Best Coaching Job in WF BB History

[Deac83]

He was, but the next season proved that even the best big man on earth needs help from.the perimeter. Part of my thinking was that 1997, in theory, should have had a better supporting cast, but said supporting cast crapped out come February, and the team finished .500 down the stretch.

We were on top up of the basketball world until the UVA game where Odom was exposed and thought the best way to approach the situation was to keep doing the same thing over and over again.

UVA decided that they couldn't stop Duncan so they'd stop everybody else. We never changed our offense to counter that. Still played to the slow half court style that Odom came to love which puts all the pressure on your guards to step up late in the shot clock.

 

[wfumike02]

I'd love to know your answer to the original question, Ph.

[Ph]Well, since Wake has never won a national championship, the only logical conclusion is that no Wake coach has ever done a good coaching job over an entire season.[/Ph]

 

[deacvision7]

I had my money on bkf going for a Bob Staak year. Had great odds on that as well. Damn. Lost money. Those 1 billion : 1 odds seemed so good at the time!

 

[WakeForestRanger]

[Ph]Well, since Wake has never won a national championship, the only logical conclusion is that no Wake coach has ever done a good coaching job over an entire season.[/Ph]

J. R. Crozier led the Deacs to a couple of undefeated seasons. Can't we petition the Helm's Foundation to give us a couple of banners to hang for that?

 

[PhDeac]

[Ph]Well, since Wake has never won a national championship, the only logical conclusion is that no Wake coach has ever done a good coaching job over an entire season.[/Ph]

Haha. Good answer. Entire season is the tough part.

Here's an answer that may shock people. 1997-98 Odom.

Looking back, that team had several parts that didn't really go well together (Rutland and O'Kelley sharing the ball), experience that wasn't that good in Braswell and Goolsby, a disgruntled big man, and a freshman class of role players, all in what was still a very talented ACC. The team managed to finish 4th, albeit at 7-9. The Clemson loss in the ACCT was very disappointing and cost that team the NCAA bid that went to FSU, but that team shouldn't have even been close looking back. It was frustrating to dive that far after a tough finish to Duncan's senior year, but looking back, that team overachieved.

A little bit of trivia for you. That 1997-98 team was the only team from 1991-2005 that didn't have a player whose jersey is retired or would easily be considered one of our otherwise all-time greats. Songaila came in the next year and Howard came in the year after that. Then Paul came after Howard.

 

[Deac83]

IMO a post season victory or two should be required but others may disagree.

That team failed for the same reason Duncan didn't get to a final 4, sub-par recruiting to support Duncan.

We were what? 15-13 and finished 16-14 after the NIT?

And we lost 75-56 to Clemson in the ACCT with a theoretical NCAA bid on the line.

Come on man!

 

[THE DEUCE]

2002-2003 season
Part of great coaching is finding a true leader of your team ( J-Ho) and letting him lead. In this season Skip took a team too young to compete for an ACC championship and snagged a number 2 seed for the NCAA tourney! We know how it ended but for a team that was picked to finish last, they sure didn't play like it! 4 regular season losses and 3 top 25 wins . Skip got ACC coach of the year and Pittsburgh tried to steal him during the off-season. {This was the last season that we overachieved}

 

[VaDeac]

Did they "shat the bed" or simply start playing tougher games? They went 6-2 at home and 1-7 away, and the 4 game losing streak near the end of the season included 3 away games. Point is home court advantage makes a big difference, especially with a young team like that.

ETA: Legit asking as I wasn't following the Deacs then; it just seems like a pretty plausible explanation.

Legit question as the ACC was pretty strong that year. I believe that squad went 7-1 through the first rotation through the league, and 4-4 in the second. One of those late losses was to last place State at home.

 

[LilburnDeac]

Single game coaching job was Staak beating #5 Duke with Mugsy as a one man press. Staak did have his moments between cocktail waitresses.

Which year was this? I don't remember Staak beating many good teams with Muggsy. He went 0-14 in the ACC in '86 and then 2-12 (2 wins over Md and 1 over Clemson in ACC Tourney)

 

[Wakeforest22890]

Every year the divine Carl Tacy graced our blessed campus

 

[liveanddiedeac]

Single game coaching job was Staak beating #5 Duke with Mugsy as a one man press. Staak did have his moments between cocktail waitresses.

Staak also beat a highly ranked and heavily favored UNC team one year. I remember that well, I was in high school and a Tarhole buddy of mine asked me very arrogantly, "Are you even going to watch the game tonight, ha-ha." The Deacs pulled the big upset and my friend had to pull the crow out of his mouth to keep from choking.

 

[ChrisL68]

We were like 30 games under .500 in the ACC during Tacy's tenure.

The Odom era is definitely the golden age of modern Wake hoops.

