Chris Holtmann (ex-tOSU Bball coach, HC at DePaul)

[OhioState001]

Here's where I am. I don't think Holtmann is a bad coach but we have to ask ourselves, do we want to be a program who is happy to make the NCAA Tournament every year but max out at fighting for a spot in the Sweet 16? Or do we want to be a program competing for B1G Championships and Final Fours?

I have no doubt that Holtmann in most years going forward could get us into the NCAA Tournament as mid level seed and win a game or two. I do have serious doubts that he can win B1G Championships and get to Final Fours. Last year was nice but it was built on KBD finally getting healthy and reaching his potential with Tate and Kam being very solid pieces. All Thad guys.

@NFBuck put it nicely. I have serious concerns about all the guys Holtmann has brought in so far to go along with the fact that not a single player has gotten better. I would be surprised if LeDee and Jallow are here next year. Young is a career role player. Don't know about Ahrens yet, outside of the game against Iowa he hasn't looked good. Muhammad looked good in the beginning but has become the worst player on the roster since. Washington is the one player you can kind of see some hope in, but at the same time I'm not sure he's ever gonna be a guy whose a 1st or 2nd team B1G player.

Next year's class is make or break for Holtmann. A couple of those guys need to become top 10 B1G players. I don't expect them to be great next year but there needs to be significant improvement in the competitiveness of the team.

 

[NFBuck]

I guess I'd caution against putting too much weight on next season, as well. Beilein looked like a disaster early, and a middling B1G coach 5 years in before finding his footing and turning ttun into a pretty solid basketball program. Sometimes, it takes a little longer than the fans want to wait.

 

[nomatta]

@NFBuck put it nicely. I have serious concerns about all the guys Holtmann has brought in so far to go along with the fact that not a single player has gotten better.

Going to repost this here, I guess we're saying the same things but my perspective might be different:

As to the point about players not improving, most individual player improvement happens during the off-season and the most improvement is usually during the frosh to sophomore seasons. Kyle and Kaleb definitely improved from last season. Andre definitely improved from last season. Our frosh are frosh and are going to be erratic; only one of these guys was a T100 talent: Luther--and after starting and playing 30 mpg all season, he's hit an epic wall or whatever you want to call it, but I don't think you'd see the same kind of slump from him if he was experienced with the rigors of B1G conference play. I think you've seen some progress from Ahrens (a guy outside the T200, it bears mentioning), and I think Duane seems to be coming out of his mid-season slump. Ledee had a decent game against Purdue, he's just kind of your typical lost frosh big. CJ was always going to be WYSIWYG and it's just unfortunate that he is dealing with injuries and isn't the real PG that this team needs to run the offense. Woods has finally started playing better after getting thrown for a major loop by B1G play, and like CJ the developmental thing was already kind of done for him--both guys were low-ceiling to begin with, that's why they were committed to mid-majors out of HS. Jallow is the one guy I think you can truly say has stagnated/regressed under this staff (and who has some potential to be more) but every program is gonna have a guy or two like that where you think they should be further along or better than they are.

In the preseason some people had delusions about the talent level--even with Kaleb, this is the least talented OSU team in YEARS. And then there were those that thought they could be greater than the sum of their parts. Unfortunately, they don't have enough complementary cogs, and without Kaleb they don't even have a motor. Losing by 35 is never okay and neither is losing by 18 to the last-place conference team, so I'm not hear to praise the coaches. But I am going to recognize the situation they are in with this roster at the moment, and that situation really sucks.

I do also agree with the sentiment that it would be unwise to expect too much from next season. But we should have better quality depth to work with and more experience where it counts (players whose ceiling isn't par, at best) so I do think you're looking at a Tournament team and then we continue to build from there as long as the recruiting doesn't fall apart and the attrition isn't more than what's typical.

 

[nomatta]

Here's where I am. I don't think Holtmann is a bad coach but we have to ask ourselves, do we want to be a program who is happy to make the NCAA Tournament every year but max out at fighting for a spot in the Sweet 16? Or do we want to be a program competing for B1G Championships and Final Fours?

I have no doubt that Holtmann in most years going forward could get us into the NCAA Tournament as mid level seed and win a game or two. I do have serious doubts that he can win B1G Championships and get to Final Fours.

I get the line of questioning here but you also have to look at the context.

