What Utefans can do to help recover our program's greatness

[TripletDaddy]

lol where do you fan chauvenists get your credentials? Sitting in front of the boob tube for hours and hours?

Junkie is usually the one taking this approach. Your modus operandi would be to accuse me of bigtry against overweight people or chide me for speaking ill of the dead.

I know you zoobies want what Boylen did to Ute basketball to hurt me. It doesn't because I'm too strong. I have an iron constitution.

[SeattleUte]

1996-1999 is far from Utah's only great stretch. 1955-62 ranks high, as does 1944-47. 1979-83 rates close, although the truly best teams flamed out in the postseason (save for the 1983 team, which didn't have anywhere near close the regular season record of past year's squads, and earned the WAC's last regular-season NCAA bid -- it went to a conference tournament the following year). None of these stretches includes the 1966 Final Four team, which if there was an "anamoly" in Utah basketball history, this was it, as it was the only NCAA berth for Utah over a 16-year period.

About every 20 years, Utah catches fire and is a major player nationally. In between, it has almost always been a solid regional act. We'll never consistently approach the levels of Kentucky, UCLA, Duke, Kansas, Connecticut, North Carolina, etc., but historically, we're certainly in the class of your second-tier powers (Ohio State, Michigan, Arkansas, Oklahoma, St. John's, etc.)

Not counting the CBI in Boylen's second year, Utah is on a stretch of just one postseason bid in the last seven years -- a stretch of futility that's happened just once before at Utah (1967-73). Utah fans are not spoiled to expect better than that. But there's a solid medium between what we're experiencing now, and what we did for nearly a decade under Majerus.

Il Padroni is a BYU sycophant and a poor excuse for a Ute fan. He calls me a bandwagoner and then turns around and tears down our tradition. What he wants most here is for BYU fans to like him.

[TripletDaddy]

Il Padroni.

I might have to switch it up from EPU.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Il Padroni is a BYU sycophant and a poor excuse for a Ute fan. He calls me a bandwagoner and then turns around and tears down our tradition. What he wants most here is for BYU fans to like him.

We like you too. In spite of your best efforts.

[EuropeanFootballMale]

I hope this apathy won't preclude you from continuing to make predictions about what BYU's team will do.

[il Padrino Ute]

Il Padroni is a BYU sycophant and a poor excuse for a Ute fan. He calls me a bandwagoner and then turns around and tears down our tradition. What he wants most here is for BYU fans to like him.

Please. You say this after posting the worst post in the history of the internet? And then you post this tripe?

I know you zoobies want what Boylen did to Ute basketball to hurt me. It doesn't because I'm too strong. I have an iron constitution.

It doesn't hurt you because you're a front running bandwagoner. You admitted that you gave up on Utah basketball after Pimm left. Then you hopped on the ride during Majerus' best years. Now you're calling for others to hide at what could be Utah's lowest point.

You are a loser and not just a loser, but the worst kind of loser in existence - one who can only feel good about himself by trying to drag everyone else down to your level of vile bitterness. Don't ever call yourself a Ute fan again, because you're not and I doubt you ever have been.

And because I'm LDS and not a hater of all things Mormon, I'm a sycophant? I'd tell you to quit while you're behind, but your vitriolic rants against Mormons have become a joke - one that you don't recognize. You're so blinded by your hatred that you don't realize that we're all laughing at you, not with you.

[YOhio]

Utefans, you can't coach, you can't play. So there's nothing you can do for our basketball program. Right? Wrong! Here's what worked for me last time--an extended deep freeze of apathy.

As a senior in college I watched the Utes shock the nation by knocking off top seeded UCLA and making it to the Sweet 16 after getting the only WAC NCAA bid. Jerry Pimm shortly thereafter left in disgust at the ill-tempered and ungrateful fan base, for UC Santa Barbara. Arnie Ferrin panicked and hired Pimm's top assistant, Lynn Archibald. I left college for law school a rabid Ute basketball fan, but with low expectations for the future. I knew about Archibald's past coaching experience at Idaho State before he was fired, and that the best players were graduating. So I was not happy with our AD, and my expectations were very low.

