Should Duke Fire Coach Scheyer?!

I’m fed up watching Duke stack top recruiting classes and still come up short when the game slows down and the pressure spikes. I lay out why Jon Scheyer’s results look great on paper but still raise real coaching questions after back-to-back late collapses.

• Scheyer’s year-by-year tournament finishes and win totals 
• Why elite recruiting does not equal elite coaching 
• The Houston Final Four loss and clock management issues 
• The UConn loss and the end-of-game decision that swings everything 
• Why I put Scheyer on the hot seat for two seasons 
• Comparing expectations using Hubert Davis as a benchmark 
• Using John Calipari’s early Kentucky run as the standard for maximizing talent 
• Dan Hurley’s path at UConn and the proof that winning can come after building 
• The real question for Duke: title game or bust?

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Transcript

Duke Frustration Boils Over

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's up, everybody? It's your favorite show. It's favorite show get a bucket. I'm your host, Trey, as usual. Hope you're all having a wonderful, wonderful day. Listen, I just got to get to the nitty-gritty. As a Duke fan, I'm not impressed. I'm not happy. I'm rather pissed off right now. And I think it's about time that we say fire coach Shire. Over Duke's tenure with Shire as head coach, we've looked okay, right? And there is a there is a world where Shire obviously keeps his job. He's had a solid start, if you will. Okay. I just think that he might not be the head coach that we need. And there's a couple reasons why I think that. So 2023, we lose in the second round. You have the number one recruiting class, 27-9 record. 2024 shows progression because we get to the Elite Eight with the number two recruiting class, 27-9 record. Both seasons, by the way, you have two players drafted. Keep in mind. The first season, you had Dariq Whitehead, Derek Lively. They were injured. So I give a little grace. And it's your first season. I'm not going to try to critique you too much. Just note some things. I heard I told you about the second season, 2025. We have the number one recruiting class. We get to the final four, and we have a 35-4 record. We lose five players because they got drafted, one of them being number one, the other one being number four. We got a number 10 pick. Like that was a star-studded season. And then this past season, we get to the Elite Eight with the number one recruiting class, and an even better record, 35-3. We're probably going to lose three to five players, give or take, right? So why should we keep John Shire? Why be pro Shire? Well, he's the he's had a 123, 123-24 overall record as Duke's head coach. He's the fastest coach, 200 wins. He has the most wins in his first three and four seasons, 89 games for season by season three and 123 games for season four. And he's had the number one recruiting class in three out of his four seasons, which the only non-number one was number two. So again, those are quality reasons why you should keep John Shire. Also, the ACC out of 32 conferences in all of men's college basketball is rated as low as number seven. So we've had good competition along the way. So again, quality reasons, quality stats why you should keep John Shire, right? Here's why I say though, I believe he's a recruiter over being a head coach. Because I still think we're riding the coattails of Coach K and the team USA connection, okay? That actually does help out when it comes to recruiting. I do believe that. So why do I view him more as a recruiter than a head coach? 2025. We're in the Final Four. We're playing against Houston. Houston's a good team, don't get me wrong. Program over the last couple years has been pretty stellar. They've been missing some offensive players. They ain't been doing that bad. They've been getting as far as they have with defense. And my Blue Devils were up 64 to 55 with two minutes and 11 seconds left. By 46 seconds left, we had a 67 to 61 advantage favoring us. Like, we lose that game. Keep in mind, ladies and gentlemen, the shot clock is 30 seconds. So that's at most two possessions. You know they're gonna foul us, and we have to keep our composure. But you know what? We don't ultimately we end up losing the game. Now, I can have gripes with referee calls, but still, ladies and gentlemen, we shouldn't lose that level. We should not lose that game. We should not at all. Like we gave that game away. But you know what? It's one time. I'm gonna give you some grace. I got to see it again. Well, guess what? We saw it again the very next season in 2026. We're playing against UConn. All right, this is the game that cemented, that confirmed it for me that John Shire is not necessarily a great head coach. He's a solid recruiter. We're up 19 plus points during the game. We go up 15 at the