It's that time of year: College coach carousel!

I don't like to spend five minutes in Columbia.

 

Won't rehash the details from the other thread, but does anyone else think Calhoun goes out a winner?

 

Pat Forde was on Kornheiser's show here in D.C. today and made a good point: If Calhoun quits, it'll be on Oct. 14, so there's no chance of Hathaway overruling him on a successor. (In that case, I'd think Blaney would coach the season.) Implicit was there'd be no chance in hell Auriemma gets even a sniff of the job.

 

I'd buy that, but Kornheiser has a way of dumbing down/mucking up every discussion. So that lowers the credibility.

 

That wouldn't surprise me at all. Yow was a terrible hire.

 

I hate it when coaches "with leverage" do this. It is an incredibly selfish move and I can't recall (sure, I could be wrong) the last time a head coach left a program in the preseason/early part of a season so the "trusted longtime assistant" would get a shot.

Dean Smith/Guthridge? Didn't work out.
Dick Bennett/Brad Soderberg. Didn't work out.

 

Guthridge was fine in Chapel Hill. I question if Uncle Gut was kind of a sacrificial lamb of sorts to give everyone in Chapel Hill an adjustment period. While a comparison to John Wooden may not quite work, look at the ghost-chasing in Westwood for years following Wooden's departure.

And it might have worked had the players not turned on Matt Doherty.

 

Eddie Sutton/Sean Sutton. Didn't work out.
Bob Knight/Pat Knight. Didn't work out.

 

If he's shouting that from the mountaintop in an unsolicited fashion, it's a problem. If that's his response from coaches interested in the NCSU job, that's understandable. Not like Gary to do the former, so assume the latter until further notice.

NCSU is a good job - there are certainly worse out there - but it's not as good as the fanbase stuck in 1974 and 1983 think. There's work to be done.

Strange part is that for someone who isn't tipping her hand to the media regarding the coaching search, I'd think it's unusual to offer this letter to the Wolfpack faithful:

http://blogs.newsobserver.com/accnow/yow-provides-update-on-search-in-letter-to-wolfpack-club

Hmmm ... laugh if you must, but if push really came to shove, offer the job to Monty Towe, who has been the top assistant, was a former NCSU player and undoubtedly has connections with the current players there and being recruited. Better that than another horrendous reach ...

 

Sam, I saw that on another board and came here to post it.

I don't know why anyone would want to work for Yow at this point. She's insulting everyone who's turned NCSU down. Rick Barnes and Shaka Smart aren't fighters because they didn't go to Raleigh?

I realize the letter wasn't meant for public consumption, but the whole thing reeks of desperation.

 

There's a story in John Feinstein's book about the ACC, and I don't have it in front of me so I'm paraphrasing, but I believe Jim Valvano had just been announced as the N.C. State coach and was getting a haircut somewhere in Raleigh. The barber talked about what a bad season UNC had just had, one in which they lost like one or two games. Valvano asked what was so bad about that. Barber responds "Just think what ol' Norm Sloan would have done with that team!"

There is serious delusion in many sectors about their place in college athletics, as evidenced by how they presume entrenched coaches at major colleges with winning traditions should be biting at the chomp to up and leave for a program that has had more coaches in the last 20 years (four, counting the new hire) than they've had trips to the Sweet 16 (one). As ACC jobs go, it's certainly not the worst (Miami leads that list, and Wake Forest might be next-to-worst now), and it's not impossible to think someone turns the ship around there, but the gap between reason and expectation is almost planetary.