Again, another example of Romar being a stand up guy.

Love or hate his coaching you have to pull for a guy like this.

I posted this late Thursday night and I think it says everything I think about this program. My apologize to MT.

As far as the Bender lovers and Romar haters go:

The UW is not a traditional basketball school. They have had decent teams from time to time, but they are not a destination school for a typical 5 star recruit.

Bender had a couple of nice teams, some average teams, and some pretty bad teams. Coaches before him were no better, and sometimes worse.

The UW updated their facilities a few years ago. That was the first step to being and staying competitive. But other schools are doing the same thing, so it isn't like they have better facilities than anyone else.

Was it fair firing Bender? I don't really know. Probably not, but he fueled some expectations by having a couple of good years.

Would firing Romar be fair? Again, he fueled expectations by having a couple of good teams.

Is it fair to expect that the Huskies will be a winning program every year in the Pac Ten, with schools like AZ, UCLA, Stanford, Oregon, USC, etc. striving for the same consistency? At this point, I would say no. There are too many great programs and coaches in the Pac Ten, and certainly several with more tradition than the UW.

So how does a team and school get into that elite upper division level on a consistent basis like UCLA and AZ?

I guess if you look around the country it usually starts with the coach. Lute did it in AZ, Wooden at UCLA. It also takes an adminisration that supports the program at a higher than normal level.

Question. How many schools with elite BB programs year after year have great football programs? N.Carolina? Nope. Duke? Nope. UCLA? Nope. Kentucky? Nope AZ? Absolutely nope. Indiana? No. Georgetown? Nada. U Conn? no. Kansas, outside of this year, terrible FB program. Even Ohio State and Florida have only recently had great programs in each sport. Ohio State BB was terrible for several years.

What point am I trying to make? The focus at WA has always been football. Only recently did they make a committment to a winning BB program. But if Husky fans had to choose, they would pick FB over BB. Heck, they can't even sell out a 10,000 seat BB arena against a top 20 team.

What will it take to have a consistent BB program? I think it will take 4 things.

1. A good coach.
2. A good coach who wants to stay at WA for his career.
3. A coach that can keep the local talent at home
4. Huge committments from the university and the alumni.

Does Romar fit the first three criteria? #2 seems like a fit. #3 seems to be working out so far. #1 is still to be determined, but I think given the chance, he can build a good program. Will it be at the level of Duke? I guess a lot is determined by the level of local talent that is produced in Seattle. I think it could be consistently good, but maybe more top 25 than top 5-10.
#4 is also still to be determined. But changing coaches all the time will not help. Finding a Lute or Wooden is a crapshoot. I am from Iowa. Lute never won a Big Ten Championship there. He had some decent teams there but I would not have guessed he would have done so well at AZ. Raveling took over for him and had much better talent and teams than he did.

Give it some more time. Give Romar some more time. He is a stand up guy with UW roots. Give him a chance to learn from his mistakes. He has proven that he can coach great teams. Let him prove he can do so on a consistent basis. Several of the players issues were not of his doing. He has not made excuses or laid blame anywhere.

Let's see what he can do to fix it.

I have two critical/cynical comments:

1. Romar darn well better have been up past 2:00 a.m.! If he was able to sleep after that performance he is not the right person for the job.

2. What does this statement mean? "If they were a rebellious group that didn't want to try to do what we ask, I wouldn't mind blaming them." Certainly not a statement a good leader should be making.

But with those said. At least he is taking the blame and saying the right things.

I won't belabor my points of how and why I like Romar because I've done that a dozen times. But I do still support him and as I said before, I agree with wayup's analysis.

Bob, as you immediately suspected we certainly want to know more about this statement: ""There are some things how we maybe have managed the players individually to where maybe I would have done it differently,"

Will you have opportunity to learn more? Also, I still strongly suspect there is some serious chemistry issues going on. I would love to know what Romar would say about that.

