College basketball coaching carousel thread

Once upon a time I was sentenced to a week of corporate training in suburban St. Louis. Since one of the trainers was a big Mizzou guy, I decided to be friendly and tell him "Welcome to the SEC."

His instant response "Thank you we look forward to dominating in basketball."

(I didn't use a comma because he didn't.)

So on that note I finished up the week. And by the time I got off the shuttle bus at the airport Friday afternoon, Mizzou was going down in flames to 15 seed Norfolk State. And five years later, they still haven't recovered from that piano falling out of the sky.

 

I think Missouri would have crawled into to the Big 10 expansion committee meeting and gone under the table and performed oral sex if that is what it would have taken to get admitted. I think the Big 10 preferred Nebraska for reasons I have never understood, given that the state of Missouri has about three times the cable households of Nebraska.

And as long as Self is at Kansas Missouri is going to take leftovers in Kansas City. The next hire must be guy who can establish a recruiting base somewhere.

 

You'd have to understand that everything I know about Missouri hoops I've learned since the weekend that the Mike Anderson to Mizzou story broke. I've been basically a SEC/SWC/C-USA fan... sure, I watch other schools, I just never paid much attention to Mizzou. The first impression I got was reading the fans on the bulletin board following what was going on with Anderson. The mods were kept busy deleting racist posts/threads one after another. I'm in freaking Alabama and some of it curled my hair. Since that point, I followed the program while Anderson was there. I watched the boards again around his move to Arkansas. I've remained aware of the program since, but see ex's post above.

So yes, I do understand the heritage a bit. I just have not seen a whole lot since I started to follow the Tigers that lived up to the history up through Norm. I'm sure some of that "unrealistic expectations" is just my perception, because message board fans are not the most reasonable of people, especially during a coaching change.

 

There also may be a prominent job opening in a border state where Mizzou may be competing for candidates as well: won't be surprised if Illinois decides to part ways with Groce and go with a new basketball coach as well.

 

Mizzou had long been a very good but not great program.

For Norm Stewart's 30 years in Columbia, NO Final Fours to show for it. He had two waves of fantastic teams -- the Stipo/Sundvold/Frazier days of the early 80s and the Doug Smith/Anthony Peeler stretch in the late 80s/early 90s. Those were my favorite teams.

They usually got bounced in the first round. 1986, 1987, 1988, 1990 all early exits. 1989 made the Round of 16 and that was because the Pimp of Detroit, Rich Daly, was the interim after Stewart got sick.

The 1994 team, while 14-0 in the Big 8, benefitted from a rebuild at Kansas. Arizona got them in the Elite Eight.

Norm always seemed to place an obsession on winning the Big 8/Big 12 tournament at Kemper. They did in 1987 and 1989.. four days before getting bounced. Yet Kansas made final fours in 1986, 1988, 1991 and 1993 -- they never seemed (and still don't) too concerned about the conference tournament.

If I won any Power 5 regular season, I'd quietly lose in the semis to get that rest. Especially if I'm playing on Thursday in freaking Spokane or Boise.

 

BTW, I wasn't intending to slam anyone here's school. I really wasn't thinking in terms of Mizzou's J-school and that it was all but certain that some here would be fans. Yeah, I know, no cheering in the pressbox, and few here actually are overt fans generally... but I didn't intend it as talking smack about anyone's alma mater.

 

The very early line is that Mizzou and Illinois will be competing for East St. Louis native Cuonzo Martin. (I remember watching him on TV in high school as the Illinois state championships beamed to my corner of Cheeseland. #thingsthatmakeyoufeelold) Mizzou's early move might force Illinois' hand now.

 

No worries. I'm all for smack talking. But Mizzou is actually a pretty good program for an up-and-comer.

However, as I type this, I'm also reading about the supposed chance of luring Gregg Marshall. LOL! Touché to your point, I guess. But that idiocy is probably on every school's fan boards.

 

As I said, messageboard fans are not known for calm, moderation, and intelligent thought, and a coaching search brings out the crazys every time.

Alabama fans were gonna hire Marshall too.

 

Mike Anderson's departure really stung. It's fair to say the Mizzou fan base thought (rightly or wrongly) we were definitely above or equal to Arkansas, and that if we were a steppingstone it wasn't to a place like that. Then the ensuing coach search led to Matt Painter either taking or almost taking the job -- very credible reports at the time said he had taken it, but Purdue made a last-ditch effort that worked -- and when they were left holding the bag, they scrambled for Frank Haith. When that went sour, they got in the position of not wanting to be jilted again and thus went with Kim Anderson the loyalist. It was a horrible move from day one and I think just about everyone knew it.

I put Mizzou's situation now in the same category as where football was in the early '90s when they hired Larry Smith. He was a retread/reject at USC and didn't mean much to most schools because of it. But Mizzou's program had fallen apart and he was great for building it back to a certain level. In that light, a guy like Crean would fit perfectly.

 

Arkansas probably would have been too much of a lateral move for most people, but Mike Anderson has the connection. I never understood why Painter was looking to leave Purdue for a similar job. I don't remember, did he leverage it into a raise?

Norm started at Mizzou a couple years after Ted Owens at KU and lasted through most of the Roy Williams era. Now Mizzou will be looking for its seventh head coach of the Bill Self era if you count interims. That's crazy.

 

If Marshall was going to go anywhere, he would have done it by now.
He's content making 3.3 per in Wichita, which is a lot of money in Wichita, Kansas with relatively zero pressure at all.