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I sent a rather scathing letter to Mr. Harper about a year ago, detailing my frustration wit the state of the basketball program. After seeing the progress the team has made, I thought I'd send him another letter, and this is what I said: To me it seemed premature to be blasting Harper last year. As a new guy, he had to be given time to see what was going on. Attacking him before he could do that was pointless. When the time came to make moves, he did. Best AD we've had in the modern era. Excuse me, but I did not blast Mr. Harper. My frustrations were with the basketball team, not him, and I think my letter to him reflected that. When I sent my letter to him last year, he was gracious enough to respond the same day, and did so once again today. In fact here is his reply: Last edited by unclemark527 (1/14/2018 7:24 pm) Unclemark, To me it seemed premature to be blasting Harper last year. As a new guy, he had to be given time to see what was going on. Attacking him before he could do that was pointless. When the time came to make moves, he did. Best AD we've had in the modern era. A slight caveat, don't forget Harper had made it clear to me and others on this board the season before that Ferry was his guy and he really believed in that coach. I felt the same frustration as the OP. To me it seemed premature to be blasting Harper last year. As a new guy, he had to be given time to see what was going on. Attacking him before he could do that was pointless. When the time came to make moves, he did. Best AD we've had in the modern era. A slight caveat, don't forget Harper had made it clear to me and others on this board the season before that Ferry was his guy and he really believed in that coach. I felt the same frustration as the OP. Regarding your point, I'm now really glad those 2 or 3 extra wins didn't happen. Glad we blew a huge lead in the PIG last year. I'm only glad because of where the nightmare season led. To me it seemed premature to be blasting Harper last year. As a new guy, he had to be given time to see what was going on. Attacking him before he could do that was pointless. When the time came to make moves, he did. Best AD we've had in the modern era. A slight caveat, don't forget Harper had made it clear to me and others on this board the season before that Ferry was his guy and he really believed in that coach. I felt the same frustration as the OP. No AD worth his salt would ever rip his coach in front of a fan or booster. That's just not a good way to operate. Programs that do that sort of thing are the one where the boosters run wild. You support your coach, until you decide that he's not your coach.
CONGRATULATIONS COACH DRU JOYCE III
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Another Open Letter to the A.D.
Mr. Harper:
About a year ago I sent you a letter detailing my frustrations with the state of the Duquesne men’s basketball program. At that time I had just watched the Dukes lose by 21 points to Rhode Island. I was embarrassed for the team and for the school. I was glad (and a bit surprised) when you responded to me, and that gave me a little hope that the Dukes might be due for a much needed shake-up.
Fast forward to this year. I have watched the Dukes a couple of times now on TV, including last Saturday’s triple-overtime game against LaSalle, and it’s been fun to see the progress of this year’s team. It looks like you have made an outstanding hire in Keith Dambrot. He has the team really playing sound, solid, fundamental basketball. They hustle, they rebound, they play defense. They do almost everything they didn’t or couldn’t manage to do last season or recent seasons. If someone would have told me that they would have a 13-5 record at this point in the season… well, it would have been difficult to believe. I might have been happy with 13 to 15 wins for the year. Seriously, this team is a joy to watch and there is no way I would have said that a year ago.
Mr. Harper, I don’t know if Duquesne is a threat to make a trip to the “Big Dance” this season, but who knows? Come NCAA tournament time the Dukes might be one of those teams that could make a little noise. If nothing else the team looks like they are on the road to respectability. And it’s about damn time. My hat is off to you and Coach Dambrot. Thank you for taking men’s basketball at Duquesne seriously again.
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
Mark,
Thank you for the note. While we have been successful to date, their is a long road ahead.
Keith is methodically building a culture of toughness and accountability that will lead to wins. He has done so at a much more accelerated rate than anticipated. The players deserve all the credit, they have learned like sponges and given tremendous effort.
While many bumps in the road lie ahead, we will focus daily on the build and putting everything in place it takes to win consistently.
All the best.
Dave
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
Good for you to reach out to AD, it must have made Dave glad you stuck with the program and are enjoying the turnaround.
I don’t think the prior coach or AD were the match Duquesne needed to succeed, I think they did the best their abilities allowed them to.
Hope you stick with the Dukes and enjoy this season.
A diehard fan since 1961
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
duq81 wrote:
But, as was pointed out here, 2 or 3 more wins might have saved Ferry last year, but 10 wins in year five just did not cut it.
Vicimus Atlanticum decem
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
Tejas_Duke wrote:duq81 wrote:
But, as was pointed out here, 2 or 3 more wins might have saved Ferry last year, but 10 wins in year five just did not cut it.
We now have a great coach, better confidence and performance from returning players, some highly regarded transfers waiting, and some high potential incoming freshmen. The change had to happen. If a few more wins last year had kept it from happening, that would have been tragic.
Well, at least to those who have been waiting for decades for the program to come back, it has been a drawn-out tragedy that we believe is over.
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Re: Another Open Letter to the A.D.
Tejas_Duke wrote:duq81 wrote:
But, as was pointed out here, 2 or 3 more wins might have saved Ferry last year, but 10 wins in year five just did not cut it.
To Uncle mark, sorry if I misread your post. It seemed like you were saying you sent a hostile letter to Harper, which of course, would have been inappropriate.
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