Timeline: Josh Hearlihy

An in-depth look at Utah's recruitment of Josh Hearlihy, who announced this week that the Utah coaching staff asked him to request a release from his national letter of intent:

Sept. 21, 2011: According to ESPN.com, Hearlihy gives a verbal commitment to Utah.

Nov. 9, 2011: The University of Utah announces Hearlihy's signing in a press release. In the release, head coach Larry Krystkowiak has this to say about the 6-7 small forward from Harvard-Westlake HS:

"We feel Josh could be a real diamond in the rough for us. He is long and skilled at 6-foot-7, who could be at 6-8 and still growing when he gets here. What stands out is his skill level and ability to make the right play. He is a good passer and has a great feel for the game. We think he will do far better in a system as opposed to AAU ball, where he has the possibility of being overlooked. He should fit really well in what we want to do at the `two' or the `three'. He is a great student and a great kid."

Nov. 28-Dec. 3: Hearlihy begins his senior season by averaging 18 points on 40 percent shooting from the field and seven rebounds per game. H-W goes 3-2 in those games. One of those games, ironically enough, was a two-point loss to Pacific Hills -- home of recent Ute signee Brandon Taylor

Dec. 14: Hearlihy has his first single-digit scoring game, scoring just eight points against South Torrance. This would be Hearlihy's last game until Jan. 28.

Jan. 26 and 28: Hearlihy attends Utah's games against UCLA and USC. Prior to the USC game, Hearlihy plays in his first game since Dec. 4, scoring nine points on 3 of 4 shooting -- all from 3-point range -- in a 62-60 victory against Torrey Pines.

Feb. 7: Krystkowiak meets with Hearlihy and his parents and tells them what Hearlihy told the L.A. Times on April 10 -- that he is/was encouraged to seek a release from his letter of intent. This comes one day after Hearlihy's worst outing of the year, a 2-point, zero-field goal, 2-rebound performance against Crespi.

Feb. 15-21: Hearlihy is as close as he ever was to top form, averaging 12.3 points on just over 50 percent shooting as H-W goes 2-1. Since his return from injury, Hearlihy connects on 13 of 25 3-point shots.

April 10: The day before the start of the late-signing period, Hearlihy, through H-W, issues a release detailing Krystkowiak's desire for Hearlihy to seek a release from his letter-of-intent.

Some conclusions that can be easily drawn:

1. Hearlihy had little, if anything, to hide regarding his health when he signed his letter of intent. After a summer of doing nothing but playing (and a summer in which he would not have earned any offers or interest if he wasn't playing) his body appeared ready to go from the start of the season, which came about three weeks after he signed his LOI. Certainly his production matches that of a player who is being leaned on to produce big.

2. Something happened on Dec. 13-14, when Hearlihy played in back-to-back games, scoring 21 points against Mira Costa before slipping to eight against South Torrance. Those turned out to be the last games Hearlihy would play for six weeks. It seems highly unlikely that Hearlihy had missed six weeks of basketball to this point, so it's highly likely that an injury occurred here. It has been reported that Hearlihy's injury did not require surgery.

3. Listening to Larry's interview on ESPN 700 on the Bill Riley show on Wednesday, and contrary to my first point, Larry gives the impression he knew about Hearlihy's health issues before the LOI was signed. So why sign him then? Because you thought he was a diamond in the rough? Then why give up on him for him missing half of his senior season and doing what he can to return to the court? Honor the scholarship and give him a medical hardship if Hearlihy proves unable to ever be 100 percent.

(Then again, maybe Larry saw what happened with Jim Boylen, and figured acts of good will wouldn't help him in the event he suffers through another losing season in Year 3, or another single-digit win season in Year 2. Why do the right thing if you're going to get fired exclusively for W-L anyway?)

If Hearlihy was worth taking a chance on in November, he should be worth taking a chance on now. If offering and having Hearlihy sign was a mistake, that becomes Larry's problem and not the Hearlihy family's problem. Larry has to start being accountable for his own mistakes and one year into his tenure, he's incapable of doing that. In fact, at the very beginning of the interview on ESPN 700, he refers to the departures from the program upon his hiring as "something out of our control." Talk about passing the buck. (EDIT: In fairness to Larry, his explanation for the latest exodus appears above-board and matches with what many of us suspected all along regarding opportunity for one year for guys like Farr, Dawson, Odunsi, etc.)

