Reasoning

I know what everyone is going to think when they see this blog. Things like, "Why would you get rid of Tom Crean? He just took you guys to the Final Four in 2003," "You're an idiot, he brings in top level recruits every year," and "Why would Marquette sign him through 2016-2017 if he's a bad coach?" To these questions I answer Dwayne Wade took us to the Final Four, when is the last time a prized recruit has panned out since our Final Four run, and Marquette officials are as blindsided as everyone else by the magical Final Four run and the potential of the recruits he brings in every year.

Our offense has been absolutely atrocious ever since Wade left. Even then it had no real game plan behind it, we were just lucky that Wade was a very unselfish player and able to spread the ball around to his teammates. If it was up to Crean, it would have been like that episode of Fresh Prince where all the coach says is, "Get the ball to Will." For four years since that's what we've put up with. In 2003-2005 Travis Diener would shoot every time unless he was guarded by at least three people. In 2005-2006 Steve Novak wasn't nearly as selfish, but he lacks any sort of real talent when it comes to passing, but we got away with it since he was a dynamite shooter. Now we are stuck with the abomination that is Dominic James.

The problem started during our 4 game stretch against UConn, West Virginia, Syracuse, and then Pittsburgh. This is when Dominic James began to think he was a three point shooter. This was a direct result of the fact that he began banking in at least two 3's a game. Tom Crean should have stopped this thinking right then and there. The last thing we needed was James thinking he was Allen Iverson. Of course Tom did nothing and we were stuck watching James shoot between 11 3's a game while only making two. What does Tommy do during this stretch? Clap his hands, push up his glasses, and take a sip of Diet Pepsi for the cameras to see. He could never upset his star player even though we were winning games despite James and losing games because of him at that point.

While we're on the topic of offensive woes, I'm sure you all remember that we were shut out for the first 9:30 of our opening round loss to Michigan State in the NCAA tournament this year. We didn't score a single point. This is because our half court offensive philosophy right now is to run a three man weave 25 feet from the basket until we can either hoist up a bad 3, get one of our big guys to set a moving screen, or drive to the basket, get fouled, and then miss both free throws. We run this play every time down the court if we're not on a fast break. Any team that plays a zone against us is almost guaranteed a victory. We simply cannot score while running a half court offense. Maybe it's because we don't set any screens, maybe it's because we don't know what a pick and roll is because we've never successfully executed a pick, or maybe it's because no one makes the back door cut to the basket until James has 15 points because they know he's not going to pass it to them anyway. I don't know, and I guarantee you Tommy is too busy drinking Diet Pepsis and telling James to keep shooting to figure it out.

Please Marquette, fire Tom Crean and end this misery. We've already lost every worthwhile player from our 2003 recruiting class to transfers, had to suffer through both Diener (in 2004) and McNeal (in 2007) getting injured in practice just days before March, and now we are forced to put up with another season of Dominic James in all of his 1-10 3 point shooting glory. All I have to look forward to is a season that begins with high expectations and a pre-season top 15 ranking just to see us play to the level of our crappy opponents and lose in the first round again.