Gillispie's Real Problem

Gillispie has lots of problems, and, to be fair, the "real problem" I'm prepared to lay before you problem isn't his real problem. I just couldn't think of a title.

Lots has been said about what has gone down in Lexington, and most of it is muddying the face of Gillispie. I don't know what happened with chicks in hot tubs or that night at Malone's or when he got pissy with Tom Leach or anything like that. It is becoming clearer, though, that his relationship with his players was suspect. And by "suspect" I mean: I'm pretty sure our best players and their families fucking hated him. I suspect those relationships played a major role in his termination. Plus, he's a stupid grit. That too.

At A&M, Gillispie had, by all accounts, a terrific rappport with his players. Acie Law would lay in traffic for the guy, and after his first season in Lexington, Gillispie appeared to have developed a similar relationship with Crawford and Bradley. Part of that, I believe, was because Gillispie's offense last year consisted of Bradley and Crawford hoisting as many threes as they could, but still, there were few issues in the locker room. The other part of that relationship building was that Gillispie was all Crawford and Bradley had. They couldn't leave, and they wanted to make it to the league.

There is something to be said, then, about Gillispie's ability to develop players. These guys listened to him and did things his way, and they succeeded.

The unraveling of Gillispie came, paradoxically, when he was able to bring in highly-rated recruits. His coaching tactics of toughness and hard-nosedness may have worked with marginal players at A&M and UTEP, but when you bring players in who have been told their entire life that they'll be in the league, they're not ready to deal with all of your bullshit. The successful coaches realize that, and they sort of baby these guys along, and give them, you know, minutes. With Gillispie, you don't earn your stripes on the court; instead, you earn playing time by trying really hard in practice and not fucking up plays.

Therefore, his real problem, I think, isn't really his problem at all. HIs coaching philosophy doesn't mesh well with blue chip recruits (Patterson notwithstanding). Discipline is one thing; but when a player of DeAndre Liggins' caliber is forced to watch Michael Porter play ahead of him, he's not going to perform well. For some guys, Acie Law, for example, that will drive them to push harder and force their way onto the floor. These big-time recruits, though, expect everything to be handed to them. And, sadly, that's what they'll get from other coaches. In the end, it will work in everyone's favor, but Gillispie's too dumb and stubborn to realize that.

So, yeah, he'll take the Texas Tech job or something and he'll take them to the Sweet 16 one year. Good for him. But there's a ceiling for how good a Gillispie coached team can be, and I'm really, really glad we figured that out sooner rather than later.

This team will be so much better next year with a new coach, unless that coach is Travis Ford. If that's the case, we're back to square one.