I thought he was too much of a philosopher with the team. I don't know if it was before the drill or after, the players would have to go over and get their notebooks to take notes and there was some other things he did that was just different.
We let Tom Davis go for making it to the sweet 16
- Thread starter troutstamp1
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Everybody that fancies themselves a basketball savant always want to delete the first two years of the Tom Davis era when they want to minimize him. I ask you - who was coaching during those two years? George's ghost? Or did the players coach themselves?
I agree. Also.....why didn't George have success with those very same players?
Yeah, George was/is an interesting cat to be sure. Very unique individual with quite a mind.
I always saw George as the collegiate prototype for what eventually became Phil Jackson...
he would have been fired before the Sweet Sixteen season but Bowlsby was blocked. So the streak could be longer.
The administration let Davis go before the season that he reached the Sweet 16 with. It was his swan song and likely a big reason he made it that final year. If he'd been retained, who knows where they would've finished that year because they weren't a great team. They were a normal-good team he would usually bow out in the second round with.
This. It seemed like he was a great coach but lazy when it came to recruiting. Tom's best years at Iowa were with Raveling's recruits.
I also remember that Sam Okey had transferred to Iowa from Wisconsin and was eligible to start playing when the 2nd semester started. Had Davis been retained, Okey likely would have sat that 2nd half of the year and retained a full season of eligibility, but he opted to play for Davis while he could.
Dr Tom was a lame duck coach the whole season as it was made public that they were not looking to renew his contract. It was a terrible look by Bowlsby. Several things were going on at that time with the Dr's team as he was not getting the big time Iowa recruits, 3 of them that went to play at Kansas iirc. Dr Tom was rumored to not go see their high school games that much or even to the boys state tourney, which is something he would be expected to do. So the recruiting was down and there were misses, Bowlsby was scheduling a weaker non-conf home schedule and attendance was down but it was not Dr Tom and his teams fault.
Anyway, Dr Tom held his head high and his last team had that incredible early season win at Kansas to break KU's long non-conf home winning streak. and then they made the sweet 16.
Also (and this seems to be an Iowa trademark), they didn't guard the 3 point shot which UNLV naturally started draining.
It is fair to remove the first 2 years of the Tom Davis era based on the incredible talent he inherited from George Raveling (which Tom NEVER CAME CLOSE to ever recruiting himself). And it's also fair to remove the first 2 years of the Fran era based on the shit talent & cratered out program that he inherited from Todd Lickliter.
This way we are looking at the last 11 years for both Tom & Fran and we have an apples to apples comparison. Both won 63% of their games.
Coaching Record over their last 11 years:
232-139 (.625): Fran
215-125 (.632): Tom
NCAA Tournament Appearances in their last 11 years:
8: Fran (including 2020, canceled by covid pandemic)
7: Tom Davis
Not hardly. Davis was headed out the door long before the tourney even started and he knew it. One could make the argument that his players rallied for him to possibly keep his job, but his forced exile had nothing to do with the tournament or its outcome.....
In the same way people point to KF's being around 60% winning. If you take out those first two years resurecting where we had fallen and the subsequent 4-20 record what would his % be?
I know Davis was tired of recruiting but what were his assistants doing? Davis wasn't the lead recruiter and every player. Davis has to be there to finish the deal though.
I didn’t mean Davis took the team to the sweet 16 every 3-4 years. I was responding to a post that said at this point they would take a first round win. I meant going to the sweet 16 every 3-4 years would meet my goals as a fan. A final four or elite 8 would be nice once a decade as well.
Ah, fair. Sorry for the mix-up. I’d love all that.
Tom likes to golf more than recruit. He lost the three Iowa boys to Kansas that would of changed the course of history for Iowa basketball.
Is the story true that he once wouldn't leave the golf course to meet with a recruit?
He was busy working on his golf game vs recruiting those summers.
Not exactly.
He failed to get Lafrentz which was really tough for people to swallow because something like that had never happened before.
Heinrich was an isu fan as I understand it and was going there but Floyd left for the bulls.
Collison was going to come to Iowa but Davis was not renewed.
In retrospect, keeping Davis just to get Collison would probably have been worth it.
The further away it gets the more you realize what a pivotal event Chris Streets death was. That changed the trajectory of the program.
I am in my early 40s and I have just come to accept I will not see another Iowa Sweet Sixteen in my lifetime
Fran and Barta should be gone within 10 years, until then we're probably spinning our wheels going nowhere.
Correct. Collison was the only one IOWA had a chance on. LaFrentz has been a KU fan for years. Heinrich was clone-bound as you said.
I have a childhood friend who worked in the basketball office for years. She's told me that Street's death was a gut punch for Dr. Tom that he never really recovered from.
Posted this in the Jack McCaffrey thread…
I feel Fran is a top 40 coach. Just like Tom Davis was before he was shown the door. After a while, lack of any quantifiable success in late March is relevant.
I feel Fran is a top 40 coach. Just like Tom Davis was before he was shown the door. After a while, lack of any quantifiable success in late March is relevant.
It was Bowlesby who fired Davis and he fully was prepared to pay him off. It was Davis who went to Sue, the President of the University and begged to be allowed to finish his contract and that would save to University the cost of the buyout. She, overruled Bowlesby and Davis stayed he didn't bother to recruit because no one knew who the new coach would be. Iowa should have hired Davis's replacement as an assistant like what Purdue did with announcing Him being Keady's replacement. Davis philosophy was to schedule as weak a schedule as possible, win half of his conference games and go to the NCAA. The NCAA clamped down on that and began to take SOS into consideration. Bowlesby ordered Davis to improve the schedule and Davis refused which cost us at least 1, probably 2, NCAA invitations. That act of insubordination was Bowlesby's last straw. Davis was a passive aggressive asshat. He stood by and allowed Rucker's NCAA paperwork to go unfiled costing Guy his final year of eligibility.
Tom's teams seemed to always be good rebounding teams. If Fran's teams could rebound they maybe could advance further?
Doesn't appear to be a problem with ISU recruiting to Lames. What they do have is a tremendous home court. The dumb asses are content to let Carver be a half filled morgue.
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