And maybe that doesn't make much of a difference but we are trending worse than his first season which we all excused as a learning/transition year.

I'm all for being patient but there's really nothing about his tenure, and not just his ND one, that leads me to believe there are any signs for hope.

And worse, I've gone from being frustrated about the program to apathy. That's the worst kind of feeling for fans.

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from playing without Burton for so much of last season? Same scenario with a stronger roster and the team was somehow even...worse this time around? Last in the entire conference.

Three years in and Shrewsberry still doesn't have a single top-25 win. Not one.

To flip your question around, who could ND find who would actually fare worse than this? It would be difficult. If Bevacqua wants to run it back, that's fine but I'm completely out on Shrews and have zero interest in paying any attention whatsoever. I was already basically there by the middle of January.

Any coach firing is basically going to be a hard reset, unless you hire a coach who can bring some players with him from his former job.

And even if Shrews manages to put together a decent year next season, Burton and Haralson will be gone, so you'll be basically starting over from scratch anyway.

But if you can tell me there's a discernible plan to what Shrews is doing, I'd be happy to listen. In Year 3, a healthy program should be able to withstand an injury to a key player without going completely in the tank. And that also ignores the fact that there were clear issues with the team, and his coaching, before Burton got hurt this year.

I'm also a little suspect of the article Noie wrote after the Duke game that everyone seems to be hailing as a wake-up call for the administration/athletic department. Acknowledging there's clearly not the same commitment to hoops as there is for football. But there's also obviously significant money being spent on the guys on the roster, and the guys they're recruiting.

I don't believe that Shrews "didn't sign up for this," ie, that he wasn't aware we were going to be a "developmental" program that majors in "high school recruiting," and makes small additions in the portal. Its the message that's been out there since he was hired, so if he doesn't agree with that approach then he's talking out of both sides of his mouth.

But the bottom line is that I can't really point to many examples of him actually being a good basketball coach, or a good developer of talent. I'm ready to listen to defenders, because I really wanted it to work out. But he's working on setting records for futility that give McLeod a real run for his money.

I haven't been paying attention on a game by game basis this year but Shrews has had more than a couple incidents and outbursts that didn't seem very professional to me.