C'mon Romar, get these guys to play hard the remainder of the season...show us some potential in the freshmen and despite no tournament invitation I know I'll at least feel good about how things finished out and looking forward to next season.

lorenzo romar is a very nice guy. he's an awesome person and he's done great things for the u. however, if he does not turn this around next year, i think it is legitimate whether or not he has control over this program. he seems confused and lost with a very talented group of players. he brought husky basketball to new heights and done a great just, but that was then and this is now.

at this point i'd play holiday a ton more. he was the one bright spot yesterday. his heart and enthusiasm can revitalize this team and give us some momentum going into next year. do the same with mba. he has a great combination of offensive and defensive skills with agility and passion.

guys i'd not focus so much on are: morris and appleby(seniors that have added what they will to the program), wallace (maximized his potential and will soon be burried in the rotation by bigger and more athletic and talented bigs), dentmon (sadly a terrible failure in this program and next year it won't be any easier to get minutes with thomas and overton in the mix)

they need to try something new and prepare for next year. i think reshuffling the chemistry centered around the young guys with borck as a leader could be refreshing and fun. at this point i'd start: overton, smith, quincy, jon and mba. with the bench: dentmon, holiday, wolf and apps or morris sparingly.

Wayup- I don't have time to read your entire post, but I did see the point you are making with regards to the emphasis on the football or basketball program. However, though UoF A hasn't been to a bowl in some years, we consistently reached bowls in 90's and reached Top 5 in the nation status a few times. Comparing my CATs to the ACC schools that you mentioned isn't quite accurate. I would go as far to say that the Huskys are just as poor as my Wildcats are in football currently, and as far as Mens Teams sports Washington just isn't relevant. Not trying to be harsh, but trying to be realistic.

Do people agree with me that Romar is the pits yet? It seems a few of you are coming around.

Well said, Wayupwaydown.
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Romar gets a few passes here and there. Why? He's earned it. And the Pac-10 is loaded this year and everybody knows it. Did anybody think UW would be this bad? No. But is that the effect of a super strong league or the Huskies underperforming? Maybe a bit of both.
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If the Pac-10 loses some or all of the following players AND Brockman sticks around, what do you think the chances of UW being a tourney team is next year?
-Buddinger, AZ
-Bayless, AZ
-Harden, AZSt
-Pendergraft, AZst
-Love, UCLA
-Collison, UCLA
-Mata, UCLA
-Mayo, USC
-B. Lopez, Stan
-Harden, Cal
-Anderson, Cal
-Hairston, Ore
-Leunen, Ore
-Taylor, Ore
-Low, WSU
-Cowgill, WSU
-Weaver, WSU
-Baynes, WSU
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UW loses Appleby and Morris. That will hurt, but Thomas, Suggs, Turner and Breshers are more athletic.
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I do think Romar needs another assistant coach who can help with X's and O's. Double screens for (insert sans-Appleby here) won't work next year.

Well, Mr Armistead I think it is a pretty accurate comparison. All the schools I mentioned have had a few good FB teams over the years including AZ. But no one identifies them as FB powers first. They are up and down in FB but their focus and strength is BB. When I think of USC, I think FB. When I think of Duke and AZ, it is BB.

As far as the Huskies, you are painfully right, but the fan base and alumni identify with FB above all else. They give it much more support and that is their vision of what they think it should be.

I really feel it has little to do with actual coaching and more to do with the players' actual ability and mental toughness - which they both severely lack at this time. Conroy alluded to it with his comments last night - and Conroy was the epitome of a player who wasn't the most talented but got it done with toughness and leadership. The only leader I see on this team is Brockman. The only pure scorer on this team is Appleby. Isolate those two, take them out the game, and you've beaten the Huskies, period. There isn't another player on that roster than can step up and carry this team to victory. There is no Brandon Roy, Nate Robinson, Tre Simmons, Jamaal Williams, and to some extent, Spencer Hawes and Bobby Jones. I hate to harp on the past, but those were all guys that could take over the scoring load when teams would concentrate on stopping another guy and let's face it - UW currently has only two weapons: 1) A blue collar, garbage man who gets his points off rebounds but cannot make foul shots to save his life, and 2) A perimeter shooter that has a hard time getting open. That's it folks.

The other obvious problem were key players unable to make the transition to major college basketball. Quincy Pondexter was regarded as an NBA prospect out of high school, ranked the #6 SF in the nation. Adrian Oliver was ranked the #8 PG. Mathew Bryan-Amaning the #15 PF. And I won't even include Hawes with this point because it was generally regarded he would be one and done. But those are three guys at this point in the season you would expect to account for at least 50-60% of your scoring and as we all know, one guy couldn't cut it and transferred to a mid-major, one guy is still struggling to find his niche on this team and one guy hasn't progressed the way you had envisioned in his freshman year. So UW needs to either be better in evaluating high school talent or they were flat-out unlucky with those three, one or the other.

