UBBullsFan

So here is the gist of it- Byron Brown has been the incumbent since 2005. For years no one even bothered running against him because it was a forgone conclusion that he was going to win.

Primary happens in early 2020, less than 20,000 people bothered to vote. Walton wins a surprise victory with 51% of the votes. Buffalo essentially woke up to the fact that there was a strong possibility that they may have a self avowed socialist as mayor, and now Republicans, Independents, and Democrats are teaming together to write in Byron Brown.

It's some guy from Memphis. The AD after him, Greene, was actually pilfered from us by Auburn. So if ya'll could kindly develop your own coaches/ADs and stop stealing them, it'd be much appreciated.

For those of you wanting any insight into Oates, this was exactly what we feared would happen at the end of this season. While we were hoping that his recent contract extension would buy us at least one more year, we kind of knew this was coming, as is the life of being one of the poors in Mid Major.

So it is no secret that UB kind of floundered around MAC mediocrity before Bobby Hurley arrived in Buffalo. A huge part of his success, however, was the hiring of Nate Oates from Romulus High School who directly brought in Justin Moss, Raheem Johnson, and later, Wes Clark, and indirectly, Nick Perkins. All of these players were critical to the turnaround of the program, and for those claiming they were "Bobby Hurley's players", is sort of misleading because the main reason Bobby had them in the first place was because of Nate Oates.

Schematically, assuming he does not do a complete 180, you can expect extremely tough man to man defense that thrives on pressuring the ball handlers into turnovers, and subsequently fast breaks. Offensively, they tend to spread out the court in an effort to create driving lanes and open threes. While we never had particularly good shooters, we shoot them... Alot.

Recruiting wise, while I am obviously bummed at his loss, I am really hoping UB is smart enough to retain his assistant coach Brian Hodgson, as he was instrumental in the recruiting of many of our main players on this year's team. UB really found a niche in the JUCO market, and I'll be curious to see if Oates continues that trend, or, since he is at a school with a much larger athletic budget now, does he go after the 4 year players.

All in all, I do think Oates is a heck of a coach when it comes to the xs and os, I'll just be curious to see if and how his recruiting strategy changes as he moves to a "power conference". Like I said before, although I hope it does not happen, if he brings along his assistant coach Hodgson, it will be particularly good for you guys, so it'll be interesting to see.