Who do you think was our worst basketball coach? I say Melvin Watkins. I've seen better coached teams in a gym where they don't even have a coach. His games were similar to pickup games between ten players who just happened to be in the gym that day.

Aston04 said:

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Best to worst game day coaches since 2000:

1. BCG
2. Turge
3. Buzz
4. BK




5. Melvin

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I'd just flip Buzz and Turge on your list. I wasn't a big fan of his teams. Always felt like a magic trick to get in to the tournament every year.

Hop on over to the baseball board… I bet they'll tell you

agspirit_09 said:

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Hop on over to the baseball board… I bet they'll tell you

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We did give up two games to Mizzou this year who had a Melvin quality coach prior to us giving up three to them…(baseball)

Watkins was the worst followed by Barrone

aggie-1997 said:

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phatty26 said:

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Tony Barone

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Ah the days of Tony. I will never forget watching him sweat profusely, coming out of the jacket and loosening the tie and we weren't even done with pre-game warmups.

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Now that's funny, right there. I don't care who you are.

Complete Idiot said:

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I was recently surprised when reminded Melvin Watkins made the NCAA tournament both years as head coach at UNC Charlotte. Two years as head coach, two NCAA tournament bids, and actually won a round 1 game BOTH times.

Then comes to A&M and never sniffs the post season.

Bob Lutz, a Melvin assistant, took over at Charlotte and he made NCAA tourney 5 out of 7 years as HC. So maybe he was the secret behind Watkins's success as Charlotte.

But wait, once UNC Charlotte moved from Conference USA to the Atlantic 10 conference, Lutz himself then failed to make NCAA even once in 5 years.

So Lutz, or the conference, or something else made Watkins shine a bit more than he deserved when A&M hired him. What a disastrous flop. Yes, despite only ONCE achieving a .500 record OVERALL (14-14), not in conference, it took A&M 6 years to fire him. 35% winning percentage overall, 22% winning percentage in conference.

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1998 UNC-Charlotte team lost to UNC in overtime in the 2nd round. That UNC team was led by Vince Carter, Antawn Jamison, and Shammond Williams, made the final 4, and was upset by Utah to finish 34-4. Then we hired Melvin.

Actually, if you assume the Buzz six year plan, then it would have been the 2020 offseason, A COVID hire would have been tough, in fact only one power conference team made a coaching change that year (not including the weird deal at Penn State later that year). Let's assume that that school would have preferred Buzz over who they did hire, therefore the guy they did hire would be in play...

Wake Forest gets Buzz and we get Forbes.

bobinator said:

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Even in year 2 he had a better conference record than Melvin ever did, but still, yeah.

Once we didn't fire him after year three it was obvious that Hyman wasn't going to fire him unless he absolutely had to.

What's funny is that in an alternate reality 2014 where we have a different AD and fire Billy Kennedy we probably hire Buzz Williams then. That's the year he went to Virginia Tech.

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Who do you think we would have then hired in 2019/2020 after Buzz tired of us? Exit: somebody beat me to it.

bobinator said:

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Actually, if you assume the Buzz six year plan, then it would have been the 2020 offseason, A COVID hire would have been tough, in fact only one power conference team made a coaching change that year (not including the weird deal at Penn State later that year). Let's assume that that school would have preferred Buzz over who they did hire, therefore the guy they did hire would be in play...

Wake Forest gets Buzz and we get Forbes.

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Such an interesting alternate reality

Tony Barone

I guess it's bad to talk about Buzz but hey let's talk about Melvin!

He knew before we hired him, he kept it from us until after the contract was his signed. His wife said this an early interview.

I think all of the coaches were skilled at different things.

I loved Turge's offense against man and press. Great ball movement, attacked the press to get layups. BCG's teams played great defense and destroyed the 2-3 zone with the killer high-low set. I think both of them made pretty solid in game adjustments. Kennedy was low-key solid on all fronts IMO.

Buzz's teams were always competitive but often made the easy things look hard. In game adjustments were hit and miss. If we are a set of refs who couldn't get us to the free throw line on a regular basis we had no offense.

I didn't see any coach before Watkins so can't comment, but Watkins is easily the worst coach we've had since I started following A&M basketball.

agspirit_09 said:

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Hop on over to the baseball board… I bet they'll tell you

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I know the situations were quite different, but the fact that the same AD that hired our disaster of a baseball coach also hired our basketball coach has (at least for now) tempered my excitement for basketball season next year. The fact that Bucky has been a head coach for several years while our baseball coach was learning on the job hopefully means there is little similarity in their results.

94chem said:

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ArlingtonAg2015 said:

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Tony Barone

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Not even close. Barone won 20 games three straight seasons at Creighton and basically put them on the map. The idea that a Creighton coach would bolt form A&M as it was in 1991 seems impossible today. Barone was forced to coach the same program that Metcalf had endured, with zero support from administration, lies about a new arena, the Kermit Davis "scandal," and a solid last place roster in a dead conference. Melvin Watkins is the only possible answer to the question.

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Say what you will about Tony -- and I think in many ways he got the short end of several sticks when he came here. But the fact is, he couldn't improve on a 19-win 93-94 season and got worse -- MUCH worse -- the next few seasons. We knew it wasn't working (with or without valid reasons) and should have cut him lose no later than 1996. If we had, we'd have had a shot at Billy Donavon, who went to Florida that year. Or Bill Self, who went from Oral Roberts to Tulsa the next.

Think about how things might have been different then. I'd say there's a better than average chance we get at least one of those guys.

Instead, bean counter Wally felt that if the department was making money, all was well.

I understand why they fired Davis, but I would have liked to have seen an alternative: suspend him for a year without pay and let John Thornton coach the team. If Kermit walked, so be it. Get NCAA approval, and move forward. Maybe that was impossible, but I don't think the brass ever even considered it. Kermit wasn't the answer long term, but I think we would have been better in the '90s.

phatty26 said:

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Tony Barone

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This. Played with his son and practiced with the team on many occasions during my days at A&M. Horrific coach. Things were different back then. My 4th grade buddy was a walk-on for Barone so I gained full accessto the team. Good group of guys....just not very talented.

In Kermit's defense, he was viewed as "an up and coming head coach" when we hired him. He had been successful at Idaho (50-12 in 2 seasons) and seemed like the right hire going forward. He also was hired at a time when A&M was squarely in the NCAA crosshairs. My understanding is that he was ratted out by the paragon of virtue Jim Boeheim for doing the exact same thing Boeheim was doing. Using a street agent in NY to assist in recruiting. A&M cut it's losses really quickly and moved on to Barone.

My first two years were the 3-13 and 1-15 conference records in Barone's last 2 years. Had to beat Baylor the final game to keep
From going 0-16. I was excited to see Melvin for the men and Peggy Gillom for the ladies. Melvin for men and Peggy were the worst I've seen.

00 said:

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My first two years were the 3-13 and 1-15 conference records in Barone's last 2 years. Had to beat Baylor the final game to keep
From going 0-16. I was excited to see Melvin for the men and Peggy Gillom for the ladies. Melvin for men and Peggy were the worst I've seen.

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It wouldn't be till Melvin that we would achieve the 0-16 feat.