The UC Santa Barbara men’s basketball program has elected not to compete in postseason play in 2014, the program’s leadership announced Sunday.
Although the Gauchos were extended invitations to appear in their fourth postseason in the past five seasons, head coach Bob Williams in consultation with Director of Athletics Mark Massari, decided to focus on other program priorities.
“UCSB basketball is honored to have been invited to play in postseason tournaments,” Williams said. “But at this time, the decision was made to give stronger attention to other priorities within our program. We extend our gratitude to those involved in the selection processes and express our hopes that their tournaments are successful.”
UCSB finished the 2013-14 season with a record of 21-9 overall and 12-4 in Big West Conference play. In 2014-15, the Gauchos are expected to return all but two players, they will add three others who sat out either all or most of the season, and a pair of talented recruits.
Bad decision by the UCSB coaches and administrators. I’m sure the players would like to play another game so they could help erase from their minds the terrible game they had the last time they played against Cal Poly. What an embarassing and humiliating game that was. So Instead of playing in a post-season tourney game the coach and staff want to focus on giving strong attention to other priorities in the program? What does that mean? To me it means they are quitters and it’s hard to support quitters. At least I can remember the good old glory days when UCSB basketball was relevant and the Thunderdome was rocking with thousands of fans cheering for the Brian Shaw, Carrick DeHart, and Eric McArthur.Gaucho teams coached by Coach Pimm. So I will remember the past Gaucho teams that were great while rooting for UCLA as they play in yet another NCAA tournament. At least those teams never gave up and quit. Just saying.