All right, DePaul, what's the deal?
To be honest, I shouldn't care who DePaul hires as its next men's basketball coach. After all, it's not my school and not my money. But the way this search is unfolding -- or not unfolding -- is starting to bug me.
Let's examine the type of coaches DePaul can bring in:
1) It can be a recruiting cheater that doesn't understand Xs and Os in tic-tac-toe, much less basketball.
But why go that route? It goes against athletic director Jean Lenti Ponsetto's goal (as stated on March 16) to hire someone with the "technical acumen" to compete with the Big East's finest coaches.
2) It can be the love child of Tex Winter and Norman Dale -- a basketball genius who can take his'n and beat your'n or take your'n and beat his'n -- but can't convince teenagers to sign on the letter of intent's not-so-dotted line.
But why go that route? If the next coach can't improve DePaul's recruiting by a convincing margin, then the program is going to repeat the 2-37 record compiled against Big East schools over the last two years.
But to see DePaul apparently in such dire straits that Isiah Thomas has read the tea leaves and planted a suggestion in the Chicago Tribune that, yeah, he'd listen if DePaul wanted to talk...how can this job be so bad and how hard can it be for DePaul to identify a qualified veteran coach who can teach AND recruit?
People, there were 347 Division I coaches this year. Some are overqualified for the DePaul job. That's fine. Some are underqualified for the DePaul job. That's fine, too. Some have been fired in the last few months, so let's cross them off the list.
But are you trying to tell me DePaul can't find a good coach to take its millions? Here's some help:
Dayton's Brian Gregory has been mentioned over and over again. I know he has been reticent to take the DePaul job in the past, but that was when Bill Bradshaw ran the athletic department and there was maybe $500,000 per year on the table.
Old Dominion's Blaine Taylor might be a tad old (52), but here are his win totals the last five years: 24, 24, 18, 25 and 27. His guys beat Notre Dame in the NCAA's first round two weeks ago.
Saint Mary's just went to the Sweet Sixteen. Coach Randy Bennett, who's in his mid-40s, comes from the Lorenzo Romar tree...and Romar just took a team to the Sweet 16 as well. Saint Mary's can't compete with DePaul's dollars, as AD Mark Orr told the Contra Costa Times recently: "It's no secret that we're not going to pay millions upon millions of dollars for a head coach here."
If DePaul wants someone young, VCU's Shaka Smart, who turns 33 in a few days, won 27 games in his first year at the school. I'm guessing since he coached under Billy Donovan at Florida that he knows a thing or three about recruiting, too.
UAB's Mike Davis has taken a team to the NCAA title game (2002 at Indiana) and did a solid job of recruiting there. Would he want to leave his home state?
What about former Notre Dame and North Carolina assistant Doug Wojcik? Here's a quick quiz: Name the first coach to post three consecutive 20-win seasons at Tulsa:
a) Nolan Richardson
b) Tubby Smith
c) Bill Self
d) Doug Wojcik
It's Wojcik, of course, who just finished his fourth consecutive 20-win season.
There are other qualified coaches as well, but I've stuck to the Top 80 in the current Pomeroy rankings.
I realize none of these guys have the Q rating of a Reggie Theus or an Isiah Thomas, but is DePaul trying to win a press conference or win some games?
OK, rant over. I'll quit caring how DePaul fares in this search.
LW
The fact that Reggie Theus has bounced around the last few years raises a few red flags. I think the guy is a coaching vagabond, one step ahead of the pitchforks and torches. That is what I meant about scraping the bottom of the barrel. Hiring Theus would be like hiring another Jerry Wainwright.
He took New Mexico State to the NCAA, overachieved during his first season in Sacramento, coached under Pitino and is now working with Kurt Rambis and Bill Laimbeer with the T-wolves. He might be great for DePaul.
I'm not too familiar with Theus' stint in the NBA. If he overachieved in his first year with the Kings, why did they ditch him less than halfway through his second year?
If I'm DePaul, I'm not sure whether to be encouraged Theus lured a five-star recruit like Herb Pope to New Mexico State...or concerned that Theus lured Herb Pope to Las Cruces, N.M. while beating out several high-profile programs in the process.
Not sure exactly why Sac got rid of Theus, but one insider told me he thought it was mostly because management wanted to use more young players and get better lottery odds. Theus didn't agree.
How is nobody talking about Josh Pastor at memphis. #1 recruiting class in the country conference usa. im done.
How come nobody is talking about Pastner as DePaul's next coach? Is that the question? If it is, the answer is "Because he just lured the nation's best recruiting class to Memphis."
If you had three of the nation's 12 best players coming to your school...at a program has won at a high level in recent years...and you have free reign to do whatever you need to do at your school...you're not leaving to come to DePaul.
LW
Thanks for clarifying your thoughts, I'm glad I came back to the article this afternoon to read the comments.
I agree, it is frustrating to watch this perceived lack of progress on the search. I blame this frustration and now negative publicity surrounding the search solely on Jeannie. Her comments regarding the required coaching resume and the amount of money they are willing to pay were not a good PR move considering DePaul's situation. These comments immediately put the expectations at a very, very high level for DePaul to really make a "splash" hire. It now seems, at least to the outside observer, that this "splash" hire is very unlikely.
