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

This. The 2012 class is too good to risk imploding.

 

Hiring Crean was the safe hire for IU, but it won't work out. He's a recruiter who can't coach. No one remembers that the only reason Marquette got to the Final Four in 2003 was because Kentucky's best player got hurt the round before, and no one remembers that Marquette promptly got waxed by Kansas in the Final Four. It was a fluke run among first weekend exits, and he got out while the gettin' was good. But he's nowhere near as good as the three coaches he'll be compared to from here on out -- Izzo, Matta and Calipari.

 

Yeah, because Indiana University has always had trouble recruiting. No coach ever brought players to Bloomington before. Nope, gotta retain the mediocre coach to save The Greatest Recruiting Class In Indiana History.

Compare him to self or Howland, and he falls short there as well. If IU wants to consistently finish anywhere from third to sixth in the Big Ten every year, get an NCAA seed from No. 4 to 9, and bow out early, then Crean has shown an ability to do exactly that. He has also shown the ability to deflect criticism, crave the spotlight, make excuses, and make sure that everyone knows just how wonderful he is.

 

Haha. I saw the Clark typo and fixed it.

 

OR Dan Monson, who left Gonzaga for Minnesota after the Bulldogs run to the final eight in 1999, figuring that was as good as it would ever get at Gonzaga. Didn't do much while at Minnesota.

Interestingly, Mark Few replaced Monson at Gonzaga and was a hot commodity a few years back, had some offers from BCS conference schools and decided to stay at Gonzaga. Not the hot guy now that he was a few years ago, but he's apparently quite happy at Gonzaga and can basically call his own shots there.

 

Yes, I forgot Monson -- he was "under my nose" for six years as I covered him.

The IDEAL example of the "Coach Who Gets Hot". If Minnesota's four players weren't suspended in the Clem Debacle of 1999, maybe Gonzaga loses that game and never makes the Final 8.

Another problem for Monson was that, each year he was at Minnesota, Gonzaga was BETTER than Minnesota. That diminished his value in a hurry.

You almost always HAVE to go when the big school calls -- even if you know, in your heart or your soul that you won't succeed at that level.

I'm in TV news. Same deal here. I love the "mid-major" city I live in. However, if a Top 25 city or my hometown calls, offers me $150,000 or $200,000 to anchor the news, even if I know I'll be at a third-place station and will probably get fired... I'm probably going to go and uproot my family.

Even if I'm canned after three years, I will be on track for a healthy nest egg. I'll be able to help my kids with down payments for homes, post-college. It is nearly the same situation.

 

After Northern Illinois loses at Bowling Green tonight, Ricardo Patton will most likely be fired.

 

It seems the window for basketball coaches is smaller than football coaches. The first year is a freebie, the second year you better pull an upset or two, third year you want to at least make the NIT. Fourth year - Big Dance or bust.
Basketball isn't like football. Having a "young" team is different. Plenty of teams have been led by freshmen to great seasons.

 

If they fired Crean tomorrow, the 2012 class scatters. None have signed NLIs, so they will almost certainly go elsewhere. Which means that IU wouldn't be in a noticeably better position than they were when they hired Crean. And if Zeller asked for his release, IU would have no top-level talent and would be out of the game for getting recruits in 2012 and 2013. You're basically advocating that IU napalm itself again. The first time was a necessity. The second time would be irrational.

And IU fans aren't clamoring for Crean to be gone. You are more irrational than IU diehards. Congrats on that -- it's quite an honor.

I'm not convinced Crean is the guy to return IU to glory and put it among Duke, UNC, UK, KU, UCLA as basketball royalty. But considering the massive hole he is working out of and his bad luck (this year might have been radically different if Mo Creek didn't get hurt last year), there is no way to know that right now. Once Crean gets some top recruiting classes under his belt, we can accurately judge whether he has the bona fides to be an Izzo or even a Jamie Dixon.

 

The recruiting classes buy him some time, but not 4-5 years. At some point much sooner than 4 years from now his teams need to stop under performing.

 

If you care to find where I said Crean should be "gone," please feel free. If you care to find where I said he should be fired at this point, I look forward to reading it. You of course won't find it, so your little idea about my being "more irrational than IU diehards" kind of falls flat.

"We'll lose RECRUITS!!!!" was the same argument some made against firing IU's football coach last fall. It also kept Mike Davis in charge past the logical point he should have been, though it is amusing that IU fans continue to lap up the "Help is on the WAY!!" idea.

Not sure a bunch of 2012 recruits who play on the same AAU team would scatter anyway if the coach were fired, but don't worry, we won't have to find out. But I suppose the idea of a recruit possibly decommitting based on continued dismal on-court results never crossed anyone's mind?

I think we can get a solid idea as to Crean's future performance based on what he did at Marquette. Pretty large sample size. The early returns at IU, that have nothing to do with wins and instead have to do with how he coaches during the game, how he makes adjustments, how he responds to the unexpected, how he reacted to the Illinois win . . . I'm not sure IU fans should be pumped with confidence that he will accomplish anything more at IU than he typically did at Marquette. And Dwyane Wade's not walking through that door.

This season is not progress at IU. I don't think fans are asking for much here. Indiana University should expect a coach to rebuild a program enough for an NIT berth in this span of time.

They've should reach the NCAAs next year to stay on track in this rebuild. They've at least got to reach the NIT, or the murmurs become much, much louder.

It's still possible Crean does well at IU. Krzyzewski didn't exactly set the world on fire in his early years at Duke. But the "recruits will leave!" argument doesn't hold water, especially since IU's current AD has already shown that he will pay good dollars for a coach, as he just did with Kevin Wilson. And a good coach likely retains recruits, perhaps bringing some of his own.

 

Except Providence isn't a Big Time program. It's a Small Time program competing in a Big Time conference. If Providence was his best option he should have stayed where he was.

And the Newell comparison doesn't really work because UALR was in a much shittier conference than Drake is in. You can bide your time in the Valley and still get a shot in a Big Time league.