Boston College Basketball’s Hope SHATTERS as Program Standards Hit All-Time Low

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The latest Blake James podcast does not do much to instill faith in the future of Boston College athletics.

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Hello, everyone, and welcome.

This is Lockdown Boston College, your team every day.

I'm your host A.J. Black of Eagle Insider, part of the 247 Network.

I've been covering Boston College for over a decade.

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On today, we have a miserable show for you, but it's going to be a lot of fun.

We're going to talk about hockey having a bad weekend, what happened, why this hurts them,

and what they need to do to get to where they need to be.

Already have a coaching change.

Joanna McNamy is gone.

Why did this happen?

And where does this go for BC from here?

And let's kick it off with something I don't usually talk about,

which is the athletic director at Boston College.

Now, on Saturday, right before BC got drugged by Miami, there was Anthony Smith of Eagle Insider,

my writer on hockey, and you've seen him here on our show a couple times, clip to tweet.

I tweeted a clip, excuse me, I got it backwards, on Blake James' podcast with John Meeta Perrell.

And yes, you want to call it whatever you want to call it, it's propaganda,

it's whatever it is.

I don't really listen to a lot of them because it's just sanitized version of whatever you already know.

But the clip that he brought really showcased something that worried me.

And it was James talking about the end of the season for basketball.

And now BC is on the cusp of being left out of the ACC tournament for the second straight year.

With the win on Saturday, I believe it was Pitt and Notre Dame, both have an edge on BC.

And BC has to win out to make the ACC tournament.

Now, Blake on one hand, Blake James on one hand, talked extensively about the last three games for BC.

And the framing he had, the way that he framed it, then you can listen to the clip yourself.

He basically was playing chalk game with BC, talking about how they're probably going to lose this game in this game.

But if they beat this team, they beat Notre Dame in this season, they're going to be okay.

And they'll make it into the tournament.

That was not a good thing to hear.

Then talking about the excitement of making the ACC tournament and how that's a great thing that they do that.

I cringe so hard, my skeleton almost flew out of my body.

Making the ACC tournament every year should be an expectation.

Because BC is so bad, we are now looking at it as, well, that's a good thing that they can get that far.

We are so far removed from them actually making an NCAA tournament.

We're now looking at the ACC tournament and saying, oh, that's great.

That could be something good.

My hope is, you hear the buzz that the ACC tournament,

so this goes to the point like, is this going to be what saves Earl Grant's job?

Like if they get to the ACC tournament, is his job safe?

If that's the case, if it takes a miracle down the stretch to not be eliminated for the second straight year,

that is pretty, pretty weak.

I'm going to say that in the nicest terms possible for what the school is looking for for a program.

You get your 80 out there saying that this is okay.

Like I get it in one sense, right?

Blake has a job.

Blake James has a job to sell this program and to drum up whatever excitement he can from the fans,

the donors, players, whatever.

That's his job. He's a politician basically, right?

That's what he does.

But to put this out there, to make this like something that everyone sees,

it just makes BC look really pathetic.

It likes them look like a program that is miles behind everyone else and, you know,

for many cases they are because this should like immediately,

like the context of this that should drive the conversation moving forward is,

this isn't acceptable.

What's going on with men's basketball is not right.

And we're going to fix it.

Okay, you don't need to say you're going to fire or grant yet because I know that there's,

you know, things that you need to do to do to jump if that's the case you're going to make.

But you've got to say that this is not okay and make that very clear.

No BC fan out there is going to get excited by or think that there's any

smidgen of success because of the ACC tournament.

And that's not the only thing he said.

It just keeps going on and on and on.

The other comment that he made that I wanted to bash my head through the my laptop

was the comment that he said that BC is a tough out for every team that they play against.

And that, you know, there are team that no one wants to face.

Oh, give me a break.

Yeah, they've been tough at times, but come on.

Like, no team is afraid of Boston College.

No team is is dreading to go to Conti Forum to play Boston College basketball.

Oh, no, that's not happening.

Okay.

They played hard.

I'll give the players that that is very clear.

And that's been the case.

That was the case with the two and 10 football team.

Those guys played hard.

They're not quitting, but they're not very good.

And that's the biggest problem here.

So after watching BC give up, was it a 30, I think it was like a 32 to 6 run or a 36 to

4 run, whatever it was, it was like a 30 point run that Miami went on.

I tuned out.

I just, I can't watch this team anymore.

Like, I, you know, what am I going to get into?

Like, if I watch, if I force myself to watch more of this basketball game,

what, what, what, what am I going to glean out of this?

And then I think so many fans are like that.

And yeah, there's a few of you out there and I get it.

You guys have showed up my comments that really love BC basketball and I love you for it.