At the most crucial period in recent Utah hoops memory as far as the future is concerned, the Hearlihy development could be a damaging blow, and perhaps fatal. Our competition for Givon Crump and Renan Lenz now has a very fresh piece of meat for those recruits to chew on. Our name in Southern California -- long the bedrock mined by Utah for next-level talent -- has been sullied. Maybe we could overcome this when we were in the MWC, but every Pac-12 school has a major presence in Los Angeles.

But just as important as this development is to our recruiting efforts, it has had a major blow on the morale of the fanbase. Whereas Utah had had departures from the program for a variety of reasons -- some of which, in case you've been led to believe otherwise, actually fall on the doorstep of the head coach -- we are now experience departures before players ever set foot on campus.

Forget eking out a single-digit win against an NAIA Division II team; Utah hoops has reached a new low on the embarrassment scale. And adding to that embarrassment is the insistence of some fans who are painting Hearlihy as the bad guy, a dishonest ingrate who deceived Utah basketball into believing he was something that he really wasn't.

Parallels between Utah basketball and the 10th round Corrales-Castillo I

Never let it be said that I don't view sports through a different lens than most people. Now, that doesn't mean my lens is of the latest Canon model and is superior, but the last thing I want to do is give takes here that are echo chambers of what the masses are saying.

The only thing more sad than the demise and crumble of Utah hoops is the state of boxing. There hasn't been anything to get excited about in the heavyweight division since Lewis-Klitschko nearly a decade ago. Money and Manny won't fight, and so many of the greats in the middle weights have left the game.

And in Diego Corrales' case, he died in the middle of his career.

Corrales will always be one of my favorites, if only for the events of May 7, 2005 in his fight against Jose Luis Castillo. The two fighters beat the stuffing out of each other for nine rounds for Castillo's WBC and Corrales' WBO lightweight titles. Watch the 10th and final round once before reading on and seeing the comparisons I'm drawing to this fight and Utah basketball.

Every short list of the greatest fights in history includes this fight, and the 10th round you just watched can only be mentioned with the first round of Hagler-Hearns as the greatest rounds of all time. This is one time in which I'm an echo chamber ... take a look at what a Google search of "greatest round of boxing ever" brings up.

And to the point at hand ...

The mouthpiece, or gum shield, consists of Utah players. Make no mistake, Corrales spit his out between knockdowns to buy more time, just like Larry Krystkowiak has "spit out" players in two successive offseasons. In boxing, such tactics are deemed unsporting and come with a penalty, as referee Tony Weeks demonstrated by taking a point away from Corrales. On the other end of the spectrum, Kentucky's one-and-done system is drawing criticism from basketball fans and the media, people dismayed over the direction college basketball is headed.

Weeks obviously is the NCAA. Whether or not Utah will be punished in APR for so many defections over the last two years under Krystkowiak remains to be seen. But it's something that, if it happens, should not be surprising to anyone. Even Corrales, his mild protest notwithstanding, couldn't argue with Weeks' decision to dock a point.

It's tough to say who trainer Joe Goossen (who pops up in the screen almost like a jack-in-the-box at 1:34) should be compared to (Chris Hill? The fans? His own expectations?), but his words to Corrales after the second knockdown couldn't not be more suited for what Larry needs to be told this offseason:

"You gotta get fucking inside of him now."

That's not a warning, that's a demand. Goossen recognized what was at stake, as did color commentator Al Bernstein. Having been knocked down twice, in addition to being docked a point, Corrales was looking at an almost certain 10-6 round. Presuming the previous nine rounds had been scored evenly, the 10th round for Castillo was the equivalent of a 28-0 third quarter in football. All Castillo would have to do to win is survive the next two rounds.

And (presumably) with the three-knockdown rule in effect, Castillo was primed to end the fight right then and there. No mouthpiece spitting out could save Corrales then.

What saved Corrales? Obviously, hard punches. In basketball (and for purposes of this comparison), those translate into recruits. Two punches stand out:

Corrales' right hook at 1:54. This changed the momentum of the fight. It hurt Castillo and allowed Corrales to get off the ropes. Also, notice the clinch engaged by Castillo shortly thereafter. With one punch, he's a desperate fighter. That punch/recruit comes in the form of a game-changer like Givon Crump. Crump's shooting can help bury teams, but his ability to get to the line also serves as a momentum-stopper for the other team.

