Rob O'Driscoll Named Maine Men's Basketball Assistant Coach

You couldn't pay me enough to move to Orono, Maine.

Man, Rob must really like a challenge. Maine might be the toughest place to win in all of D1 basketball. Maybe he owed Maine's coach a favor.

Surprising for sure, but makes me wonder if something else isnt going on here that would have made him want to make that move. Also its still been deadly silent on the portal/recruiting front. I wonder how much we lose now with Rob moving on. Its definitely concerning.

When I first saw the headline, I assumed that he was about to be named head coach. Good luck to him....I figure there's always more to the story.

A bird in hand is worth two in the bush.

There has been nothing on any potential extension for Spiker. Key players have graduated/transferred out, nobody has transferred in and the signing period wraps up in less than a week and there have been no further HS commits since the early period save for a couple of walk-ons with All CAA Name honors. All signs point to this being a dead staff walking. Next year looks destined to be a bad one, O'Driscoll chose multiple year security over the unknown.

I agree, thus my concern. Going into a year with a lame duck staff is such a bad idea and can set you so far back. Either give a 1 year extension as a show cause or cut bait. Doing nothing is just bad. I suppose its potentially easier to dig out quickly with the portal, but it still feels bad right now.

i was at the caa championship game in harrisonburg because of this man. i will always love him.

at some point i'll catch up with metsox and others about this lack of an extension. we never hear directly from the ad or anybody else so i don't know what her thoughts are. it would be a pretty major shift from the past if spiker isn't good enough. he's only a year removed from a title...like it or not.

Yes - as a long time Dragon fan, this is very disappointing.
The CAA itself is watered down and now the team is a mess.
Very disappointing.

We were at the cust of positive things back when we were in CAA championships with VCU

I like spiker.
This does seem like a disaster right now

(05-12-2022 01:37 PM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  i was at the caa championship game in harrisonburg because of this man. i will always love him.

at some point i'll catch up with metsox and others about this lack of an extension. we never hear directly from the ad or anybody else so i don't know what her thoughts are. it would be a pretty major shift from the past if spiker isn't good enough. he's only a year removed from a title...like it or not.

time to restart the concerned fans of drexel basketball?

are we not concerned?

(05-15-2022 03:23 PM)fredsavage Wrote:  

(05-12-2022 01:37 PM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  i was at the caa championship game in harrisonburg because of this man. i will always love him.

at some point i'll catch up with metsox and others about this lack of an extension. we never hear directly from the ad or anybody else so i don't know what her thoughts are. it would be a pretty major shift from the past if spiker isn't good enough. he's only a year removed from a title...like it or not.

time to restart the concerned fans of drexel basketball?

are we not concerned?

no...not really.

with everything going totally off the rails in college sports...i don't know how you can make judgements about anything right now. i'm not even sure i could figure out who is on our roster. maybe sometime in october i'll start worrying about how we look and i'll start questioning our current leadership depending on how things look in march.

the only definite in major college sports is alabama will be a national title contender in football. beyond that...good luck.

i saw frye got an extension so we're stuck with him...for better or worse. i still feel the title gives this entire regime at least this year if not next to prove that wasn't a fluke. 15+ years of bruiser was plenty of time to realize we needed a different direction...although that wasn't enough time for him to realize that himself.

i'll just add too that another person to keep an eye on is the new ad. zilmer is all i've ever known so i don't know what it's like to be around an ad who might want to win and have expectations.

that said...i would like communication about the coaching situation. it wouldn't hurt either to hear her thoughts on nil, transfers, etc. the question is where that communication comes from. we don't have a media to hold anybody accountable. i'm not sure it's her job to make a podcast or post these random things on social media.

as always we'll probably be left in the dark with the feeling that our athletic department doesn't think it has fans that actually care.

It's interesting that while our men's program appears to be in disarray, our women's program continues to be on solid footing. Amy isn't running out to the first offer she gets from a stronger school (like her CAA competitors did), and I find it hard to believe that there haven't been offers. Our best player is returning for her fifth season, and another starter is returning in her fifth season. And they're putting themselves in good position to once again compete for a title, even with so many players graduating. Meanwhile, our women's lacrosse program just won a CAA Championship and had two straight trips to the NCAA Tournament.

(05-16-2022 07:53 AM)J.B. Wrote:  Meanwhile, our women's lacrosse program just won a CAA Championship and had two straight trips to the NCAA Tournament.

And our crew team just won another Dad Vail, an event in which Drexel used be a perennial also-ran.