Kudos to Romar for taking responsibility. Like others here, I've posted several times that I think he's humble enough to see his faults and fix them. So maybe this collapse is good, in that it will force him to make some changes this off-season - hopefully adding an assistant or two to make up for his weaknesses.

Lorenzo Romar is one of the best things to happen to UW athletics and we should all feel lucky that Hedges (despite her best efforts to mess it up) hired him when she did.

Anybody who watches basketball, played basketball, or watches this team should be able to recognize the main problem being a lack of better players. We cannot hope or expect Brockman to stay productive if he's being mauled by 2 or 3 players down low every night despite how heroic his efforts are when he's on the court.

And you can't win games against Pac10 caliber teams with the guard play that we've been getting all year. They are either too small or too unathletic to defend players on the perimeter and it was quite evident last night in the way the USC guards basically made Dentmon, Appleby, and Overton look very tiny and small on offense and defense.

Morris and Holliday should get some cred for being the only players able to guard anyone outside. UW didn't make their run until Romar put Morris on Mayo to basically face guard him.

The foundation has been laid, Romar and Dollar are wonderful coaches and great leaders. The loss of Ken Bone hurts more than people may recognize but we should keep in mind that if Webster and Hawes stayed for more than zero and one years respectively, our team may be in much better shape.

Sports fans, UW alums, and the people in general here need to know how fortunate we are to have two great coaches leading our FB and BB programs and need to support all our programs here in Seattle. God knows we have the resources as a city, a university, and a community to support two great programs. Hopefullly people will keep a positive attitude (the so called support of the program) for both teams.

He have the right men for the jobs at hand. Just go to the stadium/arena and cheer on our University. Things will get better.

I've been pretty hard on Romar this year in many aspects because he has a significant responsibility and hand in most everything that relates to state of the team today. However, I do this is pretty stand up of him. But what does it mean going forward?

The mis-management of players has been infuriating to me. One thing we've seen is that our FROSH are raw.

Venoy Overton will be a fine player without a doubt, but the turnovers and poor decisions with little offensive contribution has been maddening. Others like Smith, MBA, and even Morris to a certain degree have not shown that they can be counted on for a consistent performance from night to night either. So what is Romar’s basis for his lineup and minute decisions? I mean, will Justin Holliday start against UCLA because he hit the floor the other night to make a nice play and also had a tip in? Sounds very outlandish and laughable but the lack of a consistent rotation going back to the beginning of last season doesn’t suggest there has been any stable or predictable behavior on his part here.

To me there is no reason that Overton should be starting over Justin Dentmon at PG. Secondly, Quincy Pondexter should be in this team's starting lineup, with Tim Morris bringing whatever leadership he adds off the bench.

Say what you want about Pondexter and Dentmon, but they possess some offensive skills that are badly needed and can be utilized. Could we have better prospects at those spots? Sure. But it is what it is. Neither is likely to transfer. They are a part of our future. We should invest in them and see if we can create chemistry with some experience that we know will return next year. Romar needs to quit the mind games with them and their minutes, and figure out what x’s and o’s will help the cause. Maybe instead of blaming Dentmon for the team’s poor defense, the coaching staff should consider not extending our weak pressure D 30 feet from the basket. Dare I say we could take a few notes from WSU here.

I just hope that Romar realizes it is not too late to invest in a Sr. and Jr. lineup for next season. I don’t share the optimism that Suggs and Thomas are going to rescue this team as pure freshman and make Jon Brockman’s final season a memorable one.

WE MUST FIRE ROMAR!!! How do I know? I am a blogger and am very important. I am all knowing and all seeing and I have the extraordinary gift of seeing people's deficiencies and pointing them out. What I lack in patience and understanding I make up for in superior intellect. I also believe I own a pair of pants. I cannot stand to watch the last 6 minutes of a basketball game when THE TEAM is losing, only when WE'RE winning. I did not take pride in the three consecutive trips to the tournament, two of which were sweet 16 finishes, because as you can guess, I had serious misgivings about Romar despite the success. Did I mention I was Most Improved Player - runner up in high school?

Please insert astute comment on the subtle mix of sarcasm and hyprocrisy.

I like that Romar is taking ownership. He should be. A good coach develops talent or finds talent that fits around your stars.

Look in the NW. Bennett has developed Low, and supplemented him with Baynes and others. At Gonzaga Few has Pargo and has followed that class with Bouldin, then with Gray and Daye.

