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

I believe it. He'd still be an average coach at an average program if it wasn't for that win. He may still have gotten the Indiana job, but he wouldn't have been heralded as a savior the way he has been. (And, as I said before, if Keith Bogans was healthy for that Elite Eight game in '03, I don't think Marquette could have beaten Kentucky. That Kentucky team was good from top to bottom, but Bogans was really the only great player on the team. Without him, it was a top 15 team. With him, it was the best team in America.)

 

I think people forget how great that Kentucky team was that year.

 

Without a doubt, it was Tubby Smith's best coaching job at Kentucky. It wasn't his most talented team, but it was the only team he had after the 1998 title team that was built (both mentally and physically) to play his way.

 

Herb Sendek replacing Keno Davis at Providence? Not sure what to think about this - you could either make the case that Sendek did a remarkable job of resurrecting a really bad ASU program when he first got there or that he didn't get enough out of some very talented teams and this year's dud is reflects what life is like without an NBA lottery pick.

 

And Anderson should have been hired after they fired Heath, but Broyles and Co. thought they got the right guy in Dana Altman, who realized at the presser, he was standing with batshit crazy people, and ran back to Omaha.

 

Right now, getting 3rd/4th in the Big Ten and not being on the NCAA bubble (to basically be where Illinois is right now as a program) would be huge for IU.

I'm agnostic on Crean's ability to be a top-flight coach. But he solidified Marquette as a consistently competitive program. And he is keeping optimism high at IU. The IU administration is going to let Crean bring them up to that 3rd/4th level and then see if he can bring them past that. Which is why they are going to give him time to get there.

But considering what IU was looking for in a coach: someone willing to take on a job where the program was about to be napalmed, someone who had coached a perennial NCAA tourney team, someone who had a squeaky clean reputation with the NCAA and someone who could recruit good players to a bad team ... Crean fit the bill about as well as anyone.

 

I agree with your last point, which is why I said earlier that Crean was the "safe" hire. I'm not saying Crean was a bad hire, and I think he was about as good as IU could do at that point. And I have confidence that IU will return to the middle of the Big Ten under Crean and maybe even contend for a conference title at some point along the way. But I think that's the ceiling.

The NCAA Tournament is a crapshoot, so anything can happen if you get there. Saying that, Crean could very well end up in another Final Four at IU. But based on his track record I don't think he's good enough to put the Hoosiers in position to consistently contend at that level.

 

Pros: Connections, experience in ultra-competitive conference, won't embarrass school, won't go after bunches of recruits with questionable character, track record of success (this past season at Arizona State notwithstanding).

Cons: Does he really want to mess with the sort of position where he is expected to win like that again? Tempe isn't nearly as delusional as Raleigh was. (Unknown to this poster: Understanding the regional landscape and reality vs. expectations)

Providence could do a lot worse - if Sendek really wants to leave Tempe.

 

I suspect that the amount of heat on Sendek at ASU will be proportional to the success that Arizona has over the next few years. Meaning that Sun Devils supporters will be content to be "OK" as long as Arizona isn't making any Final Four runs.

 

Why the hell would Sendek make that move? It's a hell of a lot easier to win the Pac 10 at ASU than it would be to win the Big East at Providence.

 

Hell, a little more than 20 years ago, Bill Frieder thought the ASU job was better than the Michigan job.