HB Arnett’s
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Vol. 35, Issue 21 – December 15, 2014
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Cinderella Cougars
Mustache Magic…Lady Cougars are Killing and Blocking it (literally)
At the conclusion of the regular season and after capturing the WCC championship trophy, BYU Women’s Volleyball coach Shawn Olmstead started growing a mustache.
He said he wouldn’t shave it until the Cougars lost a match in the post season NCAA tournament.
Facial hair has never treated BYU athletics so favorably. The Lady Cougars have advanced to the Final Four of the NCAA Volleyball Tournament and earned a ticket to the big show in Oklahoma City for a semi-final matchup against No. 2 ranked Texas. Along the way the beat Seton Hall, Arizona, Florida State and Nebraska.
Imagine if BYU’s marquee coaches followed suit. Bigote Bronco (Bigote is Spanish for mustache) and Razorless Rose might actually someday take BYU to the postseason big stage.
It takes more than a mustache to accomplish what this BYU volleyball squad has. They are making their Cinderella run with great play at the net. They have been exceptional in their NCAA run at blocking and kills.
They have done it with great players. Jennifer Hamson has proven that she is probably the best woman athlete ever at BYU. Alexa Gray proved that her selection as player of the year in the WCC was warranted.
What this team has up front at the net is size, defense and offensive hitting ability. As good as these girls are athletically, they are getting a boost just at the right time by their coach.
Olmstead may have the mustache, but more importantly, he has the machismo.to make just the right personnel decisions, even this late in the year. In the latest game, he started for the first time this year freshman setter Alohi Robins-Hardy. She was a difference maker to compliment Olmstead’s mustache and machismo coaching style.
It will take a tub of testosterone and all the girls on the team growing their own mustaches to beat Texas. They are the real deal and very athletic. Stanford is even better.
Regardless, what this team has done is historic. The last time BYU made a final four appearance was in 1993. As a show of support for Olmstead and his team, it may be time to “Man the Mustaches Muchachos.” If you are a faithful male fan of BYU, you have four days to give it your best shot and let your meager mustache show your support for the Lady Cougars’ volleyball team.
If you want another reason to like Olmstead, click here to watch highlights of the match against Nebraska and see Olmstead’s reaction after winning the match go from Giddy to Game Face in three seconds. It starts at the 48 second mark.
Weber and Women, the Perfect Pain Killers for BYU Basketball
With BYU’s men’s basketball team coming off a major disappointing loss to Utah last Wednesday in Provo, this team and their fan base was experiencing heartache and headache.
Turns out that the cure was found Saturday on the road with the perfect pain killers in BYU’s women basketball team defeating Utah in Salt Lake 60-56 and the BYU men rebounding against Weber State 76-60 in Ogden.
As good as the two wins were for both programs, it wasn’t like the Cougars discovered a cure for cancer. Utah’s women, with a 4-5 record and Weber State, with a 3-5 record, presented no serious health issues but were more like irritating runny noses that required a couple of ibuprofen and a box of tissue to get the wins.
Popping a couple of “Tylenol” Haws always seems to solve the latest Cougar cough and fever. Haws led all Cougars with 19 points in leading BYU to their current 8-3 record.
BYU was especially effective from distance. The Cougars hit 12 of 19 from beyond the arc which included a spectacular 8-10 in the first half. Next up for BYU will be a Saturday matchup against Stanford in the Marriott Center. The game is set for a 9 pm MST tip and will be televised live on ESPNU. The Cardinal are currently 5-2 with losses coming against Duke and DePaul. Stanford will host Loyola Marymount on Wednesday before traveling to Provo for the Saturday game.
My Big Disgruntled and Disappointed Disclaimer
Losing to Utah in football and basketball makes me irrational…and mad. When I am mad and irrational I say things I probably shouldn’t and will regret later. Losing to Utah in the Marriott Center last week made me angry and made me pen the following words. Don’t worry, my penmanship will be much more positive just as soon as we can play Southern Virginia, Eastern Kentucky, Weber State or Loyola Marymount again.
