2019 Coaching Carosuel

[mvpreed2]

UPDATE!

One of my favorite targets this off-season is on the move!
Eric Musselman has agreed to become the next coach at Arkansas.
Musselman was the head man at Nevada, and I bought into his statement of wanting to stay on the West.
I guess the money was good enough eh Eric?

Mike Young has agreed to become the next head coach at Virginia Tech.
He spent the last 17 season at Wofford of the Southern Conference.
Lastly, Vanderbilt has found their next coach, in Jerry Stackhouse.
The former NBA guard and North Carolina alum is headed back to the state of North Carolina.
This is Stackhouse's first stint as a head coach, so it will interesting to follow his journey to see how the Commodores progress under his leadership.

There has been another name linked to the UCLA job, and this one isn't the home run hire, but it's much better than Mike Cronin.
Rick Barnes has been the next coach rumored to be targeted by UCLA.
He has rebuilt Tennessee and built Texas into the power it was by coaching SEVERAL NBA products like Durant (GSW)/Thompson (CLE)/Joesph (TOR) and Turner (IND).

[mvpreed2]

As it stands, my current top three job openings:

UCLA
Nevada
BYU

[KansasCityCats]

I hope Rick Barnes works out...or they find a way to pay Dixon's buyout.

Barnes did well at Tennessee, but he was a mediocre coach at a Texas program that should have won more often.  Bring him to Westwood!

[eggdog]

Barnes is a fine regular season coach and they'd be tough in the regular season but he drew up the worst end of game play in the tourney this year and doesn't seem able to win when it matters. Guess that's ok at UCLA since they hired Steve 16. At what point do they have to consider talking to Rick Pitino?

[KansasCityCats]

Good point.  His regular season record is nice...which could translate into success.

Liquidated would freak out if Arizona mirrored his postseason success; the guy hasn't been to a Sweet 16 since the '07-'08 season.  If Howland was fired for "not winning" one of his 3 final four appearance, I couldn't imagine Barnes hanging around for more than 3 years.  Haha.

[mvpreed2]

Crazy thing the rumors of UCLA reaching out to Pitino hit immediately, and there hasn't been much since.

Howland goes worked by UCLA though, I don't care what anyone else says.
Three-straight Final Fours and you fire me?
All while I have a top 10 recruiting class coming in?
While you haven't been to the Final Four since I left, and only got close once in 2016-17 with Lonzo and company?
Be careful what you wish for UCLA..

[eggdog]

I thought they'd be crazy to go after Pitono at first but now what do they have to lose? The Howland firing was a disaster - their team won the PAC 12 in his last season but lost badly in the first round. I guess their fans expected more from a team led by 34 year old Shabazz Muhammad.

[2012Cat]

Rick Barnes stying at Tennessee despite the fact he is losing 2 of the best players they've ever had and should be closer to missing the tournament next year than winning it.

How does dan Guerrero still have a job?

[eggdog]

Sounds like Chris Mullin is stepping down at St. John's and Bobby Hurley is their number 1 target. I hope he stays at ASU because he's fun to root against but St. John's could get the better hire than UCLA if they land him.
https://www.azcentral.com/story/sports/college/asu/2019/04/08/asu-basketball-bobby-hurley-reportedly-linked-st-johns-coach-job/3407475002/

[KansasCityCats]

https://www.latimes.com/sports/ucla/la-sp-mick-cronin-ucla-basketball-coach-hired-20190409-story.html

6 years at $24MM.  Looks like they don't want to invest real money in a coach.

I personally like Cronin.  He is unbelievably tough, he's well-spoken and his players work hard on both sides of the ball.  They'll be "OK", but not championship material.