need to give him and the team our support so we can turn this thing around.

I don't think the basketball program has ever been in this bad of a condition. We are going to get pummeled this year. I accept that.

I don't care how many games we win. But I do expect to see the following: (1) We play hard; (2) we share the ball; (3) by the end of the year we are making hard decisive cuts and screens that make help defenders lose sight of the ball; (4) by the end of the year we are executing a sound defensive scheme (I don't care what the scheme is as long as the players work in unison); (5) We box out; (6) We generally don't take contested pull-up jump shots until the shot clock gets to about 10 seconds.

I for one still think this team can be "sneaky" good. We do have a very good combination returning players and new blood. Couple that with the most size, across the board, maybe ever and if Fox can coach I think we'll be respectable, even with the step up in competition. This game was not good but until I see some results I refuse to call the season a disaster! Oh, and the program HAS been much worse, it was called the Press Maravich Years!

There is a guy who knows a lot more about this than I do. His name is Coach Fox. If at the end of the season he is happy then I will be happy.

One thing that has to be remembered is that we are down a day. The other teams are allowed to have practices/games 6 out of 7 days. Due to inCapel we are currently restricted to 5 days out of every 7.

So we would have to take off Sunday and Monday to have 4 days of practice and the Ohio game and then take off Sun and Mon and have 1 day of practice before the Furman game. The schedulers are having fun this season.

I was able to catch some of practice Saturday morning, and I have to say I'm very impressed with Coach Fox. This was the first time I've had a chance to speak to him, but it was easy to see why others who have talked with him are so upbeat about our program.

The difference in his practice compared to Caple's is night and day in terms of organization, teaching, and tempo. He even made a few jokes to get some laughs out of the team. It seemed like we were installing the entire offense so I would imagine we were pretty basic against LMC. It was very clear that players will have to be smart and give max effort to see the floor for Fox, which is exciting to see. Most of the guys seemed to be catching on, but there were a few having a hard time learning all of the sets. The biggest concern I had watching practice was our outside shooting. Hopefully it was just an off day.

This year will probably have some tough times, but its hard to imagine Fox not getting this program turned around. He was very welcoming to us and even had the entire team come over to introduce themselves to us after practice. We all need to get behind this group as they work to get us back on track.

WER4ASU wrote:I for one still think this team can be "sneaky" good. We do have a very good combination returning players and new blood. Couple that with the most size, across the board, maybe ever and if Fox can coach I think we'll be respectable, even with the step up in competition. This game was not good but until I see some results I refuse to call the season a disaster! Oh, and the program HAS been much worse, it was called the Press Maravich Years!

As you can probably tell by my user name, I was at App during the Press era. It was ghastly. What we are going through now pales in comparison to how bad that was.....then came Bobby Cremins who was my neighbor on Aho Road!!!

JTApps1 wrote:I was able to catch some of practice Saturday morning, and I have to say I'm very impressed with Coach Fox. This was the first time I've had a chance to speak to him, but it was easy to see why others who have talked with him are so upbeat about our program.

The difference in his practice compared to Caple's is night and day in terms of organization, teaching, and tempo. He even made a few jokes to get some laughs out of the team. It seemed like we were installing the entire offense so I would imagine we were pretty basic against LMC. It was very clear that players will have to be smart and give max effort to see the floor for Fox, which is exciting to see. Most of the guys seemed to be catching on, but there were a few having a hard time learning all of the sets. The biggest concern I had watching practice was our outside shooting. Hopefully it was just an off day.

This year will probably have some tough times, but its hard to imagine Fox not getting this program turned around. He was very welcoming to us and even had the entire team come over to introduce themselves to us after practice. We all need to get behind this group as they work to get us back on track.

Wish I could rep this post more than once. My family had the opportunity to meet Coach Fox on Saturday and I couldn't be more excited for our future. Players will be held accountable on the court and off and that's going to be the biggest difference going forward. Wins will be tough to come by this year but progress will be made.

appstate77 wrote:

WER4ASU wrote:I for one still think this team can be "sneaky" good. We do have a very good combination returning players and new blood. Couple that with the most size, across the board, maybe ever and if Fox can coach I think we'll be respectable, even with the step up in competition. This game was not good but until I see some results I refuse to call the season a disaster! Oh, and the program HAS been much worse, it was called the Press Maravich Years!

As you can probably tell by my user name, I was at App during the Press era. It was ghastly. What we are going through now pales in comparison to how bad that was.....then came Bobby Cremins who was my neighbor on Aho Road!!!

I witnessed a game during the Maravich years between App and Gnatsboro Southern in Varsity Gym. It still stands as the single worst college basketball game I have ever seen on any level. We are thin on talent, but I believe Fox, given a couple recruiting classes, will build this program into a winner.

Gentlemen, You talk about the Press Maravich years. Press was hired my freshman year in 1972-73 and we lost to NC State 130-53. He posted 6-20, 5-20 and 3-23 years during his stay. It was brutal....and then came Bobby! Cremins turned the program around and won 13 games in his first year and took us to the Big Dance in 1979 for the first time in program history...It CAN be done!