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With all the firings over the past two weeks there has been a lot of speculation about which opening would be the ideal one to step into a new coach. One job that has consistently been mentioned at the top is Georgia Tech, which opened up after Paul Hewitt was fired. There have been several reports that current Dayton coach Brian Gregory may be in line to take the coveted position as he has been offered the position and is currently mulling the offer.
- On the other end of the spectrum is the Tennessee job, which offers the appeal of a large university in a power conference without the stress associated with other positions (read: it is still a football school), but also is in line for sanctions related to the Bruce Pearl fiasco. While many people expected the coaching search to last at least a month, the Volunteers have already grabbed a coach as they hired Cuonzo Martin to be their new coach. While Martin has limited experience as a head coach (only three seasons at Missouri State) he has been very successful turning the program around from 11-20 in his first season to 26-9 and a Missouri Valley Conference regular season title two years later. Martin will be able to attract more high-level talent to Knoxville than he did at his previous job, but he will have his work cut out for him in the SEC given what will likely be harsh sanctions from the NCAA.
- In more coaching news (busy day for coaches and ADs), Bradley announced that it had hired Kent State coach Geno Ford to replace Jim Les who was fired earlier this month. Ford is coming off two consecutive MAC regular season titles (and Coach of the Year awards) and will need to work his magic turning around a Braves team that was 11-20 last season and saw Sam Maniscalco, its star player, transfer to Illinois after Les was fired.
- One name that had been mentioned as a possible replacement at many schools with vacancies was Chris Mooney, but we can take his name out of the running for any opening as Richmond signed him to a 10-year extension yesterday. Although Mooney struggled in his first four seasons with the Spiders he rebounded to make two consecutive NCAA Tournaments including a Sweet 16 appearance this year.
- Getting back on the court (sort of), Las Vegas has installed Kentucky as the favorite to cut down the nets in Houston in a week. We are sure that the relative “passion” of Kentucky fans may also have something to do with them being the favorites over UConn although the Huskies come in as the higher seed. We are also somewhat perplexed by the 1371-1 odds on VCU reaching the Final Four compared with the 175-1 odds on VCU winning the title. We understand that the former was for individual games, but it seems like a sophisticated gambler would have found a way to exploit an arbitrage opportunity there. We also find it hard to believe that the 11th seeded Rams were the first “field” team to make the Final Four. We would have assumed that other #11 seeds (LSU in 1986 or George Mason in 2006) would have been “field” teams as well.
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No big deal but Geno Ford and Kent State are in the MAC not the MAAC.