Brock is a stud. He has developed nicely, certainly our highly regarded class last year has not. I am beginning to wonder if Romar places all of his onus on recruiting top classes, and is not a good coach in the regards of player development. Possibly that was Bone's role with us?

I agree with wayup's analysis and a fine and complete analysis it is.
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Coaches develop like players develop only moreso. Romar is developing very nicely. We will not be a top 25 program until we stick with a good coach year in and year out. He must be a coach that doesn't want to go elsewhere regardless of his current teams' performance.
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Romar is a good coach and will be a great coach.
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Romar, please sit Appleby and only use him when behind and close to desperation time. He hurts us defensively and offensively because the offense becomes focused on Appleby rather than TEAM.
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Romar, rethink free throw shooting strategy. Get help. Find a woman who can hit 49 of 50 and have her take over this aspect of coaching. Do something!
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Go Huskies, especially against UCLA, LA, LA, LA...

Romar:
Following Washington's 73-59 loss to USC on Thursday, Huskies basketball coach Lorenzo Romar said he stayed up past 2 a.m. "brainstorming," attempting to find cures for the ailing Huskies.

He didn't spend any of that time trying to figure out where the blame lies, however, saying that's an easy question.

"I don't think I would put it on the players," Romar told reporters before Friday's practice. "I would put it on me. I have not done a good enough job of getting us at a place where we need to be right now."

---------------------------------------------

Well, it's about friggen time the idiot ADMITS to....well....being an idiot.

Sure glad Romar is on your team! Do the PAC-10 a favor and keep him until he's 75 years old and retired to the psychiatric ward.

Romar, here's a question for you: why do (a) Justin Dentmon, and (b) Joe Wolfinger, EVER play??? They're both HUGE liabilities at all times when they're on the floor, and no one else seems to know his role when either of those 2 guys are out there. Why do they have scholarships? I'm pretty confident that I've never seen someone less athletic than Wolfinger, and Dentmon seems to think he's Iverson, even though there are multiple, mediocre high school players that could own him in a game of one-on-one.

Play the future. Give Venoy more minutes and the team will rally, seeing as how he's way more of a true point. Play MBA more, play Holiday more (a guy who can truly play D), etc. Get rid of the jokes that you are currently rotating in for truly talented potential guys.

Bob....well well well....your idol player Devon Jefferson is playing for the TROJANS today and what did he contribute to the first half - he is 2-3 shooting, 1 for 1 3-pointer with 5 points all while starting and playing a lot.

While WSU beat the Trojans, AT USC mind you, a couple weeks ago, you mentioned that that might have not happened since Jefferson didn't play.

What is your excuse for your obvious lack of College Basketball knowledge now??

Oh, by the way, the Cougars are leading 29-19 at halftime (should have been 29-17 but USC got a cheap last minute basket....their lack of play in the first half is pretty evident they won't do much in the 2nd half as well but then again, you wouldn't understand this sort of thing since you tend to consistently find excuses to giving WSU their due credit - you are a Husky writer so why should you give a damn for the Cougars much less give then a single thought).

Bob please ban this moron Geno. He brings nothing but hate to this board.

Pinhead....if there was a single micro-ounce of intelligence in that ball of grey matter sitting on your shoulder you would call 'your brain' I would give you a minute or two of my time but there isn’t so I won’t and I won't even try.

I think Bob can defend himself - don't you? If anything, having you in his corner would provide him a liability given your obvious lack of reason.

USC embarrasses the Huskies.
WSU embarrasses USC.
WSU owns USC
USC owns UW.

Not much more to add.

What's funny is that ABC posted what they called 'the elite PAC-10 eight' when discussing the argument for the PAC-10 sending more than six team to The Dance and of course, UW wasn't on that list. Brought tears to my eyes....

Is it safe to say Quincy Pondexter is the biggest recruiting flop in the last 10 years??? Is there a player in the pac-10 that gets more garbage(meaning when the points dont count, either were up 20 or down 20 with a minute to go) points than Pondexter? Point Blank Romar needs to stop recruiting projects, not every player is going to turn out to be a Bobby Jones! We need impact players!!!!!

Well Geno, since the Huskies are sitting right where they were picked to finish it shouldn't come as a surprise to you. But as I recall the Coug's were picked to finish second. So how's that working out for you? Face it, they were a one year wonder. Possible NIT team.