Dave Rose is Perfect for BYU…Except for his Pedigree
Dave Rose is the ideal coach for BYU Basketball. He is personable, has great rapport with the media, and is well thought of by fans and administrators alike. He also is a good recruiter….kinda. He is a good x’s and o’s coach…kinda.
When it comes to recruiting, Rose is outstanding when it comes to landing perimeter players and personnel that can shoot it from distance and play and run in the open court.
Unfortunately, he is average to mediocre, or some, like me, would say poor, when it comes to recruiting post and front court players that can actually score close to the basket.
Here is my biggest disgruntled and disappointing gripe about Dave Rose: If you are going to recruit front court and post players from Utah County, make sure that either their scoring or rebound averages at BYU are greater than the mileage from the Marriott Center to their Utah County high school.
Here are the stats for BYU’s post players from Utah County based on the mileage vs. production in points and rebounds so far this season.
Nate Austin…Pts per game, 3.0; Rebounds per game, 5.6…Miles from Marriott Center to Lone Peak HS, 15.6
Corbin Kaufusi… Pts per game, 3.2; Rebounds per game, 3.1….Miles from Marriott Center to Timpview HS, .2.7
Josh Sharp…Pts per game, 1.5; Rebounds per game, 1.3…Miles from Marriott Center to Lone Peak HS, 15.6
Kevin Nixon…Pts per game, 3.0; Rebounds per game, 1.5…Miles from Marriott Center to Orem HS, 3.9
Ryan Andrus…Pts per game, .8; Rebounds per game, 1.3…Miles from Marriott Center to American Fork HS, 13.9
Here’s me making my case for playing Kyle Collinsworth in the post (see more on that later) based on proximity and more importantly, production.
Collinworth…Pt per game, 13.6; Rebounds per game, 7.1…Miles from Marriott Center to Provo HS, .7
Maybe this griping is no more than frustration because of losing to Utah, but speaking of Utah, I noticed they don’t have any post players from Utah County. Neither does Gonzaga.
Actually, their big man recruiting policies seem opposite of BYU’s. The farther away a post player is from Utah’s and Gonzaga’s home courts, the better they seem to be.
For example, the Zags have two very good post players in Domantis Sabonis from Lithuania and Przemek Karnowski from Poland. Utah’s starting center, Jakob Poeltl is from Austria.
In contrast, Rose’s Utah County zip code big man recruiting formula has produced mainly zip.
For those who think Eric Mika was and is the exemption, you might be right. Mika just may be the anomaly. Here are his final stats from a year ago in scoring and rebounding vs. mileage from the Marriott Center: Pts per game, 11.8; Rebounds per game. 6.4…Miles from Marriott Center to Lone Peak HS, 15.6. He almost succeeds in my points/rebounds greater than mileage from high school theory.
Pedigree Problem
Since I’m still in the pouting stage, here is another pet peeve of mine when it comes to Rose. He is always out pedigreed when it comes to actual coaching on the floor.
Rose, in my opinion, is a “roll it out” coach. For the old timers, my definition of “roll it out” coaches would be Norm Ellenberger of New Mexico and Smokey Gaines of San Diego State. I once heard Ellenberger say in a late game timeout with the contest on the line, “Somebody get me a hoop”. RIO’s (roll it out) coaches rely more on having more and better athletes than an opponent instead of out coaching them.
Unfortunately, Rose’s pedigree is from “roll it out” coaches. He played for Guy Lewis at Houston, who was able to “roll it out” and be successful, to a point, because he rolled the ball out and let athletically gifted guys like Clyde Drexler and Hakeem Olajuwon out athlete the competition.
Rose, coached the same way at Dixie College. Rollin’ it out is standard fare at the juco basketball level. The guy with the best and most athletes wins.
When he arrived at BYU, he was still in the juco mode while working for a juco coach in Steve Cleveland.
Rollin’ it out and going fast and up-tempo works with great athletes until you meet an actual coach with a serious pedigree that knows how to control the tempo of a game and actually has a half-court offense and defense that works.
Good coaches with legit pedigrees know all about “time and score” and the half-court game.
BYU had a pedigreed coach once in Roger Reid. He was reared under the tutelage and lineage of Dick Motta.
