The Holy Land of Hoops

I know there probably aren't much but I have a curious yet serious question for DePaul fans. Now that it seems DePaul is FINALLY making a little progress, do you guys feel that Purnell might deserve another year or he still needs to go? There's still plenty of ball left to be played but I'm just wondering if DePaul fans maybe feel a little conflicted? Not a DePaul fan, but personally, I still believe he needs to be given the axe because while it's great that they've won some conference games, but if I were the AD, I wouldn't ignore 4+ years of poor play and poor discipline. But that's just me. So, do you feel OP is finally turning the corner and you see signs that say he's going to bring the Blue Demons back to respectability or these wins are great but they're fools gold, he's taken too long to finally make progress as he didn't make any the last 4+ years? This of course is a Big East message board so anyone can chime in!

I think it would be wise to maintain Purnell until the stadium is ready to go. You then can present a completely different product at the same time with momentum.

Five years and $10 million spent, and we're supposed to be happy with a .500 Conference record and an outside chance at an NIT birth?

Probably would give him a year till the new facility is ready. But you can't ignore how his team played OOC and you can't ignore the lack of interest in the City of Chicago. When the new facility is ready to go they need a young guy (Wojo, Miller, Hurley type) or a guy like Marshall or Smart with plenty of fire that can market the program and excite the students and fan base.

His team is showing signs of hope and potential, my thought is he gets another yr.

Do you guys remember how bad they were before he got there? "4 years of losing can't be forgotten." Yeah and you can't forget that no one was winning with that team he inherited. The DePaul fix was never going to be a quick one. It is a LONG process, a SLOW rebuild. It's gonna take time and like I said in the past you can see clear improvements each year. Last year they won 2 BE games but took 6 others to OT where they lost. Thats tied at the end of regulation, very easily they could have won more of those games. They weren't the easy win last year you had to show up and be ready to play. This year it's even more clear because now they are winning those games in regulation that they lost in OT last season. He very clearly has the program moving in a positive direction but there is still a lot more to do. He even said it when he was given the job and thats why the deal was a long term one. It never was going to be a quick fix unless they were able to hire Coach K or Tom Izzo which never was going to happen. It's all about patience and it's starting to pay off for the Blue Demons.

The big question is who replaces them at the bottom if they do become a winning program again?

NJRedman wrote:Do you guys remember how bad they were before he got there? "4 years of losing can't be forgotten." Yeah and you can't forget that no one was winning with that team he inherited. The DePaul fix was never going to be a quick one. It is a LONG process, a SLOW rebuild. It's gonna take time and like I said in the past you can see clear improvements each year. Last year they won 2 BE games but took 6 others to OT where they lost. Thats tied at the end of regulation, very easily they could have won more of those games. They weren't the easy win last year you had to show up and be ready to play. This year it's even more clear because now they are winning those games in regulation that they lost in OT last season. He very clearly has the program moving in a positive direction but there is still a lot more to do. He even said it when he was given the job and thats why the deal was a long term one. It never was going to be a quick fix unless they were able to hire Coach K or Tom Izzo which never was going to happen. It's all about patience and it's starting to pay off for the Blue Demons.

The big question is who replaces them at the bottom if they do become a winning program again?

I totally understand from where you're coming from, but it really doesn't matter how hard the rebuild is. In year 5, in any gig, significant progress should be made and they should be expecting to make at least a postseason (usually NCAA's). Significant progress hasn't happened and there have been some kids at DePaul who have gotten in trouble off the court and/or transferred away. Purnell simply lost control of the program. That's why I mentioned above "poor discipline". When you're trying to douse a fire, you pour water on the flames, not gas.

OmahaGuy wrote:

NJRedman wrote:Do you guys remember how bad they were before he got there? "4 years of losing can't be forgotten." Yeah and you can't forget that no one was winning with that team he inherited. The DePaul fix was never going to be a quick one. It is a LONG process, a SLOW rebuild. It's gonna take time and like I said in the past you can see clear improvements each year. Last year they won 2 BE games but took 6 others to OT where they lost. Thats tied at the end of regulation, very easily they could have won more of those games. They weren't the easy win last year you had to show up and be ready to play. This year it's even more clear because now they are winning those games in regulation that they lost in OT last season. He very clearly has the program moving in a positive direction but there is still a lot more to do. He even said it when he was given the job and thats why the deal was a long term one. It never was going to be a quick fix unless they were able to hire Coach K or Tom Izzo which never was going to happen. It's all about patience and it's starting to pay off for the Blue Demons.

The big question is who replaces them at the bottom if they do become a winning program again?

I totally understand from where you're coming from, but it really doesn't matter how hard the rebuild is. In year 5, in any gig, significant progress should be made and they should be expecting to make at least a postseason (usually NCAA's). Significant progress hasn't happened and there have been some kids at DePaul who have gotten in trouble off the court and/or transferred away. Purnell simply lost control of the program. That's why I mentioned above "poor discipline". When you're trying to douse a fire, you pour water on the flames, not gas.

We can disagree over what "significant progress" is. Personally I think that the current projections, which have DePaul finishing 6th, represent a minor miracle if that is indeed how they finish.

But more important to the decision making process is the fact that Purnell's contract runs through 2017. Is DePaul prepared to eat 2 years of his contract?

Finally the question that has to be answered is, "Compared to who?" Presidential candidates often run low in the polls toward the end of their first terms until the opposition party picks a candidate. That's when reality sets in that the choice is with another flawed human being. Who's the up and coming young coach who's dying to take on a reclamation project in Chicago who has ties to the recruiting base in Chicago high schools and who can overcome all of the problems with the DePaul history and infrastructure? BC showed Al Skinner the door because they thought they could do so much better with someone else. It's been an unmitigated disaster through 2 different coaches over the past 5 years. Sometimes the devil you know . . .

I think a big part of things is how they finish this year. If they go 1-5(beating only Creighton at home), with an ugly loss or two, then lose in the conference tourney 1st rd, they would have finished the year 2-10. It would kind of make the middle stretch a lot less important. But if they say go 3-3 and somehow get to 9-9 in conference play, I don't think there's a chance they get rid of him at that point.

I doubt DePaul has the money to buy out Purnell, but who was the genius who signed him to such a lengthy and expensive deal? It's not like he was a hot commodity. Terrible move, reminiscent of some of the SJU hires.