Trouble at Long Beach State

[tornado]

several top players including two top BCS-level transfers and their best returning starters, were said to be dismissed, then possibly negotiating to return but...still seem likely gone..

http://www.gazettes.com/sports/lbsu/basketball-conflicting-reports-regarding-long-beach-state-dismissals-update/article_24bb4ba2-b93f-11e2-a515-0019bb2963f4.html

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/blog/eye-on-college-basketball/22225331/three-long-beach-state-players-likely-gone-from-program

USF is also cleaning house including a highly touted UCLA transfer

http://www.examiner.com/article/parker-dismissed-by-usf-three-others-leave-program

[tornado]

Some explanations of the multiple player dismissals at Long Beach State....now a fourth has been sent packing, Kyle Richardson.
Dan Monson has largely built Long Beach State into a perennial power by recruiting top notch high schoolers and developing them for four years...
but when he brought in a bunch of short term fixes (transfers Keala King, Tony Freeland then more transfers due this fall) and a couple of well-travelled kids who didn't even play basketball the year before -- because of the loss of four senior starters - that's when the team chemistry changed and problems arose.

"Monson apparently felt his program needed a makeover....King and Freeland couldn't behave well enough to remain part of the program ..
...a team that never found a way to mesh the newcomers and the returners, leading to tension, if not outright dissension in the locker room.
The problems were most visible on the floor late in the season as Long Beach State finished with five losses in its final seven games.
Among those were a 71-51 rout at Pacific, a maddening Big West semifinal loss to middling UC Irvine and a non-competitive 112-66
meltdown in the opening round of the NIT at eventual champion Baylor.
Even before last season began, Monson appeared to have an inkling his transfer-heavy roster had a boom-or-bust quality to it.
"There's a lot of individual talent, but is there a team? When you have that many transfers, they came for themselves.
They left for personal reasons, they come to you as individuals and they've got to buy into what makes the team successful.
So I know there's enough talent to contend and now it's my job to get them on the same page."

"King, Freeland and Deng were celebrated products of that effort to attract
new talent, but two came to Long Beach waving serious red flags. Deng did
not play for any high school team as a senior after a spat with a former coach
and a botched transfer. King was dismissed from Arizona State mid-season,
despite leading the Sun Devils in points per game."

"Discipline’s been really difficult with this team because we have a lot of
guys that, they have an idea of what they want to do, and I have an idea
of what I want them to do,” said Monson....
Monson said after one game that he would never take three transfer players in the same season again."

[tornado]

This is relevant to BU since Dan Monson was one of the candidates considered for the open Bradley coaching hire in 2011.....and he turned the job down telling BU "he had no interest in the job"...

but after a lot of turmoil last year (see above) now he's started this season terribly - at 1-8 and is struggling - with only a win over a DII keeping them from being winless, as they got drubbed Tuesday night by Creighton.
They sure didn't do themselves any favors with their scheduling - knowing it was going to be a down year they still scheduled..
Creighton, Arizona, Kansas State twice, VCU, Michigan, Washington, USC, NC State, and Mizzou.