Agreed.
We can all say that Fred didn’t walk into the best roster but we made the NIT the two years before he got here.
They actually made the NIT the year before Fred got to NU, but the only returning player from that team was Thor.
I did some fun research earlier today.
College Basketball Coaches hired in 2019:
Mick Cronin - UCLA 97-35 .735
Steve Alford - Nevada 69-50 .580
Nate Oats - Alabama 92-41 .692
Eric Musselman - Arkansas 95-41 .699
Buzz Williams - Texas A&M 76-47 .618
Juwan Howard - Michigan 79-48 .622
Fred Hoiberg 40-83 .325
Fred tried to do the same roster build here as he did at Cockeye State, and it failed miserably. I would be interested to see how he would have done if we were hired at one of the colleges listed above. My guess is that things would have gone a lot better.
He tried a different approach this year, and it was better but not great. I still think Fred is a smart coach, and I believe he out-coached many teams this year with a roster that was not as good as most of his competition.
Fred is on the clock, and I think it's NIT or bust this year. For whatever reason, NU is just different than any other place in the history of college basketball. No coach has been able to figure it out in 126 years.