What does success look like for next year?

[SanityLost17]

And keep in mind.    The 1st 6 minutes of the game is as bad as any team anywhere can possibly play.  The last 4 minutes was not a lot better.  Lots of 2-3 minute stretches during the game we looked bad as well, running around the court like chickens with their heads cut off.   I would say for about 18 minutes of the Toledo game we were absolutely dominant. 

What does success look like this year?   Slowly cutting down on mental mistakes all season long so that we are playing our best basketball to end the season and playing 35+ minutes of the best basketball this team is capable of playing.   Still LOTS of mental mistakes in the Toledo game so plenty to work on.   

[VUGrad1314]

Just as long as we're done with the 5 6 7 8 minute stretches of looking terrible on offense I'll consider that a significant improvement.

[Valpower]

But I do have laugh a bit about Sackey. He is such a physical pest out there on defense, that just his presence alone can be frustrating to ball handlers. 

My favorite quote from the Toledo board was this pithy summation:

Got tired of seeing Knapke get stripped by that little guy.

[VALPO LI]

I would finally like to put this question to rest:

"So barring a miracle run in St Louis this year is pretty much done. And we%u2019ll have several months to dissect this season, so I%u2019ll leave that until tomorrow.

So here%u2019s my question:

What would need to happen for you to consider the 2019-2020 season a success? What needs to happen for you to be ok with a Lottich extension?

And I ask because I honestly don%u2019t know what I think yet. A top half finish? Top 3?  Very unlikely we go from back to back Thursday nights to a Sunday appearance. What has to happen 12 months from now for you to say, %u201CI support the direction of this program.%u201D


-Playing in the MVC championship game tells me that the 2019-2020 season was a success.  Also a wise man has been asking us fans this question for awhile "Is this team good?" I think we can finally answer that question now as well.  Looking forward to seeing how this run translates into success for next season.

[PlumStreetBum]

Success is 12 wins, or a Lottich firing. I'll be happy with one of those. His guys didn't play with any effort tonight, and that was the last thing we had to hang our hats on.

Well, we won 12 games against Valley opponents, and we had a helluva run at the end. And most importantly, the team gave incredible effort, especially compared to last year.


Glad to be wrong about Lottich's program. So glad.

[truth219]

What an incredible run we had. This program has made a giant step going forward in the past 5 days. I believe in Matt Lottich. He has shown the potential to be an elite coach. If we retain our core players JFL, krickee, clay, sackey, and McMillan I believe we should be contenders for league champions. Sackey could be a beast if he improves his shooting. If we could get a talented post player...we will be at the top of this league. Lottich turned a huge corner this weekend.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G891A using Tapatalk

[VUGrad1314]

Success for this year looks like... Well... It looks a lot like this... Fantastic job by Matt and the team in St Louis! The future is bright and I think we have post players that will work in this league in Mileek Clay Krikke and Ognacevic! Adding a shooter like Barrett and a scorer like Edwards are great reasons for excited! Go Valpo! I BELIEVE!

[justducky]

What else am I to conclude but that we intend to be a barnacle on the good ship MVC

Great idea! The Valparaiso Barnacles---   It is accurate, politically correct and unique in the entire world of sports. What a recruiting pitch----Son---I want you to come to VU and be a Barnacle.  Will the board of directors have to approve our mascot name change?

Fortunately our leaky dingy from last spring was dry-docked and refitted then returned to the water looking more like the Queen Mary than the SS Minnow. After our 2019-2020 5 month test run I am expecting much smoother sailing ahead.

[GoldenCrusader87]

Assuming the major puzzle pieces stay in tact - which I think they will - success for the 20/21 season definitely means

1. We are top 2 in the league. Maybe top 3-4 at worst depending on the parity and how things shake out.

2. Defend our home court. Less than 3 losses on the season at home. 1 or less loss at home in conference.

3. Advance to the mvc championship game and play well. Ideally get an NCAA birth.

[4throwfan]

Assuming the major puzzle pieces stay in tact - which I think they will - success for the 20/21 season definitely means

1. We are top 2 in the league. Maybe top 3-4 at worst depending on the parity and how things shake out.

2. Defend our home court. Less than 3 losses on the season at home. 1 or less loss at home in conference.

3. Advance to the mvc championship game and play well. Ideally get an NCAA birth.

I basically agree with Golden's benchmarks.

Looking purely at trajectory, then I think that 11-7 seems realistic (6 wins first year, 7 following year, 9 wins this year, then 2 more wins results in 11-7).  Based on this past year's standings, that would put VU tied for third place.  Since we were 10th place first year, 9th last year, and tied for 6th this year, moving to tied for 3rd or 4th place, again, seems realistic.

However, I would add one more benchmark, which is dramatically harder to measure.  I think that culture was significantly better this year.  I'm hoping that culture continues to improve.  A couple of signs of that improvement this year is how much more enjoyable games were to watch, and how much more the fans on this board have embraced the team throughout the course of the year, even after losses.  For the most part, we complained about the coach, but not the players.  I don't remember anyone complaining about negative attitudes like we've done in the past couple of years.

So, agreed with all three of Golden's points, but add a fourth for culture with simply an 'up' arrow.