And look how bad Sanchez turned out to beā¦ god I hope we donāt go the assistant route againā¦ if we do just keep Fearneā¦
Anyone try emailing Hill and asking him what kind of coach we are going to hireā¦ ha
FWIW, going the assistant route has worked out pretty well for Arizona. Of course, not comparing us to UA as a landing spot. But no denying what Tommy Lloyd has done in his first head coaching job.
As far as a D-I HC, Casey Alexander at Belmont would be worth a look, though heāll probably be on Vandyās shortlist barring some sort of miracle by Jerry Stackhouse & Co. in SEC play.
https://twitter.com/TheD1Docket/status/1744476844483584099
This is still a good list. Good read too.
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Good article!
that list does not exciteā¦none of those say guaranteed turnaround success
We cant afford anyone that is a guarantee. No matter who we hire itās going to be rolling the dice. We just have to pick the one we feel best about.
No guarantee comes with any candidate except God and He is too busy with other stuff to coach our team.
clt says it looks like the lowly sunbelt is becoming training grounds for potential aac coaches
Just keep Fearne Mike Hill has about the same level of intuition to pick a good ball coach as my dog.
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If we canāt then we are mismanaging our budget. I also absolutely believe some extra money could quickly and easily be raised for a big time hire.
We have to stop making excuses for the AD. The basketball coach is somewhere between the #1 and #2 most important aspects of the entire department. If we donāt have the money to make it a good one, then we arenāt doing it right. Especially with the #79 budget out of 362 basketball playing D1 schools.
We could add a ton more ticket revenue with essentially the same fixed operating expenses at Halton if we hire a winner. 3,000 extra seats sold per game (which would still be below our strong historical average) at $20 a seat for 15 home games is an extra $900k a year. This is the ONE thing above all else we should stretch on if we have to.
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I think you misunderstand what I am saying. There is NO guarantee in college coaching hires. None. All there is is degrees of potential success. If there were guarantees Michigan football wouldnāt have cycle through a bunch of coaches. The more money you have the higher the chance of success and the easier it is to get out of a bad decision. That by no means means we canāt hire the right guy to get us turned around, but if you are looking for a hire that is 100% going to work out - well that guy isnāt out there. Will Wade - he has a million dollar buy out. Would he win here? Yeah I think so, but not a sure bet. Can we afford him? Would he come here. Nope and Nope - at least not at our budget. Thats the reality.
So like I said no matter who we hire itās going to be rolling the dice. We just have to pick the one we feel best about. That isnāt making excuses for the AD - hell its putting more pressure on him. That is acknowledgement of situation.
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Our best coaches over the years have been our own assistants. Watkins, Lutz, and even Odom who was not retained.
If God applied for one of our coaching jobs, I doubt Hill would hire him.
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Interview question: Will you work on Sunday NO? Well, then you are not hired.
I donāt think misunderstand what youāre saying at all. You said āwe canāt afford anyone that is a guaranteeā you didnāt say āno one is guaranteed to win.ā
Anyone with a rational mind knows that there is no such thing as an absolute guarantee. We could have John Wooden incarnate and it wouldnāt be a guarantee. What we can do is hire someone like Rick Pitino when St. Johnās hired him, or more likely, we can hire one of a half a dozen up and coming coaches, several of whom have turned around absolutely abysmal programs and been dancing or will dance this year.
If we choose not to allocate a sufficient enough amount of money to hire someone like that, we are choosing to REALLY roll the dice again. While all hires carry some inherent risk, our lack of success can be directly attributed to hiring risky candidates.
Alan Major, third down the bench Assistant at big program. College experience mostly with recruiting and development. Best known for landing a few big time recruits not likely to come to a place like Charlotte. No established Xs and Os experience. No experience running a program. Total gamble.
Mark Price, retired NBA player, one of the best shooters of all time, immediate prior job was shooting coach for an NBA team. Only head coaching experience was an abysmal and very short stint overseas (0-5). No college experience at all. No real established Xs and Os experience outside of high school. No experience running a program. Total gamble.
Ron Sanchez, associate head coach at a top tier college program. No head coaching experience. Significant college experience as an assistant. No established Xs and Os experience. No experience running a program. Normal, reasonable gamble. From my eyes, from the moment he was hired, I didnāt like his messaging and didnāt think heās make a good head coach. He refused to be accountable from his first press conference and was full of platitudes. I wonāt harp on him, but the rhetoric that he was a home run hire is probably a bit overplayed.
Next coach:
We can either hire a guy like Sanchez, or we can hire a guy who has:
- Head coaching experience
- In-game collegiate Xs and Os portfolio to look at - body of work
- Experience running a program and recruiting
- Someone with experience turning a program around (or has previously run successful program)
There are a half a dozen guys with resumes that look like this out there and most of them are making less than $200K a year. We absolutely can afford to hire them. They will still be a gamble like any coach will, but if we look at someone who has an established track record as a head coach then we are limiting risk. We are minimizing what the gamble looks like. We can and should make the budget work to hire someone like that. If we donāt, itās a much bigger gamble, and we canāt afford that.
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I dont disagree with any of that. I have been saying we needed to hire someone with HC experience since we replaced Bobby.
Our budget does come into play, it is ok to acknowledge that as it puts some guys out of reach. It is not an excuse for not making a good hire though. We have to make the smartest hire possible within our budget. I will also throw out there that if you canāt afford to fire them, you canāt afford to hire them. Have to keep it at a place that if it goes south we can get out from under it.
FWIW Iād prefer a retread with a track record of getting it done at our level. If we do get a young up and comer I want one that in the interview says in 5 years I will be gone and the program in a better place.
Maybe it is just me, but it feels like over time we have never paid top half of conference salary in basketball. Am I wrong?
Iād like to see us show that we want to step it up. Show that we are investing.
Part of our challenge was since Bobby we have been paying two coaches for the majority of the time. Combine the two amounts and we have probably be on the high end.
That is why not making a move sooner with Fearne was wise. For the first time since Melvin left we are in a coaching search for basketball where we donāt owe the previous coach anything which should help in the process with a full market place.
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I wanna see us make the proper financial commitment to the right guy and for all of it to make sense to an outside observer, including considering where we are as a program and the solid conference affiliation, especially in regards to meaningfully improved TV coverage.
I do not want us to try gimmicks or be cheap. The program has been sacrificed so many times to go that route - thatās what got us 18 years of no NCAA tournament bids.
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And I dont want Fearne to get overlooked because heās not the glamour/name hire that some are clamoring for.
We are at a huge NIL disadvantage so his recruiting is limited. If he can win and build a culture heās done the job.
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