He won with inferior athletes because he could coach the half-court game and knew how to get the ball into the post for easy buckets.
Unfortunately, while he had a legitimate pedigree, his personality and people person pedigree, or lack of such, was what got him fired.
The difference in Reid and Rose in the half court was that Reid was a master at getting the baseline pass into the post for an easy layup.
Rose’s go to half-court offense, in my opinion, consists of setting several screens for Tyler Haws to curl at the top of the key or elsewhere on the court while taking an 18-20 foot contested jumper.
The up tempo, out athlete game plan will work against ordinary coaches, but those with proven pedigrees will shut it down. It happened to Lewis at Houston in the national title game in 1983 when his team was a prohibitive favorite with 2 slam dunk NBA first round picks. The athletically gifted Houston Cougars were beat by a pedigreed coach at North Carolina State who slowed the game down and made it a half-court contest. He took home the hardware and Houston took home a headache.
Jim Valvano did to Lewis what Larry Krystkowiak did to Rose last week. He took control of the tempo and game and held Houston, a team averaging 83.5 points per game to just 52. NC State won 54-52. Utah beat the BYU Cougars the same way. They coached and controlled the tempo against a team averaging over 90 points per game and won 65-61.
My Pedigree is Poor
My personal basketball pedigree is poor. It mainly comes from Joe Wine’s Blythe City League. I still hold the league scoring record with Jaywalker and the Pedestrians. I was the Jaywalker and the defense was very pedestrian.
Nevertheless, here’s my Joe Wine Rec League pedigree proposals. The Chase Fischer transfer isn’t working…at least against good teams with quick guards that can get in his face. That spells inconsistency.
We might as well go with Jake Toolson and get ready for the future. Toolson is a bigger and better body and has better range.
As for post play, it is obvious that Rose was counting on Jamal Aytes to get him points in the paint this season. But with Aytes no longer available due to an ankle injury. What now?
Again, here’s my Joe Wine and Jaywalker suggestion for Rose. Put Kyle Collinsworth down on the block and let him use his patented spin moves to at least get up an occasional layup. Because he is only 6-6, a lot of those shots will be blocked, but he will also go to the line and shoot better from the charity stripe than your current bigs are now doing. And did I mention rebounding, he already is head and shoulders your best rebounder. Getting him closer to the hoop will even make him better. Call it the Keena Young, Part Deux plan.
To replace Collinsworth at the point, give Anson Winder a full time job. Let him be backed up by the current backups Skyler Halford and Frank Bartley.
You will still need Nate Austin healthy to rebound and defend the bigger post guys, but with Collinsworth down low, you actually will have an inside out offensive option that will open up the outside for Haws, Fischer or Toolson, which is what you intended to happen before the post problems popped up.
You might as well get your best players on the floor at the same time. With no post scoring presence, stick Collinsworth down there and get the ball to him to allow him to at least try to score. If not, he is a good enough passer to kick the ball back out to the perimeter and hopefully an open shot with Haws or Toolson.
One more suggestion. If your pedigree is set in stone with the up tempo, full court game offensively, then hire an assistant coach with a proven pedigree in the half-court game and clock management. Time and score is still a big deal. Remember the Oregon game last year with the Cougars up eight with just a couple of minutes to play?
It’s okay to take time off the clock and manage the score. A time and score type coach with a pedigree would have won this game for BYU.
Joe Wine is dead and Dave Rice is floundering at UNLV, but hiring a good assistant coach with a big time half court and defensive pedigree and a small time ego (for both the assistant coach and Rose), could actually make Dave Rose the perfect coach for BYU now and in the future.
Closing Disclaimer: My pout and pontificating are now officially over. At least until another pedigreed coach puts it on BYU again for another early exit from a post season tournament. There are 351 NCAA Division I teams playing basketball. The Cougars’ up tempo, perimeter, and no post offense is good enough and exciting enough to beat at least 300 of those teams. It’s the other 50 or so teams with post players and coaches that coach defense and game tempo that cause the problems.