This is not to say that Jeanie won't hire a good, or even great coach for the program. In fact, that still may very well happen. I believe there are still many good options out there for DePaul, but none of them will be probably be perceived as a "home run" hire in the short term (except maybe Butler's Stevens or Baylor's Drew). As a result, the program will probably get further negative press this month. But lets not forget that the games aren't being played now. When they are, that's when we'll all be able to make the real judgment on Jeannie's hire.
Lindsey, DePaul is my alma mater and I do care how this crazy coaching search is going. I take no offense to what you wrote today. As a matter of fact, I like the passion. This coaching search has been a joke. I don't know if Jean Lenti-Ponsetto thinks DePaul is so much under the sports radar that the relative inactivity smattered with articles of chasing Jamie Dixon is considered good publicity. The fact is that my school, with a rich basketball tradition, has a chance to turn things around by hiring a really good coach and I read on CBSsportsline that the search is a farce, Reggie Theus is going to get an interview, and Isiah Thomas is interested. Those are the things that would make an alum or beat writer want to pull their hair out. It's no secret that I wanted Steve Lavin (the coach that I think was referred to as the recruiting cheater who doesn't know X's and O's) but he is gone. DePaul cannot go from Jamie Dixon to Reggie Theus or, God forbid, Isiah Thomas. There has to be a coach from a smaller conference who recognizes the tradition and potential of DePaul. Lindsey, I like the candidates you presented today, especially Randy Bennett. Maybe he can bring the Australian pipeline to the little school under the ELL tracks. Fellow DePaul alums, don't take your frustration out on the beat writer, take it out on our AD who is making our school even more of a laughing stock in the college basketball world than it already is.
In my original post, my references to cheaters who can't coach and coaches who can't recruit weren't meant to describe specific coaches...just the types of coaches who are out there in the college basketball universe.
I will say, though, that I thought Steve Lavin would have to return to the game (after eight years away) at a lower level than a BCS school. Apparently St. John's won't be hiring me as a consultant any time soon.
LW
LW..Geez..all this Illini-Weber-Demitry Mcgoofoff..or whatever his name is stuff, is clouding your brain. But Reggie Theus or Isiah Thomas...OUCH..those guys don't sound like the type of guys Jeanie was talking about a few weeks back. There are better options. I would hope.
And I thought Big Bubba didn't know how to find this site! :-)
Judging by the response here, obviously I need to clear up something -- mostly my own words.
Considering I've been covering this team since 1995, except for a few years' hiatus, I care about this beat. So I shouldn't have phrased it as "I don't care." Not only is it my livelihood to care, college basketball was my hobby long before I earned this job and it will remain that way when it's no longer my job.
What I should have typed is, "I shouldn't be taking this search personally." My emotions shouldn't get tied up in this the way a fan would...because I'm going to cover this guy whether DePaul hires Reggie Theus or Pat Kennedy or Schaumburg High School's Freshman B coach.
But my emotions clearly are tied into it, as this paragraph suggests:
But to see DePaul apparently in such dire straits that Isiah Thomas has read the tea leaves and planted a suggestion in the Chicago Tribune that, yeah, he'd listen if DePaul wanted to talk...how can this job be so bad and how hard can it be for DePaul to identify a qualified veteran coach who can teach AND recruit?
If Reggie Theus is the guy, then so be it, but I'm not sure he fits the parameters Jeannie outlined to us 17 days ago. He did recruit Herb Pope to New Mexico State, though, so I guess there's that if DePaul fans want it.
Lastly, this was a blog. Yes, I frequently offer a bunch of information in this outlet...but this was not one of those times EXCEPT to point out there are a bunch of qualified coaches out there whose names apparently have been overlooked.
LW
Your original blog post seemed a bit out of character, so thanks for clarifying. There are some fans left who care very much about this hire, so we'll be looking forward to you providing some scoop on the job very soon.
LW do all of us a favor and stop writing about DePaul basketball, please. What a total and complete joke this article is. You get paid for writing this stuff???? And you will be eating your words along with the rest of the DePaul haters very very soon. Signed bigbubbathebluedemon.
I've gotta tell you, starting the story with your ambivalence toward this search was a HORRIBLE journalistic decision. I'm a U of I guy, but I care about DePaul b/c it's local. You should care for reasons more than that. And if you don't, something is wrong.
I wish I could get back the precious minutes of my Friday after reading this garbage. Joe College, Sports...Lindsey whatever the hell your called...REPORT!!! Tell us something that is actually realistic....but you don't care....hmm...what a joke.
When are you going to announce the "mystery" candidate Joe?!?!? Its a damn shame that some fans are going to google the DePaul search today and are going to read this crap and think that Mike Davis might actually be a coach at DePaul. Please don't write anything till November.
Lindsey,
You are a reporter for one of the top newspapers in this area, and your focus is college sports. I know your passion is U of I, but with DePaul being one of two BCS schools within a train ride of downtown that has the best basketball tradition of any local school (recent history aside), not to mention the thousands of alumni that DePaul has in the local area, I find your recent entry a tad shocking.
Some of us wanting information in the search thought the Herald (and more specifically you) would be a source, but it appears there is only one reporter in this town (Dave Kaplan) who is willing to do so some legwork on the topic and keep us remaining fans somewhat in the know.
As Gordon Gekko once said, "Stop sending me information and start GETTING me some information". Thats the reason people buy newspapers.
But based on your last line, I'll quit caring what the Daily Herald has to say about my alma mater, or frankly whatever you have to "report".