With Holtmann we just don't know for sure what the ceiling is. We know he made the tournament all three years at Butler, won a tourney game every time, and his last season there they went to the S16 (and beat a top Villanova team twice that season). Is his ceiling the S16, when he's never worked with a recruiting class as on-paper talented as the one he's bringing to OSU next season (unless you're counting the remainders of Thad's 2014 class for one year)?

I also think it is difficult to put a hard-line projection on what a college basketball coach's ceiling is, especially if we are using a fickle one-and-done tournament as the ultimate measuring stick. Frank Martin took South Carolina to the Final Four in 2016-2017. That's the only time in six years he has had them in the Dance. The season prior they lost in the second round of the NIT. The season after they tied for 11th in the SEC, and this season they are 14-15. Meanwhile, Tony Bennett is widely considered one of the best coaches in the game and has his team in the ACC hunt on the regular, and he's been to the S16 just twice and the Elite 8 only once in his entire career.

I think consistently putting your team in a position to succeed is far more important than having those few fluke years where you do really well but then having mostly mediocre seasons. UVA just might make the F4 this year, and that's because Bennett has kept that program consistent and has constantly put them in the position to achieve good things and he's build something there. During his good years, Thad was the same way, he had one of the most consistently good programs in the country. While Holtmann is a different coach from those guys (especially from Bennett), I do feel like he has the attributes of a coach that I believe could build something consistent here and once you're in the Dance, anything can happen.

So I guess the other question is if we're not fine with Holtmann and whatever our assumed or projected ceiling is for what we think he can achieve as a coach here, who are we fine with? Who do we think we could get that we feel confident would raise that ceiling significantly higher? I mean, me, personally, I can't think of anyone that I'd feel that confident about that we could realistically get.

 

[OhioState001]

I get the line of questioning here but you also have to look at the context.

With Holtmann we just don't know for sure what the ceiling is. We know he made the tournament all three years at Butler, won a tourney game every time, and his last season there they went to the S16 (and beat a top Villanova team twice that season). Is his ceiling the S16, when he's never worked with a recruiting class as on-paper talented as the one he's bringing to OSU next season (unless you're counting the remainders of Thad's 2014 class for one year)?

I also think it is difficult to put a hard-line projection on what a college basketball coach's ceiling is, especially if we are using a fickle one-and-done tournament as the ultimate measuring stick. Frank Martin took South Carolina to the Final Four in 2016-2017. That's the only time in six years he has had them in the Dance. The season prior they lost in the second round of the NIT. The season after they tied for 11th in the SEC, and this season they are 14-15. Meanwhile, Tony Bennett is widely considered one of the best coaches in the game and has his team in the ACC hunt on the regular, and he's been to the S16 just twice and the Elite 8 only once in his entire career.

I think consistently putting your team in a position to succeed is far more important than having those few fluke years where you do really well but then having mostly mediocre seasons. UVA just might make the F4 this year, and that's because Bennett has kept that program consistent and has constantly put them in the position to achieve good things and he's build something there. During his good years, Thad was the same way, he had one of the most consistently good programs in the country. While Holtmann is a different coach from those guys (especially from Bennett), I do feel like he has the attributes of a coach that I believe could build something consistent here and once you're in the Dance, anything can happen.

So I guess the other question is if we're not fine with Holtmann and whatever our assumed or projected ceiling is for what we think he can achieve as a coach here, who are we fine with? Who do we think we could get that we feel confident would raise that ceiling significantly higher? I mean, me, personally, I can't think of anyone that I'd feel that confident about that we could realistically get.

It's true that it's hard to come up with a name that would be better than Holtmann right now. I've always liked Buzz Williams, he took Marquette to the Elite Eight and won two Big East titles, but then he had a bad last year there. Then he went to Virginia Tech and took a team that hasn't had basketball success and has them in the NCAA Tournament every year. But his record is pretty similar to Holtmann. Jeff Boals had a good season at Stoney Brook this year. The Billy Donovan dream would be ideal.

 

[nomatta]

I do think Donovan is the dream but the amount of money rumored for that to happen just isn't going to be something that OSU dishes out for a basketball coach. And I think if Donovan comes back to college basketball, it will be for a blue-blood.

I like Boals but there is no way I'd want to swap Holtmann for him.

