After digesting tonight's loss, I have finally come to the conclusion that following Iowa basketball under Fran McCaffery is literally a waste of time. 12 years now and in the spirt of the movie "groundhog day" every year is a repeat of the previous years.
It doesn't matter if Aaron White, Devyn Marble, Adam Woodbury, Peter Jok, Jerrod Uthoff, Jordan Bohannan, Tyler Cook, Luka Garza, Joe Wieskamp or the Murray bothers come through the turnstile, all outstanding players in their own right, the results are always the same. The lack of a supporting cast is never there and "defense" is but 7 letter word.
I'm treating this year as if Keegan and Kris never happened because in the end it proved to be no different than past years.
Whether anyone comes back next year or not, whether Dasonte Bowen is a game changer or not, whether josh Dix recovers or not, Iowa will lose upward of 3 to 5 players from this years roster and I just don't have any confidence that Fran or his staff can fill the needs to allow Iowa to compete for a Big Ten Championship. It's just not ever going to happen under Fran.
Rebraca had an outstanding game against Michigan tonight, there is no deputing that, but his inconsistencies and lack of inside defense is not what Iowa needed this year and he'll be returning next year as he has stated.
Fran also had the chance to give big men Josh Ogundele and Riley Mulvey game experience this year in major blowouts but instead kept them on the bench giving them little to no court time and Iowa's opponents basically took advantage of Iowa's lack of beef in the middle and Fran continues to play Rebraca even though it's evident that that's Iowa's one weakness and has cost us multiple losses this season.
Fran was a guard in college and looking at his college stats, I can see why he's unsuccessful in recruiting the one position that wins championships and this year's crop is again pedestrian.
This season is basically over with, with no chance to finish with a positive record in the Big Ten and little chance to do much damage in the Big Ten Tournament either. The season started with very little hype and as it turned out despite some early success, Fran has made sure that all the preseason predictions came true.
The only regret I have for following Iowa basketball for this long was not taking the cue from the Iowa student body in seeing though the program that has no direction for success.