Cougar Football Comings and Goings
Goings: BYU will leave for the Miami Beach Bowl on Thursday, December 18. When they arrive, it will be without Dallin Leavitt, the sophomore safety, who is transferring to Utah State, Trent Trammel, a senior corner, who will graduate and seek to play one more year at another program and Brayden Kearsley, the sophomore offensive lineman, also intends to transfer to another school, but must complete academic work before he can move on.
BYU will also be without its current director of football operations, Zach Nyborg. He will rejoin his old boss Gary Anderson at Oregon State. His last day of work for BYU was last Thursday.
That means that Bronco Mendenhall is now looking for a new director of player personnel and a new strength and conditioning coach. What he won’t be looking for are any new assistant coaches. Mendenhall is standing pat with his current crop of coaches.
Comings: BYU is hoping there will be a big crop of comings as it relates to recruiting. The focus for this new class will be on the offensive line, juco defensive backs and quarterbacks. BYU wants to sign three quarterbacks this year.
The emphasis on the offensive line is to establish depth and more continuity at that position because of the constant flux and comings and goings of missionaries. We should know today, Monday, December 15 how that project is coming.
That is because the best high school lineman BYU is seeking will announce today his choice of schools. That would be offensive tackle Kieffer Longson of San Ramon (Calif.) Dougherty Valley HS. He will choose between BYU, Ohio State, UCLA and Utah. He reportedly is a candidate for serving an LDS mission before enrolling in the school of his choice. For more details this prospect click on his name here: Kieffer Longson
BYU actually wants to have four new quarterbacks in the fold for this coming year. Tanner Mangum is returning from his LDS mission to Antofagasta Chile in June. In case you forgot, he was co-mvp of the elite eleven quarterback competition a few years back with Jameis Winston, the former Heisman winner and current sophomore at Florida State.
He is the real deal.
Meanwhile, BYU already has two commits at qb in Kody Wilstead, the long and lanky thrower from Pine View HS in St. George. He is headed on an LDS mission before enrolling. The other high school qb that has said he will sign with BYU is Beau Hoge from Highland High School in Fort Thomas, Kentucky. Ft. Thomas is a suburb of Cincinnati and just across the Ohio River.
Hoge is 6-1, 205 pounds. Click on his name Beau Hoge to get a better description of what BYU is getting in the son of Merril Hoge, the former NFL player and Idaho State graduate.
BYU thought they had the answer to just who would be backing up Taysom Hill next season with an early commit from juco Trent Hosick. Now the Cougars are just another name on Hosick’s shopping list.
The story goes that Hosick said he would sign with BYU because he thought Hill was headed to an early entry to the NFL. That all changed when Hill broke his ankle and will now be back at BYU next season.
With the starting job at BYU now not a done deal, he is looking at other options. Those options are all appealing. Schools now pursuing the dual threat qb from Arizona Western, by way of Northeastern Oklahoma (for a couple of months) and Missouri, now has Auburn, Ole Miss, Texas A&M and even Oregon in the hunt.
For BYU, they are not willing to say never, but I am. Hosick signing with the Cougars this month and enrolling in January, is now an extreme longshot.
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Here’s another new name to put on your Cougar recruiting list. This past weekend BYU hosted a running back named Squally Canada on campus. He is a transfer from Washington State where he was a redshirt freshman and originally prepped at Milpitas HS in California. He is 5-10, 195 pounds. He will have to sit out a year at BYU before becoming eligible. According to all of his twitters he had committed to BYU. Click here for his WSU bio.
TV Timetable
BYU vs. Texas (Women’s Volleyball Final Four)
Thursday, December 18 at Oklahoma City
Match Start: 5:00 pm MST
TV: ESPN2
BYU vs. Stanford
Saturday, December 20 at Provo
Tipoff: 9:00 pm MST
TV: ESPNU
BYU vs. Memphis (Miami Beach Bowl)
Monday, December 22 at Miami
Kickoff: Noon MST
TV: ESPN
BYU vs. UMass
Tuesday, December 23 at Provo
Tipoff: Noon MST
TV: BYUtv
BYU vs. Gonzaga
Saturday, December 27 at Provo
Tipoff: 4:00 pm MST
TV: ESPN2
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