I do.

I think it's awesome.

But for the vast majority of BC fans, look at the stadium, look at the student section,

look at the social media or interactions, don't I mean, I can say what I want.

But like, the results speak for themselves.

It's a dead product.

It is what it is.

And you can deny that.

And yes, there's fans that would love to see it get back, but it's not back, right?

And I can't, I cannot, it just, you guys get bored with it, whatever.

I cannot do 35 or how many, you know, 30 games they play.

I can't do 35 or grant shows because it's just repetitive.

But the fact that you have a team that has 10 wins, they're going to have 10 and 20 or 11 and 19 if it's that much better.

And we're at the end of the day listening toward the AD saying, oh, it's a great thing.

And there's some excitement because they could go into this, you know, ACC tournament.

It just was so, like, it was so laughable as Anthony Smith said so well, like, it's laughable.

We are so, BC is so far removed from the NCAA tournament.

This is where things stand right now.

This is where people think of BC.

And it's got to change.

It's got to change.

In a moment, one change is coming.

And I'll explain who is leaving already and I'll explain what that means for BC in just a moment.

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Locked on BC AJ black here and I want to tell you again want to invite you I don't want to tell you I invite you to join our every day or club.

I will be doing a first cup with AJ on Tuesday so don't miss out on that but on Monday every tier you can join our discord group chat.

It's an app that basically works as a group chat that talks BC bus BC sports I will be in there to do a Q&A with all of you that are part of it.

In the discord you just need to sign up get in there you can ask me anything you want I will answer it the best I can.

That's on discord I hope you sign up because it's a really cool thing it's like I love group chatting I have so many group chats from work and things like that.

Think about this with BC people like just talking BC stuff.

Come over and join our every day club you can do that at the basic tier or the premium tier and get those locked on those last cups with a first couple of AJ as well now.

Let's get into more the let's get diving more with BC sports as we're talking about football because there's so much other stuff going on that I have to put football to the side i'm breaking that cardinal rule but when your AD says one thing as a coaching change I gotta get into it.

And BC already has made a coaching change after the end of one basketball season as

Joanna Bernabé McNamee is out as women's basketball coach now I don't talk a ton about women's basketball on the show and I specifically didn't talk a lot about them this year because they were atrocious.

They were five and twenty six I think they were just real bad they had one ACC win and I had said going into the season like they lost I think 11 players to the transfer portal last year.

They did not do a good job of bringing in a ACC caliber players in my opinion and showed them a court and you know just like with a lot of BC sports.

I thought Joanna McNamee was a pretty good coach but the results speak for themselves right like I can't argue with what you see and some of that is on her and some of that is on the school yet to say the school has not done a good job with any of the sports and supporting them financially with this new NIL world and I think the team that probably got hit hardest with this is women's basketball you know around the world women's basketball is a big deal when it's good.

But BC has not been good for a while and you look at them and there's I mean BC men's basketball has nobody there but women's basketball it's like playing in front of an empty stadium it's just nobody's there other than family members.

And so after a year like this where BC has probably their worst season and I don't look at the record books but I've I've followed along for a while.

Women's basketball worst season in like recent history five wins total one ACC win it was ugly and so they move on here and there's some interesting wording in the press release which was released I think like three hours after their final game like I thought Stephen Dazio got fired fast when he got fired like 24 hours after their final game.

Magnemy didn't even make it to bed before she was fired and that's just you know it was a quick move and that's what they did.

Now the piece that I thought was most interesting was that it's a firing but the wording and the press release makes it seem like they just let her go because she was playing on the last year of her coaching on the last year of her contract.

So this was it for her and they just just in the wording says they just decided not to extend her contract i mean it's that's firing right but like it's an interesting way to say it and it's interesting because it does impact other sports now because because of that wording you are not paying a a pay a you know a bio or you know you don't owe her anything.

So there's no dead money here and that's an important piece to consider is that if you need to move on from another coach you know the sausage and it looks like that would be the case but we don't know yet.

You're not doing like you're not going to be paying out to his coaches and we know BC is cheap we know they don't like doing that that's important okay.

But if BC wants to fire Earl Grant now you'd only have his extra money his dead money that you'd be paying for so that's an important piece because I know I saw Nick Petralia who I you know is a great writer on BC he's a student they're saying like this could impact the Earl Grant thing I don't see that happening I don't in any way that would prevent them from making a move but that's what they want to do.

Now now McNamie is gone.

What do you do what do you do you get to find another coach obviously you're going to you know the press really says they're going to do a nationwide search you know this coaches out there that are good and you know probably mid majors that you can bump up or you know assistant head coaches and power for schools but the end of the day.

