College basketball coaching carousel thread

Right. The No. 1 criteria for a new coach will probably be his level of hatred for UNC

 

Hire Phil Ford at NC State.

 

I'd like to see King Rice get an interview just to witness the meltdown from State fans.

 

As a graduate of a Missouri Valley school that had a very good team 10-15 years ago before sliding into mediocrity (hints: school is in the middle of nowhere and has an oddball canine nickname), I always follow Marshall's situation with interest. He's got a great situation at Wichita and it's hard to see him ever finishing worse than second in the MVC. Also some chatter that Wichita might upgrade from the Valley to the AAC, which could affect what he does. Marshall has turned down a few overtures from power-conference schools in recent years, but I've always thought it was just a matter of the right situation coming along.

 

Isn't part of the charm of the Missouri Valley Conference that its membership is a constantly shifting set of schools that are generally in the middle of nowhere but that nowhere is almost always not even in the Missouri River watershed?

 

I listened to Gary Parrish do a podcast (CBS Eye on College Basketball, very good) right after he did a long feature on Marshall. Parrish said Wichita is paying a lot of money, Marshall has personnel use of a jet and he likes being the big deal in a smaller city. Parrish says Marshall probably could of had the Cal job and had a pretty good shot at Alabama but he does not want to leave for a mediocre job in a major conference. Parrish said that Marshall does have a list of schools he would go to.

 

It's actually improved a bit since I was in school, when New Mexico State and West Texas State (now West Texas A&M) were members.

As far as I know, the only MVC basketball school situated in a Missouri River city or town was Creighton before it moved to the Big East.

 

That's a Big, Big East when it includes Omaha.

 

The MVC hasn't been the same since Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, Nebraska, Mizzou and OU bailed.

 

In fairness, when I was a kid and even a teenager in the heart of the Bowash corridor, my idea of the MVC was that it meant "out in the Midwest somewhere." Which was accurate at that time.

 

I was actually a little surprised to look and see that other than swapping Creighton for Loyola Chicago it's basically the same conference it was in the 90s. It always was a fun mid-major back then.

 

I don't know why I do this but this is my all time MVC team. The team had to be in the conference for at least some portion of the players career. So Bronco77 can not use Walt Frazier and Illinois State alums can not insert Doug Collins.

Here is the history of the schools and when they were in the conference:

Missouri Valley Conference - Wikipedia

First team
Forwards Larry Bird
Dave Stallworth
Center Wes Unseld
Guards Oscar Robertson
Hersey Hawkins

Second team
Forwards Xaxier McDaniel
Larry Kenon
Center Sam Lacey
Guards Butch Beard
Lewis Lloyd

Lloyd is a bit of a reach but I could not think of another guard. The best player not to make the team was Chet Walker but Kenon and Stallworth took teams to the Final Four and McDaniel was a tremendous college player.

The members of my teams, with one obvious exception, are blacks who generally played in the late 50's through the 70's. I think that is the Valley's place in college basketball history, as a place where blacks were given an opportunity to play when bigger schools might not be as willing to recruit them. And the white member was working on the wrong end of a garbage truck when Indiana State recruited him.