half. Now we've seen leads dissipate before. I'm not gonna critique him, but so much on that. Where it got me was we're up two points with 10 seconds left. To get the ball across half court, you have 10 seconds. So Yukon's hat, they have to foul, especially if we make one pass. They have to foul. Duke makes that one pass, and we then try to make another pass to get past half court. There's no reason to get past half court. There is no reason to get past half court because Yukon's finna foul us. As John Shire, I'm looking at you to say, you should have told the team this. Could you prepare for this in practice? Maybe. I'm not gonna slight you for that because this is a specific example and you never expect to be here. But you could have told your team, hey, we just need to hold the ball. Like I'm blaming John Shire for that moment. I got to. I have to. Can I blame Caden Boozer? Sure. This is up there with the Chris Weber timeout being called for me when they didn't have a timeout. This is up there for me. And John Shire, I'm looking directly at you. Now, for me, John Shire is on the hot seat. I stated recently, I thought that Hubert Davis was fired prematurely. I thought the UNC should have given him one to two seasons after this season. I'm saying the same thing for John Shire. Now keep in mind, Huber Davis actually went to the title game. He didn't have the luxury of having a Duke program that was still in the thick of things. UNC, when they had Roy Williams, started to slip a little bit. 2016 was their last good season, basically. Because after that, it started getting a little dicey. Go check the stats real quick. I'm telling you, it was they were not as relevant as they have been in the past. They didn't boast the better recruiting record. Matter of fact, their recruiting actually got better over time. They had number five recruiting in 2024 for the 2025 season. Then they had a number seven recruiting for this season. Now, they lost in the first round, I'll give you that. The first three seasons, too, that Hubert Davis had, you had a good quality team to work with. I'll give you that. I thought they should have gave him one, two more seasons. And again, he didn't have the luxury of following up Coach K on a farewell tour where we went to the Final Four, where we were recruiting at a high rate. He didn't have that Team USA connection. And yet Hubert Davis still went further than John Shire has to date. And again, Hubert's only coached for five seasons. Now, yes, they missed March Madness, one of those seasons, I'll give you. UNC has still been relatively relevant. The relevancy, I guess, has been in the past, and no, it has dropped. But keep in mind too, though, when Roy Williams was head coach, it wasn't at this high. So Hubert Davis has had to deal with less and went further. Now, another reason why I feel like this is fair, because you might say, oh, that's not a fair comparison. Okay, cool. Well, then let's talk about John Calapari when he went to Kentucky. Because in fact, over the first four years of John Calapari's career, he went 123 games, one, and lost 26. So we did it in two less games. But you know what John Calapari did do? First season, Final Four loss. Second season, Elite Eight loss. Third season, championship. Now, the fourth season, he missed March Madness. But you know what, ladies and gentlemen, that's a quality first three seasons right there. It's hard to top that. It really truly is. So, what did he do over the next one to two seasons after that? Because remember, I said he has a championship in those first four years. Well, he went to the championship game in 2014. And then he lost in the Final Four in 2015. And his team only lost one game that entire season. It was that Final Four loss. So, y'all want to talk about I'm being unfair? No. We've seen another coach be more successful. And keep in mind, too, I'll give you$100 right now, non-Kentucky fans. If you tell me, I'm joking by the way, but if you tell me who was the coach before John Calipari at Kentucky, because remember, Kentucky didn't have that same springboard the way that John Shire did following after Coach K. And then if you can tell me who was the coach after John Calipari, who was the coach after that or before that? Be quite surprised, but everyone knows Coach K. Everybody knows that we had Team USA connection. So again, Coach Cal was being considered as a good head coach because he eventually won with the talent that he had. So over six seasons, that's two final four appearances, an elite eight, and two trips to the championship game. That's stellar. It's showing that, hey, this is a fair justification for why I'm saying we may need to cut bait in a season or two. You don't think that's fair still? Okay, fine. How about ironically, Dan Hurley? Because apparently Hubert Davis isn't a good comparison, and John Calapari isn't a good