The big piece to me that always struck me with bones basketball is just like everything else with BC it just hits them harder they got to support this program no matter who you bring in that person's going to need the financial backing to put a good product on the court.

If you're going to make them fall woefully behind an NIL and not have the money to go out there and be competitive in the portal and recruiting.

What's the difference between what you just fired with Joanna McNamie you need to change that and so maybe just getting a fresh start on that is going to help BC get to that next point but.

All every firing that we hear about now whether it's McNamie or could be Earl Grant like BC as an institution needs to change how they view everything in terms of financing it's a different world now and both basketball programs sort of struggle because of that I mean.

You could build a tournament team with the guys that BC is lost in the portal you know with Devon McLaughlin and Jason Zachary and even the guys that are you you thought were bad last year look great now that's all other story but we're not going to get into that right now but all of these basketball programs they need more support financially not from you guys you know that's a different story and now you know this is the first move so for Ben's basketball in terms of what what's going on.

You have two more games left you play on the road of Virginia Tech which if you listen to Blake James is a really really hard place to play it's really hard he said that very clearly and then you you come home and you play Notre Dame who is going to be playing without one of their best players so that's it if they don't win out their season ends will they move on if I was a betting man I I have said yes I don't think this program is going anywhere right now I don't see.

You know as I said earlier Earl Grant has said you know we're going in the right direction we've rebuilt this program and I don't see any of that so I think that's the case there now in our final segment hockey BC's flags some of you may think their flagship program has one of their worst weekends of the year let's just let's just put it a cap on this turd sandwich by talking with the basket hockey team in just a moment.

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Wrapping things up after a terrible weekend this is locked on Boston college and I'm your host AJ black and if you want to second listen check out locked on ACC with Kenton Gibbs now external to create podcasts on the Atlantic coast conference check that out on YouTube or ever you get your podcasts now hockey had a big weekend in front of them they were playing BU it was the battle a calm app you know BC had beaten BU in the bean pot.

But obviously we're Friday high they've been but since then BC has been really up and down they had that miserable loss against Vermont they played pretty well against you con now they just they really needed to win this weekend to kind of solidify their you know their rankings heading into the final couple weekends of the the hockey East schedule hockey's tournament and then for hoping to get the

get into that next year well everything went to hell and a hand basket this weekend is BC lost both games home and home both went to be you on Friday night they were at again a serena Oscar gelvik was back which is great but they fall behind two to one and then give up in empty netter to lose three to one tough loss and you know they they came out slow battle back and then just could not keep up but it was Saturday

night's loss that was just the real Debbie downer BC loses five to one at home to to BU and look completely listless and just kind of lost out there it look like a almost like a a situation of motivation for BC BC out there just like they just

didn't seem like they were that invested in this game and that's a big problem with these losses BC's potential chances of making the NCAA tournament dropped drastically they need

to start winning fast there are hopes of winning the hockey East regular season crowns are gone and the overall picture of this team is more

concerning because they had just looked so inconsistent of weight look look at Claudia their their goalie has not played well you know they're struggling to score goals you know they got to get much more going for for them to actually go the places that you're hoping they could go so these were just you know too

really tough losses for BC and again it goes into this giant you know data collection of just inconsistency that this team has been playing with which is sad

because they you know coming out of the bean pot you had all of this hope you were feeling good about this program and then it was like the rug was pulled from

underneath you as BC just as struggled and struggled and struggled so there's that I mean what else is out there from this weekend there was nothing but football so that's good I guess but baseball

baseball lost two out of three to Florida Gulf Coast not good and and and women's lacrosse be Clemson who is ranked higher than them Clemson is one of those schools that just started women's lacrosse

and starting to really get their legs underneath them so to beat them was good so that is the only positivity from this weekend the rest has been pretty bad so I hope you got a better weekend hey the weather's getting better and what's

be real you know I'm a football podcast first and foremost but I do like talking hockey and basketball and and if there's coaching changes in basketball we will be talking a lot about

that we'll also be talking about football with practice and recruiting which is going to hit next levels type stuff soon with practice starting on March 10th so we're right around the corner again I told you on a previous

episode there isn't going to be a spring game this year which makes a lot of sense you have a new you know you have all you have all these new players you don't

want to give that away in addition there isn't a spring portal window but it sounds like teams some teams are just not going to care and keep doing it

anyways which I I don't get any of this I don't know how this continues to just be legal but that's where things are at that so thank you all for listening I'll see you all

again my name is AJ black you can follow me on twitter at a j by two for seven Facebook Instagram the tiktok I'm on everything follow me on all the

socials and I'll see you again tomorrow for another episode of locked on Boston college your team every day

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