investment.

The shocking part isn't that we're middling. The shocking part is that Beamer somehow pulled off making us a perennial Top 20ish program without the kind of facilities and staff other programs have. He had a great plan and made it work for many years (except for retaining the OC for so long).

The state of our program today is completely predictable and understandable if one assumes that sustainable success requires investment. We are far behind our peer institutions and if we want to be relevant in the Coastal, the ACC, or nationally, it doesn't happen because we simply want it to. It happens because the program is well-funded, keeping up with the marketplace with regard to staff and facilities, and therefore in position to recruit top talent into the program.

Is funding a guarantee of success? Of course not. There are plenty of programs that flounder even when they have everything they should need in place to succeed. Are there programs that have success without having deep pockets? Yes, there are exceptions to the rule -- but they usually require unique circumstances and aren't sustainable (see VT, Kansas State, Wisconsin).

The state of our program is not a surprise if we just look at what successful programs are typically built upon.

To return to prominence, one of three things will have to be the catalyst:

1. Wealthy donors just decide to infuse the program with resources (ala UNC).
2. Fuente's newly constituted staff (which is much younger now) gets things turned around in recruiting PRONTO.
3. We change out the coaching staff and take a flyer on a young, dynamic coach who we hope can recruit like mad.

By all accounts, #1 is not apt to happen. The current confidence level in the coaching staff is not sufficient for those donors to write big checks. #2 has a chance, I suppose, but that requires banking on COVID really being the culprit for this year's poor recruiting (and Tapp, JHam, etc.) needing more time to establish themselves as recruiters. #3 is a risk as well -- requires an expensive buy-out and there are no guarantees. What if the recruiting woes can't be fixed with charisma? If that's the case, our recruiting would continue to suffer and now we'd simply have a less experienced (and likely less capable coach) who still isn't infusing the program with talent. That just makes us worse off.

Our program is in the doldrums and there is no easy fix, to be sure.