I don't know what to make of this guy going to UMaine. He seems to have bounced around quite a bit in his career.

assistants are always moving around. it seemed atypical that we kept our staff together for so long. when i look at a coach's bio i always feel bad for their families. sometimes i wonder how much the effort is there once they get a head coaching job. i wouldn't be surprised if they're like "wow...i made it...i'm just going to enjoy this and the pay check that goes along with it". they're going to get canned in 3 years if they're not alabama anyway.

i have trouble saying our men's program is in "disarray". comparing them to the women is tough because that program has been so strong for so long. it's as close to a gold standard as you'll find at their level. i am amazed the way amy has been able to hold this thing together especially with the short bench. she seems to really have the buying in.

you also wonder if priorities are a bit different in the women's game. maybe...just maybe...things like academics are important so they're more likely to stay some place where they're happy in that area. every 18 year old male athlete these days thinks they're the next michael jordan. that said...i know some programs have been hammered by transfers. i saw maryland in the ncaa tournament and they seemed like a strong team/program. a few weeks later a bunch of their top players were gone.

(05-16-2022 06:38 AM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  i'll just add too that another person to keep an eye on is the new ad. zilmer is all i've ever known so i don't know what it's like to be around an ad who might want to win and have expectations.

that said...i would like communication about the coaching situation. it wouldn't hurt either to hear her thoughts on nil, transfers, etc. the question is where that communication comes from. we don't have a media to hold anybody accountable. i'm not sure it's her job to make a podcast or post these random things on social media.

as always we'll probably be left in the dark with the feeling that our athletic department doesn't think it has fans that actually care.

It would certainly be nice to hear something. Anything from her. Shes been awfully quiet on everything. She is certainly more visible than Zillmer at events, but something on strategy or the plan or how they are tackling these real issues, would be nice to hear her stance.

(05-16-2022 06:38 AM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  i'll just add too that another person to keep an eye on is the new ad. zilmer is all i've ever known so i don't know what it's like to be around an ad who might want to win and have expectations.

that said...i would like communication about the coaching situation. it wouldn't hurt either to hear her thoughts on nil, transfers, etc. the question is where that communication comes from. we don't have a media to hold anybody accountable. i'm not sure it's her job to make a podcast or post these random things on social media.

as always we'll probably be left in the dark with the feeling that our athletic department doesn't think it has fans that actually care.

got it

let me know when you’re concerned and decide to fire people up like last time

maybe that would show the new ad people do care

until then, enjoy no information and an off-season of walk on signees

(05-18-2022 09:14 PM)fredsavage Wrote:  

(05-16-2022 06:38 AM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  i'll just add too that another person to keep an eye on is the new ad. zilmer is all i've ever known so i don't know what it's like to be around an ad who might want to win and have expectations.

that said...i would like communication about the coaching situation. it wouldn't hurt either to hear her thoughts on nil, transfers, etc. the question is where that communication comes from. we don't have a media to hold anybody accountable. i'm not sure it's her job to make a podcast or post these random things on social media.

as always we'll probably be left in the dark with the feeling that our athletic department doesn't think it has fans that actually care.

got it

let me know when you’re concerned and decide to fire people up like last time

maybe that would show the new ad people do care

until then, enjoy no information and an off-season of walk on signees

You are more than welcome to start your own Facebook group if it means that much to you. There's no reason that you have to rely on others to do your dirty work for you.

yeah...it kind of was dirty work. i didn't like doing it. the better way is what i'm doing now. i go to games and i've donated some money. apparently i gave enough that i got invited to a meeting with the ad. i can talk to her directly about what her goals are for the basketball team. if i don't like what i hear...and i don't see things improve on the court...then we'll decide where to go from there. seems like the better and more mature way to handle things. still screw up other things up i'm sure but getting better in this area.

(05-20-2022 11:40 AM)hiroshimacarp Wrote:  yeah...it kind of was dirty work. i didn't like doing it. the better way is what i'm doing now. i go to games and i've donated some money. apparently i gave enough that i got invited to a meeting with the ad. i can talk to her directly about what her goals are for the basketball team. if i don't like what i hear...and i don't see things improve on the court...then we'll decide where to go from there. seems like the better and more mature way to handle things. still screw up other things up i'm sure but getting better in this area.

That's great news, and we'll be interested to hear how it goes. I never got to officially meet here last year. I was hoping to at some pregame events but they never happened. I've always said that buying season tickets and making donations is how you help things get better. I never understood the haters who tried to blame the supporters and thought that ignoring things would make things better. It obviously does not.