I have honestly never seen a coach that is this clueless at this point in a season, and in his career. I could almost forgive the fact that it took him forever to decide on a rotation if the rotation he finally decided to go with was viable. Artem Wallace and Ryan Appleby are such obvious bench players it isn't even funny. To continue to start them is just inexcusable. Romar is just looking like a stubborn ass at this point. I don't give him much credit for being a stand up guy because he is accepting the blame. He has no choice at this point. He may as well be the one to say it so that it disempowers his critics. And apparently this tactic has worked judging by the responses on this blog. If he were really a standup guy, he would admit that he has no ability to develop players, not enough common sense to make no-brainer decisions. It is obvious to me that the race problem is really a problem and he is afraid to bench the white guys for fear that he will lose Brockman.

Romar is a stand up guy. I got give him credit for taking the blame. Hopefully he turn this thing around. Can he do without shaking up his assistant coaches?

seeing how everyone is voting today..how about a little poll question...what starting line-up would you like to see? put down the line-up and your reasoning, or just your line-up...then we can add them up at the end..I am curious what everyone else thinks...i'll start it off with

1. venoy
2. morris
3. Qpon
4. MBA
5. brockman

the only tough one is morris for me...i could be convinced of smith instead, but i like him off the bench with some instant energy...

realitycheck ur a dumbass. the reason romar is a standup guy is because he took the blame. thats what that definition implies....so he is, because hes really moral and a good hearted person... in regards to his coaching... we all knowthat story

SOLUTION:
UW Renegotiate Romar's absurd 10 year contract/$1 million dollar+ contract DOWNWARD to a reasonable amount like 3 yr/$700k.

Romar has many good qualities but coaching competence is lacking. He is grossly overpaid for his deliverables.

So lets enjoy the recruiting hype and nice guy personality and enjoy the mediocre teams(occasionally good). UW will possibly be better due to Romar's recruiting hype but even he cannot seem to recruit players with chemistry to play in his system.

Maybe Mark Emmert will hire elite assistant coaches (dump Dollar), pass that cost onto fans so Romar can be better and still get his recognition.

Romar cannot be released as firing two top black coaches in the same year would make NAACP picket UW for a decade.

look for Romar to be eased out in 2009/2010 season.

Solution_Dawg, what a stupid suggestion. Get real will you. Romar is not overpaid nor would he accept such a moron idea. Quit posting and leave the board if you aren't going to help out things.

I do not care if Romar will accept a decrease in salary as he claims ikt's the only place he truly wants to coach!

Does money buy Romar's happiness?

SnohomishRick has a past history of attacking posters on this blog and he could never manage any project from a successful financial perspective.

All I posted was the concept that Romar has some good qualities but lacks the skills to competently coach an elite team!

Thus forcing Romar to accept a lesser contract would allow the hiring of more competent assistant coaches at a higher salary so the total payout would not lead to ticket increases.

It is humorous that to get coaching competancy from Romar or Willingham the UW needs to hrie more competent assistants.

Seems the UW is in competent in hiring good coaches at a fair salary and if anyone questions the fiscal efficiency then individuals with limited intelligence on this blog attack the messenger not the issue.

Let do math for the low IQ posters:
UW: 15 wins projected in 2007/2008 season
Romar: $1.1 million/yr + $400k incentives
Dollar: $120k/yr

Thus the cost of a win for teh quality of coaches at UW:
$100,000/win

What a lucky institution when to get such a great deal when the non-conference schedule almost guarantees 10 wins.

I vote the next UW AD to be Snohomishrick as he is as naive as all other AD's who hand out lavish contracts to inferior candidates.

May the NAACP visit SnohomishRick instead of UW when the financial status of the UW is ruined by poor performaing and overpaid coaches.

Romar gets credit for loyalty, personality, and recruiting hype but his failures at his current salary will impact for decades to come!

Meathead, read this article to understand how important a winning program means to generate revenue:
http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/printDS/181283

UA is desperately overpaying to hope wins translate into more revenue.

100% chance Levingood will increase ticket prices to adjust for hsi failure to hire a competent coach at a fair price.

solution_Dawg, take your stupid ideas and stick them ok?

I am not the problem here, it is the many morons like yourself posting stupid things.

solution_Dawg, you and Geno have to go. I'm begging Bob that he bans you both.

Nice game so far UW. You are nothing right now but a gnat on the PAC-10 basements butt so anything you can do to beat UCLA is much appreciated.

Saw Romar after the game and congratulated him on a nice win.
Wish he can win more as he is a classy guy but his salary above and beyond what he has produced.

Good luck Ro.......