A left hook, this one at 2:02. A simple straight right hand, noted by play-by-play man Kenny Albert, set up Castillo for his inevitable downfall. In fact, he fought the rest of the fight against the ropes. The punishment is starting to pay a price, and this is where a power forward like Renan Lenz comes in -- a physical 4 who can bang away, yet "connect" from the outside when asked to.

There is no doubt that Utah hoops is on wobbly legs, and Larry Krystkowiak cannot survive another mass exodus of players. The first came because he wanted to clean house. The second is coming because he was too late in the recruiting game to get quality players to replace the first group of players.

It's either win big (amazing comeback) or be fired (get knocked out). Amazingly, Corrales "killed" by rebounding in stunning fashion to knock Corrales out -- and with still almost a minute to go in the round! 

What will be the "knockout" for Utah hoops? Nothing short of making the NCAA tournament will suffice, and no one is asking for a turnaround as quick as the one we saw in this fight -- although it should be noted it can happen, just like it did in the fight. It doesn't have to be next year, but it has to come (much like Corrales still had two rounds to get his KO after the 10th). 

Utah hoops should never tolerate coaches who cannot achieve this goal. We're not Rhode Island, which kept Jim Baron around for 11 seasons without making it once to the tournament, but who survived for as long as he did because he had so many near-misses that ended with NIT invitations.

When the knockout comes, and Larry has proven himself as a coach, he can spit out the mouthpiece a third time as Corrales did upon winning the fight. But when we get rid of players in the future, it has to come when there's zero penalty and the program has re-established itself as a power.

And let's hope our staying power is stronger than Corrales' See, this is the last fight he ever won. He lost the rematch with Castillo, getting KO 4. A rubber match against Joel Casamayor resulted in a 12-round split decision and in his final fight, Corrales was destroyed by Josh Clottey in losing a unanimous decision. One month later -- and exactly two years after his epic fight against Castillo, Corrales died in a motorcycle accident.

Utah hoops vs. the spread: A ray of optimism?

I'm giving the Larry Lapdogs and Propagandists the best evidence we're getting better, or that we were better than a five-win team this year.

The point spread.

Utah was 13-15-1 ATS. That's still a loser, but not as big of a loser as were were straight up (SU), or 5-24.

There are two ways to look at Utah's mark, and a delineation point must be made before looking at it. Utah started the season 0-7-1 ATS. Justifiably, at that point Utah was viewed as being on pace to becoming the worst major college program of all time.

But do the math: Utah was 13-8 afterward. It's possible Vegas never adjusted to Utah's "improvement", that Utah wasn't as bad as it looked in its first eight games, or that Utah really did get better as the season progressed.

It's probably a little bit of all three, but it's hard to reconciliate the number the soul-crushing blowouts of 25 points or more -- six of Utah's eight point-spread losses in that 13-8 stretch were of that vareity -- with improvement.

Nonetheless, numbers are numbers, and at least in Vegas' eyes, Utah was a better team over the final two-thirds of the season than it was in the opening third

The good: Within that 13-8 mark was a solid defense of home court. Starting with BYU, Utah went 9-3 ATS at home. Only the Oregon schools pulled off an ATS sweep. And even though Utah was largely putrid on the road, we did cover three of our last four.

The bad: The 1-6 mark ATS in midseason after Utah had put together almost an opposite run of 6-2 was a regression. But I can't shake the Oregon debacle. Utah had covered six straight entering that game, three each home and away.

Utah was only 1-5 SU, but along with the Stanford win, played Arizona to a draw for 38 minutes and damn near pulled a rabbit out of the hat at ASU. If there's such a thing as "best basketball of the year" for a team with 5 D-1 wins, Utah had it heading into Eugene before the roof caved in on us.

The ugly: The 0-7-1 mark bears repeating. A repeat is not acceptable, and while it's possible to go 0-7-1 ATS, but 8-0 SU, that can only be the byproduct of a good team that's always favored by large amounts of points that has a solid strain of underachievement running through it. Utah will not be anywhere close to that kind of team in Vegas' eyes. That's an extreme example, but I think we've already demonstrated that ATS/SU results mirror each other to some extent.

For this team to show the improvement in W-L, and match the improvement we saw ATS over the last 21 games, getting out of the gate 0-7-1 ATS ... well, if you thought this season was contentious, let's see what it's like next year if we start the season showing nearly no improvement from last year.