Buzz is a good coach and has had some success but I think it's definitely too early in our time with Holtmann to know if we'd prefer a coach like Buzz. Maybe in a few years we will know. Even then I wonder if coaches like Buzz who have built something at power conference programs are gonna look at OSU as a more desirable job. Maybe, I guess, if the price is right.

 

[OhioState001]

I do think Donovan is the dream but the amount of money rumored for that to happen just isn't going to be something that OSU dishes out for a basketball coach. And I think if Donovan comes back to college basketball, it will be for a blue-blood.

I like Boals but there is no way I'd want to swap Holtmann for him.

Buzz is a good coach and has had some success but I think it's definitely too early in our time with Holtmann to know if we'd prefer a coach like Buzz. Maybe in a few years we will know. Even then I wonder if coaches like Buzz who have built something at power conference programs are gonna look at OSU as a more desirable job. Maybe, I guess, if the price is right.

What Buzz has done at Virginia Tech is more impressive than meets the eye. Virginia Tech is arguably a worse basketball program historically than Penn State or Rutgers. They have only made it to the Sweet 16 once and it was in 1967. This year will be the first year they have made the tournament 3 years in a row. And he's not recruiting lottery picks to do it. Can you imagine if a coach came in and turned Rutgers or Penn State around in two years to have them at the top of the B1G and consistently in the NCAA Tournament ? Very underrated coach.

 

[NFBuck]

I get the line of questioning here but you also have to look at the context.

With Holtmann we just don't know for sure what the ceiling is. We know he made the tournament all three years at Butler, won a tourney game every time, and his last season there they went to the S16 (and beat a top Villanova team twice that season). Is his ceiling the S16, when he's never worked with a recruiting class as on-paper talented as the one he's bringing to OSU next season (unless you're counting the remainders of Thad's 2014 class for one year)?

I also think it is difficult to put a hard-line projection on what a college basketball coach's ceiling is, especially if we are using a fickle one-and-done tournament as the ultimate measuring stick. Frank Martin took South Carolina to the Final Four in 2016-2017. That's the only time in six years he has had them in the Dance. The season prior they lost in the second round of the NIT. The season after they tied for 11th in the SEC, and this season they are 14-15. Meanwhile, Tony Bennett is widely considered one of the best coaches in the game and has his team in the ACC hunt on the regular, and he's been to the S16 just twice and the Elite 8 only once in his entire career.

I think consistently putting your team in a position to succeed is far more important than having those few fluke years where you do really well but then having mostly mediocre seasons. UVA just might make the F4 this year, and that's because Bennett has kept that program consistent and has constantly put them in the position to achieve good things and he's build something there. During his good years, Thad was the same way, he had one of the most consistently good programs in the country. While Holtmann is a different coach from those guys (especially from Bennett), I do feel like he has the attributes of a coach that I believe could build something consistent here and once you're in the Dance, anything can happen.

So I guess the other question is if we're not fine with Holtmann and whatever our assumed or projected ceiling is for what we think he can achieve as a coach here, who are we fine with? Who do we think we could get that we feel confident would raise that ceiling significantly higher? I mean, me, personally, I can't think of anyone that I'd feel that confident about that we could realistically get.

Tony Bennett is an interesting name to bring up, Re: having patience and allowing a coach to establish himself. His first four years at UVA, he went 15-16 (no postseason), 16-15 (no postseason), 22-10 (NCAA one and done), 23-12 (NIT)...that's 76-53 (.589) He's now widely considered one of the premier coaches in the game and has gone 172-35 (.831) in the 6 seasons since. Yeah, his postseason record is a bit spotty to this point, but UVA has been one of the best programs in CBB since 2013, having finished 1st, 1st, t2nd, t5th, 1st and currently t1st in the best conference in the country most years.

The bottom line is Ohio State basketball was getting pretty toxic by the end of Matta's tenure. Expecting overnight success is probably pretty unrealistic. tOSU has a solid hoops history, but it is not a blue blood program. Reboots take a little time and patience. I know Matta got things rolling pretty quickly, but the CBB landscape, especially regionally was vastly different in 2004/05.

