Bruce Pearl's first three years at Auburn

Great point

People really think Matt and Wade are playing with the same deck of cards lol

He also didn’t take over a program that had been to 4 straight NCAA tournaments. He also didn’t have the roster that McMahon has this year.

Did he have the ability to add immediately eligible transfers?

agree with everything stated but the draconian sanctions. Look at the "punishment" received by other schools with very similar violations and the fact the Coach was fired, it'd be shocking if any significant sanctions were placed on LSU.

This roster sucks.
KJ is the only legit player we have and even he has flaws.
If KJ had the grit that Hannibal has, he'd be a Top 5 pick.

I don't believe another player on this team would be starting for any SEC team in the top half of the standings.
Maybe Miller, but he's struggled coming back after the year off.

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He also didn’t have the roster that McMahon has this year.

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There is a reason his best player is a 5th year player that came from a small school. He probably didn't recruit or have a relationship with the top players while he was at Murray St. WW used $$$ to build his relationships quickly.Hopefully McMahon can use NIL to get better players and not get caught on tape while doing it.

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agree with everything stated but the draconian sanctions. Look at the "punishment" received by other schools with very similar violations and the fact the Coach was fired, it'd be shocking if any significant sanctions were placed on LSU

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None of that as it pertains to other schools was known in April and we still don't know LSU's fate today.

The freedom of transfer rules also didn't exist during Pearl's first 3 years either. That is a complete game changer and has expedited the rebuilding process.

In 20-21 TJ Otzelberger took over an Iowa St. team that was the WORST in major conference basketball the year before. 2-22 record (0-18 in Big 12 play). 7 guys from the 20-21 team transferred. He had 3 scholarship players on his roster before bringing in transfers and 1 signee. The team didn't even have the full 13 scholarship players on the roster. All ISU did last season was make the NCAA Tournament (where they beat LSU) and reach the Sweet 16. ONE year after winning two games. Lest you think that was a fluke, Iowa St. is currently ranked #12 and tied for first place in the toughest conference in CBB.

Tied with Iowa St. for first place right now is Kansas St. They are led by first year HC Jerome Tang. Before Tang took over Kansas St had three straight losing seasons. I know we all like to think LSU is the only team that had a mass exodus after a coaching change...but it's not. Nine (9) players transferred out of KSU. Tang had to bring in an ENTIRELY new roster with 10 transfers and 2 freshman signees. Good thing Tang didn't just accept his team had to be horrible in year one, because he is currently 16-2 with wins over Texas, Baylor and Kansas.

Now, are those guys the "high end" of what can happen in just the course of year? Sure. But comparing coaches in the pre freedom to transfer era to the post freedom of transfer era is ridiculous. I have ZERO doubt Pearl's first three years at Auburn would have looked vastly different had he been able to turn over the roster with transfers like coaches can now.

It is equally as ridiculous to give McMahon a complete pass because "he started with zero players". Most first year HCs in this era of CBB are going to have to completely rebuild the roster in their first season. As noted above, Iowa St and Kansas St (like LSU) had just a small handful of player return in their new coaches first season. Florida had to bring in 7 new players this season. Same for Georgia.

I don't care where McMahon started in April. He had a full roster going into the season. A roster that, despite McMahon never coaching a major conference game in his life was though enough of to pick LSU to finish 8th this season in what was expected to be a loaded SEC. That LSU is losing to Kentucky, Auburn, Alabama is not unexpected. Those teams are better. But this LSU team is not only losing, they are not even competitive right now. And that's not just to Alabama and Auburn. That's against A&M and Florida too. Decent, but by no means great teams.

So no, I don't think McMahon should get a 100% pass on what's going on right now just because it is his first season. For all of the constant absurd bitching and complain about LSU's "street ball" offense under Wade, it was NEVER, not even close, to as bad as LSU's offense right now. From an efficiency standpoint this is the worst LSU offense in over a decade. That's not solely on the players. The staff is not getting it done.

I'm not leading the charge to fire McMahon after just over half of his first season. But along with the ability to completely overhaul a roster in one season comes a corresponding decrease in the level of patience that should be afforded to HCs in doing so. You can cry and say that's not fair. And maybe it isn't. But that IS reality.

Well, then you should give MM some damn credit if you think his roster is more talented because he was able to bring in the amount of talent he does have in such a short period of time. He had absolutely no players on the roster and recruited in what he has ( which isn’t much talent.). His roster is undersized, can’t shoot outside nor finish at the rim. That’s a recipe to get your arse beat on a regular basis in the SEC, the competition level is a lot higher every night.

If he doesn’t have the team playing at a lot higher level next year, I understand the criticism then. The supposed rankings of the players he has doesn’t translate on the court, you don’t have to watch long to see he doesn’t have a talented group of shooters or scorers. The only guys who have shown they can create their own opportunities and score consistently are KJ, Miller and Hannibal, the others are very inconsistent and are bonafide bench players. There isn’t any LSU players, other than KJ or maybe Miller, that would be able to start for other SEC teams over their starters.