 

[scooter84]

I assume he is talking about the 1985 win over Duke at Durham, but there are multiple errors in his post. Duke was 12-1 & ranked #2 at the time, not #5. Muggsy was hardly a one-man team that night, as we had five guys in double figures, including Kenny Green & Delaney Rudd with 24 points each. And, of course, the guy who coached that fantastic upset at Cameron Indoor Stadium was (surprise) Carl Tacy, not Bob Staak. Here is the box score:

Durham, NC
MP FG FT R A PF Pt 3FG TO BL S
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Green * 44 10 19 4 8 8 1 4 24 - - 2 2 1
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Cline * 34 3 9 6 7 6 0 3 12 - - 2 0 0
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Garber * 28 4 9 5 9 4 3 3 13 - - 0 0 0
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Rudd * 45 8 18 8 8 6 3 4 24 - - 3 1 0
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Bogues * 45 4 7 4 6 2 7 3 12 - - 4 0 4
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Thomas N 28 2 3 2 2 8 1 4 6 - - 0 1 0
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE Wessel N 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 - - 0 0 0
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE TEAM W 225 31 65 29 40 37 15 22 91 - - 11 4 5
WFU 8515 Jan17 DUKE OPP L 225 37 71 15 24 43 15 31 89 - - 16 8 5
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Meagher * 25 4 7 1 2 3 1 4 9 - - 1 0 1
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Alarie * 36 7 9 3 4 7 1 5 17 - - 4 3 0
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Bilas * 28 5 8 3 5 9 0 4 13 - - 1 0 0
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Amaker * 33 6 9 4 5 2 2 5 16 - - 4 0 0
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Dawkins * 41 4 16 0 0 6 5 5 8 - - 3 2 2
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Henderson N 28 4 13 3 5 5 4 3 11 - - 1 1 2
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Strickland N 7 4 5 0 0 2 0 4 8 - - 1 0 0
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU Williams N 9 2 2 0 0 3 0 1 4 - - 0 0 0
DUKE 8514 Jan17 WFU King N 18 1 2 1 3 3 2 0 3 - - 1 2 0

Wake Forest 44 29 18 = 91
Duke 32 41 16 = 89

I doubt it was for that game, since Duke lost and their fans were not in a good mood - but, I saw the Duke crowd give Muggsy a standing ovation at the end of a Duke-Wake game in Cameron after he gave one of his typical inspiring efforts. The one and only time I have ever seen that.

 

[ChrisL68]

And the 76-77 team has to be the only final 8 team in history to lose 5 of its last 7 games.

Hard to say that a team ranked in the top 5 which blows a lead in the conference regular season race in the final week of the season and then loses in the first round of the ACCT is the greatest coaching job in school history.

 

[ChrisL68]

Haha. Good answer. Entire season is the tough part.

Here's an answer that may shock people. 1997-98 Odom.

Looking back, that team had several parts that didn't really go well together (Rutland and O'Kelley sharing the ball), experience that wasn't that good in Braswell and Goolsby, a disgruntled big man, and a freshman class of role players, all in what was still a very talented ACC. The team managed to finish 4th, albeit at 7-9. The Clemson loss in the ACCT was very disappointing and cost that team the NCAA bid that went to FSU, but that team shouldn't have even been close looking back. It was frustrating to dive that far after a tough finish to Duncan's senior year, but looking back, that team overachieved.

A little bit of trivia for you. That 1997-98 team was the only team from 1991-2005 that didn't have a player whose jersey is retired or would easily be considered one of our otherwise all-time greats. Songaila came in the next year and Howard came in the year after that. Then Paul came after Howard.

Good offbeat answer. That was the team that started 5 freshmen on the road and beat State.

 

[Complacent Deac]

1984
2003
2001 - Skip's first season. The Joel was not as dead as it is now, but it had been kind of quiet for a few years post - Duncan. We lose Howard to the ankle sprain and that killed our shot to beat #5 Cincy at home; and Dawson gets hurt during the Oregon game. Skip draws up a play to get Songaila a layup to beat Oregon and he missed the layup to send us to the sweet 16.

Rodney's first year (1990). Yeah, we had Rodney, but Odom did a hell of a job energizing the program and the community that year. That year it felt like WFU was Winston-Salem's team. It was cool.

We had 3 really good coaches in Tacy/Odom/Skip

 

[morrison2951]

[Ph]Well, since Wake has never won a national championship, the only logical conclusion is that no Wake coach has ever done a good coaching job over an entire season.[/Ph]

Yep- still waiting (very patiently I might add) for a NC!

 

[DeacHead]

I've heard repeatedly that Adolph Rupp, John Wooden and Mike Krzyzewski couldn't have done better with our basketball team last year, which means our coach did as a good as the best coaches in basketball history. So I'm nominating Jeff [Redacted] for 2010-2011.

 

[Milhouse]

1984
2003
2001 - Skip's first season. The Joel was not as dead as it is now, but it had been kind of quiet for a few years post - Duncan. We lose Howard to the ankle sprain and that killed our shot to beat #5 Cincy at home; and Dawson gets hurt during the Oregon game. Skip draws up a play to get Songaila a layup to beat Oregon and he missed the layup to send us to the sweet 16.

Rodney's first year (1990). Yeah, we had Rodney, but Odom did a hell of a job energizing the program and the community that year. That year it felt like WFU was Winston-Salem's team. It was cool.

We had 3 really good coaches in Tacy/Odom/Skip

songaila's layup would have tied the game

 

[Ralph Medlin]

Let's give Songaila a break. The shot wasn't exactly a lay-up...It was a pretty tough leaner in traffic. Should he have made it? Probably but I would say that is basically a 50/50 shot.