 

[cslewis]

The '18 class (this year's freshmen) could be generally classified as Holtmann taking the best players available in a very shortened recruiting cycle. It would be like starting '20 recruiting in June/July of this year. Most of the top players had already established relationships with coaches and schools. The '17 class was obviously put together in even more of a rush, and with more of a need to just fill out a roster (Jallow, and to a certain extent, Young). Kaleb was obviously a legacy & Matta's guy (a high level recruit). Therefore, most of the '17 and '18 recruits, although Holtmann's, were recruited under duress as a result of the timing of the hire and previous misfires (e.g., '15 class). So, to characterize most of the freshmen and sophomores as Holtmann's responsibility is accurate, but somewhat misleading. I've been amazed at how restrained he has been after some of these losses, saying he still believes in this team. Some coaches, although not saying it directly, would imply that they just don't have the talent to compete in this league - which would be true.

Hopefully, the '19 class is not a fluke, and Holtmann and company can continue to recruit at a similar level going forward. Then, we will see if he's a good enough coach to turn this program around - I think he is.

 

[DZ83CK]

The '18 class (this year's freshmen) could be generally classified as Holtmann taking the best players available in very shortened recruiting cycle. It would be like starting '20 recruiting in June/July of this year. Most of the top players had already established relationships with coaches and schools. The '17 class was obviously put together in even more of a rush, and with more of a need to just fill out a roster (Jallow, and to a certain extent, Young). Kaleb was obviously a legacy & Matta's guy (a high level recruit). Therefore, most of the '17 and '18 recruits, although Holtmann's, were recruited under duress as a result of the timing of the hire and previous misfires (e.g., '15 class). So, to characterize most of the freshmen and sophomores as Holtmann's responsibility is accurate, but somewhat misleading. I've been amazed at how restrained he has been after some of these losses, saying he still believes in this team. Some coaches, although not saying it directly, would imply that they just don't have the talent to compete in this league - which would be true.

Hopefully, the '19 class is not a fluke, and Holtmann and company can continue to recruit at a similar level going forward. Then, we will see if he's a good enough coach to turn this program around - I think he is.

Yes, and I would add that partly due to the short recruiting window that Holt brought a bunch of Butler recruiting prospects to OSU, and the truth is the B1G is a bit of a step up from the Big East competition-wise, so it is not particularly surprising to see a lot of these guys struggling.

 

[Jake]

Duke is 0-3 vs ranked opponents without Zion, but they did manage to win at home by 1 point vs shitty Wake Forest.

Kaleb isn't Zion, but it seems losing your best player has a detrimental effect on your team even if you have a hall of fame coach. Perhaps some folks should consider this before deciding in the last 10 days that Holt can't coach?

 

[Systems_id]

Duke is 0-3 vs ranked opponents without Zion, but they did manage to win at home by 1 point vs shitty Wake Forest.

Kaleb isn't Zion, but it seems losing your best player has a detrimental effect on your team even if you have a hall of fame coach. Perhaps some folks should consider this before deciding in the last 10 days that Holt can't coach?

This is with Duke still having 3 other potential first rounders mind you in Barrett, Reddish, and Jones. They're still easily the most talented team in the country even without Zion. But sure, lets act shocked that a young, talent deficient roster with little depth missing their best player looks like shit in arguably the best conference in the country.

 

[nomatta]

If you consider the circumstances and context of what I'm about to post, it's not as bad as it looks, but still, not the most encouraging stat ever.

From Steve Helwagen:

"In two seasons, OSU is 3-10 against ranked teams under Holtmann. In eight seasons as a head coach, Holtmann’s teams are a combined 16-25 against ranked teams."

The plus of that is it means Holtmann was 13-15 against ranked teams before OSU.

 

[OSU_Buckguy]

who here trusts ho1tmann's coaching in close late-game situations?

 

[TooTall]

who here trusts ho1tmann's coaching in close late-game situations?

I’ll trust it much, much more when he has some scorers capable of putting up points. Woods was awful most of the season, CJ Jackson was too inconsistent and turnover prone, Washington and Muhammad had a sharp learning curve and struggled quite a bit, Kaleb couldn’t stop himself from committing terrible fouls.

Andre Wesson improved his game, but still has more to work on, and Justin Ahrens finding his place on the squad was nice. Hopefully he can continue to build and be another sharpshooting option from beyond the arc.

It will be interesting how next season plays out. Hopefully some of the incoming freshman are a little more college ready. But I think the team will improve dramatically next year.