But my destination was Georgetown, and those were heady days for the Hoyas. My first year of law school they won a national championship. A Final Two (and a painful upset loss to Villanova in the title game) followed. I got married, moved to a new state, started my career and my family, and the Hoyas kept on trucking with the Reggie Williams teams, etc. Meanwhile, the Utes were losing, meeting my low expectations. I basically put Utah basketball out of my mind. I almost forgot about the Utes, which spared me a lot of pain.

Then in 1989 Georgetown played Ball State in the second round of the NCAA playoffs. I remember four things about that game. First, Ball State had a gaudy record, 29-2 or something. Second, Georgetown was heavily favored because, well, it was a Big East team, and Ball State hadn't played anybody. Third, to my irritation, Ball State hung close the entire game, and the Hoyas damn near lost a close game. Fourth, Ball State's coach was so enormously fat he was shocking to the eye. I had never before heard of or seen Rick Majerus.

A few weeks later, I heard that Chris Hill finally fired Lynn Archibald and had hired that same fat coach who was at Ball State. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned that we'd lose some cool points with such an enormously fat coach. I didn't think much about my basketball Utes for a number of months, until next thing I knew, they were themselves sporting a gaudy record . . . .

So, you see, the Utes need your apathy right now, not your pain, not you bitching. Just forget about them for awhile and things will work out. What else can you do! I hope you've got a good auxiliary team to turn to.

As for me, this season the Hoyas have a constellation of fabulous young talent, they have beaten two ranked teams showing a lot of grit down the wire, and are now themselves ranked. I'm looking forward to seeing how far JTIII's extremely young and retooled new team will go this season.

Good post.

[DU Ute]

Good post.

POTD?

[il Padrino Ute]

Good post.

Don't encourage him.

[Top Ute]

Utah fans got spoiled during the late 90s, but most fail to recognize that Utah's best years were about a 4 year stretch. If that's what fans expect it to be at all times - which is the case for SU - then they'll be in for a huge disappointment.

It will take a bit of time for any coach to breathe any life into this current Utah program. For now, I'll just cheer for the team and not let losses get me down. It could even be fun to embrace the ineptitude - it certainly made the 80s in football more bearable.

1. I'm not gonna get into the little pissing match SU has with you, but you kinda stepped in it with that remark. I tried blowing it up as nicely as I could. The idea that fans were spoiled because of what happened under Majerus is absurd. This is the worst seven-year stretch of basketball in Utah history, bar none, so better get used to tolerating voices of frustration -- even if they appear overly rash.

If anything, this misguided tolerance of Krystkowiak thus far is a result of most failing to recognize that such a dismantling of a premier program is tolerated at approximately zero percent of all Division I institutions.

2. As much as I took you to task for the first point, you're probably dead balls-on right here. I definitely vacillate between disgust toward the program and a sick perversion to see us tank like no other team has tanked before. Hell, I was torn between whether or not I wanted to see Utah beat San Diego Christian. If you know the wreck will be spectacular, might as well get a front row seat and enjoy the show, right?

[hostile]

As much as I took you to task for the first point, you're probably dead balls-on right here. I definitely vacillate between disgust toward the program and a sick perversion to see us tank like no other team has tanked before. Hell, I was torn between whether or not I wanted to see Utah beat San Diego Christian. If you know the wreck will be spectacular, might as well get a front row seat and enjoy the show, right?

'Where's Mom? Go get her! Tell her to get her friends! They'll never see a fire like this again!'"

- Thomas Edison, to his children, as his lab and manufacturing plant went up in flames.

[TripletDaddy]

such a dismantling of a premier program is tolerated at approximately zero percent of all Division I institutions.

Self awareness is the first step on the road to recovery.

[SeattleUte]

Self awareness is the first step on the road to recovery.

You wouldn't know a premier basketball program if it bit your face BYU/USC fan.

Topute would have fired Tom crean three years ago.

[SeattleUte]

Heh, there is your model for redemption Utefans. Tom Crean and Indiana.

[TripletDaddy]

You wouldn't know a premier basketball program if it bit your face BYU/USC fan.

Topute would have fired Tom crean three years ago.

If something bit my face, I think I would know.