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Saturday
Jan292011

Cincinnati Bearcats: From 15-0 Start To 18-3 To NIT?

Picture of Mick Cronin, Bob Huggins

By JOHN P. WISE
One Great Season

The men's basketball program at the University of Cincinnati, my beloved alma mater, is not in good shape under coach Mick Cronin. Don't let its 18 wins fool you.

The Bearcats have zero quality wins this season. And that's usually been the case under Cronin.

In his team's latest embarrassment on Saturday, Cincinnati lost its first home game of the season to West Virginia, coached by 'ol whatshisname.

Is one loss on a Saturday in January worth throwing out the baby, the bathwater and the head coach? Certainly not. But there have been far too many of these one losses over the last four-plus years.

The way the Bearcats lose games is just as bad as the frequency the last few winters. It's just plain ugly, and with seven losses possible in the remaining nine games ahead, it's going to get hideous.

After Bob Huggins' first few years at Cincinnati, when he relaxed his style and became less of a pressing coach, the Bearcats became a team that could win ugly. They'd batter you and bruise you and find themselves ahead, say, 49-45, with six minutes left, then still find a way to hit 70, cover the spread and win by double figures. You could thank Huggins' superior athletes for that.

But can you name the last elite player to come through Clifton? I can't either. And if you say Lance Stephenson, please click that little red X on the top right corner of this page.

Though the coaching staff has changed and so has the quality of the recruit, what has remained consistent is Cincinnati's anemic offense. I rarely understood when Huggins' last few point guards would bring the ball up the center of the court, pass to a wing, then follow the pass and have the ball handed right back to him.

But such an offensive scheme would actually be an upgrade because under Cronin, there appears to be no specific strategy whatsoever.

It's often a freelance, out-of-sync attack that lacks continuity and energy and personality. It's rather ugly, and it has never evolved. Yancey Gates hasn't developed on the inside, and there's never been a reliable go-to marksman on the perimeter.

Even the body language is bad, as are the spacing failures and many ill-advised bricks tossed up at the most random of moments. There is absolutely no flow.

It's also worth noting that the anemia isn't limited to those who suit up for Cronin. Cincinnati's home crowd has got to be the weakest audience in the Big East. I was a UC student when that barn was built, and in its first few years, crowd support was never an issue. Huggins' teams were exciting, fun to watch, and very good. Plus, a shiny, on-campus facility was something that was sorely missed for quite some time, so making that joint rock was a frequent occurrence.

But the newness wore off, as did the annual expectation of 25 wins, and now every one I went to school with agrees that those four empty corners and high, flat walls are a huge waste of space. On a campus that brags about its design program, no less.

Hopefully for fans of Cincinnati basketball, their campus can be one that brags again about its Bearcats, but that seems less and less likely as long as Cronin is patrolling the sideline.

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