IMO the player retention problem is a bit overblown. First, examine the departures:
– Addition by subtraction: Harrow, TDT, Harris, Purvis. Also notable, Harrow didn’t give Gott a chance, so he can’t be Gott’s fault.
– Raymond never would have played; Gott never would have signed him. Zero impact.
– The reason given for Painter’s departure was family illness, which is not on Gott.
– Leslie, Warren, Brown, and Lacey left to go pro early. The only way to prevent this is not to recruit players good enough to go pro, i.e., not to recruit top talent. That is nonsensical.
– IMO both Lewis and Washington would have been clear backups if they stayed, likely playing 15 minutes or fewer per game, aside from injury/foul trouble situations.
People like Rick want to bash Gott about player retention, but IMO it doesn’t hold up when you actually break it down. IMO you can throw out Harrow, TDT, Harris, and Raymond as not mattering, the guys who left early to go pro as being an acceptable consequence of signing top talent, and Painter’s family situation. Meanwhile, Gott brought in a lot talent via transfer: Johnson, Lee, Lacey, Turner, Henderson, Dorn. Given the high nationwide transfer rate, overall it seems to me that Gott has actually done a pretty good job in this area.
I think the real issue is what others have stated, that Gott should be signing more recruits and using all of his scholarships. IMO he should continue going after the elite talent, and he seems to be pretty good at that, especially considering he is representing N.C. State and competing pretty well for recruits with the blue blood programs. But he should not be limiting his recruiting to only the elite talent as he seems inclined to do. He needs to sign some lesser ranked players to fill out his rosters.
It also wouldn’t hurt if he had his teams play at a faster pace which enabled him to use a larger rotation and might enable him to keep more players happy with playing time, but IMO that is a weak criticism. The bottom line is he has a good track record on the court, which gives some validation to his system and rotations.
