UPDATE Friday February 2, 2007 New opening at the end of this season. Santa Clara's Dick Davey, after 30 years at SCU, 15 of which as a head coach, will be "retiring" at the end of this season. This looks more like a "Denny Crum-like retirement", meaning the AD and adminstration are heavily encouraging him to retire so they can bring in a new coach (I seriously doubt they can find a Rick Pitino).
UPDATED Thursday November 30, 2006: Apparently this post was slightly prophetic. Dan Monson (Monsoon?) of Minnesota has just resigned (read: fired) after a rather disappointing start of the season (three losses at the inaugural Old Spice Classic (aka Disney classic), and a really bad blowout home loss last night to Clemson in the ACC-Big11 Challenge).
This is rather premature, but it looks like university administrators are starting to mimick the NBA. At least three jobs are open for the 2007-2008 season:
All four coaches have been at their universities for a long time.
Coaches on (or projected to be) the HOT SEAT
*** does not necessarily mean they are at risk of getting fired ***
Top available coaches:
* Mike Montgomery
* Nolan Richardson
* Larry Brown
* Flip Saunders
The broadcasters:
* Rick Majerus
* Pete Gillan
* Steve Lavin
* Steve Lapas
* Perry Clark
* Paul Westphal
* Mike Jarvis
Recently fired/resigned/retiring and available coaches
* Dan Monson (ex of Minnessota)
* Ricardo Patton
* Riley Wallace
* Dick Davey
Comeback long-shots
* Gene Keady
* Eddie Sutton
* Bennett Senior (Dick)
If Bobby Cremins made a coaching comeback after half a dozen years of broadcasting, I wouldn't be surprised with any of the above making a comeback either...
2 comments:
In the list of potential replacements, where are all the up and coming Assistant Coaches? It seems to me there is a lot of talent already working at the Division I level. Why do they look to the people that got out or got fired? Give the young guys a shot. They're more passionate and fun to watch on the sidelines anyway.
That is a very good point, and I agree with that. The reason I didn't post any up-n-coming Assistant coaches is because I don't know many of them, those that I do know of, I don't know if they might be interested in making a move as a head coach. Next time I update it I'll add a section for them.
Some teams do go that route with a young ready-to-go assistant (eg Billy Gillespie, Norm Roberts, Frank Haith, Doc Sandler). Others prefer to go with established names for various reasons (eg fan/booster pressure for a quick turnaround such as Kelvin 500-call Sampson, or an AD worried about job security so he doesn't take a risk).
Sometimes colleges get burned with a young coach/assistant, so their next one is veteran. Or vice versa.
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