comparison. Fine. Dan Hurley, the man that just beat us. His first four years, Miss March Madness, 2019, Miss March Madness, 2020. Didn't really have NBA picks, by the way. 2021, he lost in the first round. And 2022, lost in the first round. Now keep in mind, UConn did not have the same springboard that Duke did. Again, they didn't have that Team USA connection. Duke, as an organization, as a program, is on a much higher pedestal, was on a much higher pedestal than UConn was. Just to be clear. Now, after those first four seasons, Dan Hurley, what does he do? Wins back-to-back championships. The precedent's there, ladies and gentlemen. Over the next one to two seasons, my expectations of John Shire, especially if we keep winning these recruiting battles, we have to at minimum get to the championship game. At minimum. We also can't keep losing while being up anymore. Like that's that has to be over and done with. Again, these teams, these coaches that we've seen winning championships, whether you're talking about or getting to the championship, whether you're talking about Hubert Davis, again, UNC did not have the same springboard that Duke did. Kentucky and John Calapari did not have the same springboard that Duke did. Dan Hurley with UConn did not have the same springboard that Duke did. So I'm looking at all three of these coaches and feeling out and thinking, you know what? If we put them in Duke's program, do we actually win a national championship? Or do we even get to the national championship? Because all three of these head coaches, Hubert Davis, John Calapari, and Dan Hurley, literally have gone further with less. With less help from the program, with less help from the prior coach. Like that is a fact. We have more connections as an organization, as a program, than these other three. So again, I'm putting John Shire on the hot seat for the next two seasons. Because again, if we can fire Hubert Davis, if John Callipari can lose his job, come on now. And we've seen success from all three head coaches. Did Hubert win? No. But did he get to the championship game? Yes. Came close at winning that game. But close only matters in horseshoes and grenades. So I get you. I hear that. But I still believe that Huber should have gotten one to two seasons extra. John Calapari has shown you can be a successful head coach early on. Still keep your job. But again, to be clear, that championship was needed. And to be clear, our program is a little higher than Kentucky. Because again, when you think about success, we've seen success with Coach K. We didn't see that much success before John Calipari got there. There was a nice little lull for Kentucky fans. And then Yukon. Did we see Jim Calhoun win? Yes. Who was the head coach between Jim Calhoun and Dan Hurley? Don't worry, I'll wait. Kevin Ollie, in case y'all were wondering. Did he win? Yes, but we weren't really expecting that that season. So again, even for UConn, they were a little bit sporadic because they would win and then not make and then not hit March Madness. I told you, John, Dan Hurley was building up that program. So if he doesn't win these championships, we're not looking at Dan Hurley the same. But guess what? He eventually got to the championship game with less talent, with less of a springboard. So again, I beg the question, ladies and gentlemen, with all that we have going for us, is it fair to say that John Calapari, Hubert Davis, and Dan Hurley would have done more? Because again, John Shire has already shown we have not gotten to the championship game. And this is now two seasons in a row where we've been up late in the game and lose. I question that. I question that severely. But ladies and gentlemen, I know what y'all are gonna say, oh, you're just a spoiled Duke fan. All right, cool. Well, you know what? Maybe I am. But again, that success that we have cannot be denied. That springboard that we have cannot be denied, ladies and gentlemen. So I'm curious, what are your thoughts? Should we look to fire John Shire over the next one to two seasons if we cannot get to the championship game? Yes, success has mattered. But to be clear, I think anybody could actually coach what we did or with the team that we had to where we went to. And to be honest, one of these teams should have gone to the championship game. Like we should have been playing against Florida last year. We should be playing against Illinois in the Final Four this season. To potentially go up against Michigan or Arizona in the championship game. We should still be there. So I'm curious what your thoughts are. But, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, that does conclude the end of the episode. So please make sure to like, subscribe, comment, tell anyone who's anyone about the show. My name is Trey. I'm the host of Get a Bucket. I hope you are all having a good one because I'm not. Take care.