Top College Basketball Coaches (Today)

With the Final Four approaching and Georgia’s search for a head basketball coach moving forward with all the momentum of a coked-up model toward a Double Quarter Pounder w/ Cheese, it seems like a good time to discuss college basketball coaches.

No, not the coaches that might actually be offered or accept the Georgia job, as that would make too much sense for a Dawg Blawg. Plus, it appears that the job is Mike Anderson’s to reject, with Jeff Capel and Jamie Dixon being darkhorses for a sweet payday courtesy of Damon Evans and Co. Personally, I really like Xavier’s Sean Miller, but you can’t go wrong with any of the above names.

Hopefully, Georgia’s next coach can rise to the elite level occupied by coaches in the list below. In my lifetime, Georgia has only had one such coach that could be considered elite, Tubby Smith, and he never really hit that level until he left Athens for Lexington and promptly won a title with Rick Pitino’s players. I’ll take a quality football program over a good basketball team 865 days per year, but I've got to admit I am a bit jealous around this time of the year of the schools that have these guys as coaches:

(Ultimately irrelevant criteria for list: “Who are the best coaches in college basketball right now?” “If you could have any coach in the country to coach your team next year, who would the top choices be?” Recent performance is weighted more heavily, but tournament success is viewed as the end-all-be-all, as it is how the top coaches are separated from 2^nd or 3^rd tier guys.)

10. Jim Boeheim, Syracuse - Yeah, he’s had a third of a century to pimp his resume, and his one ring came during the greatest one-and-done season in college ball history, but 800 wins and three final fours stamps your ticket to the hall of fame. Kids like to play for a legend, and this man is Syracuse basketball.

9. Ben Howland, UCLA – Brought success back to Pitt and has established a recruiting dominance not seen in LA since the Wooden years. May not have a ring, yet, but you can’t fade three final fours in a row.

8. John Calipari, Mempucky – Two lines of thought on this greaseball. On one hand, dude has built programs at friggin’ UMASS and Memphis into elite basketball powers, bringing both programs to the final four. On the other hand, he’s got no rings, just a small handful of deep tourney runs in 21 seasons and has amassed a slew of wins against not-exactly-powerhouse Atlantic 10 and Conference USA competition. Therefore, his impending move to Kentucky will seal his fate as to how he is remembered as a college basketball coach. Fail there and he’ll be coaching Colorado to Sweet 16s in ten years. Win a title or two, and he will reach Pitino status in the commonwealth.

7. Billy Donovan, Florida – He has two dominant titles (more than all but one of the coaches above him on this list), and the first back-to-back run since those loaded Duke teams in the early 90s. For that, he will be Florida basketball for as long as he wants. And that’s fine, because outside of those two titles, his resume consists of NIT appearances and early-round tourney flameouts…and nobody in Gainesville gives a shit. Is there any surprise he wants no part of that Kentucky gig?

6. Coach K, Duke – By far and away the most accomplished coach in college basketball today. Three titles, a whopping TEN final fours, and 11 ACC championships. However, as has been pointed out, Duke has fallen the fuck off in recent years. I blame their seemingly concerted effort to target every top white recruit in America. What happened to the Duke teams of Elton Brand, C-Boozer, Jay Williams, William Avery, etc.? The Shavlik Randolphs, Josh McRoberts and Greg Pauluses of the world ain’t cutting it anymore. Unfortunately, I’m not sure Coach K has learned his lesson either. I was watching the McDonald’s HS All-American Slam Dunk contest last night, when some goofy white kid threw down a two-handed jam while flailing through the air as if he was doing the Elaine dance from Seinfeld. Where is ole boy headed to school next year? No doubt.

5. Bill Self, Kansas – Gotta admire a man that can climb the coaching ladder from Oral Roberts to Tulsa to Illinois to Kansas in a decades time. Top notch recruiter, already has been to five elite 8s, and took only a few seasons to do what Roy Williams never could and win a title in Kansas.

4. Rick Pitino, Louisville – The head greaseball in college basketball, narrowly edging out Calipari and Donovan. A great coach to be sure, and those mid-90s Kentucky teams were arguably the most fun to watch (and in, a bizzaro way, so were the Celtics teams where he tried to use the same full-court tactics that worked at UK) of my lifetime, but let’s be real. We’re going on 14 years since his one and only college title. Still, at the end of the day, you hire Pitino, you know your program is in good hands for years to come.

3. Tom Izzo, Michigan State – He’ll get no shortage of love from the media this week, so I’ll keep it short: 5 final fours in the last 11 seasons, a ring and 24 wins per season. All of his four year players have played in a final four. All impressive, but my favorite Izzo stat is that he has been to eight sweet 16s in 14 years as a head coach. For more than half of his coaching career, his teams have reached the Sweet 16. That’s nuts. And yet, I’m still glad he didn’t take the Hawks job.

2. Jim Calhoun, UCONN – Like a damn movie. Brings a program from a prolonged period of embarrassment to the pre-eminent sports entity in the state, wins a couple of titles along the way, sends dozens of players to the pros, beats cancer for good measure, and is back at another final four. Of course, this could also be the point in the movie where it all begins to unravel before one final championship run. Stay tuned.

1. Roy Williams, UNC – If all coaches were free agents, I’d want the white Roy-Dub at the helm for the Hoop Dawgs next year. Finally got the championship monkey off his back, recruits NBA talents by the boatload, runs a clean program and has dominated what most experts contend is the best conference since his arrival. His winning percentage is good for third all-time and he’s been to seven final fours, second only to Coach K. And unlike Coach K, he’s still at the top of his game.

And with that, I can go ahead and admit this was all just a convoluted measure to predict UNC over UCONN in the Final Four. Fuck brevity.

Lamest Preview Ever!

Warning: Might be a painting and/or photoshop. Damn I miss KVH.

There was once a time when college basketball was my favorite sport. During this time, I also detested the fact that college football was discussed on the Atlanta radio airways during the spring. I'm pretty sure I was also watching like four episodes of Saved By The Bell each day, and I definitely didn't have a girlfriend.

So while the mid-nineties may have been the halcyon days of college basketball, it definitely wasn't a time period I personally enjoy remembering. But just for the sake of this post, allow me to take a step back to the 1995-1996 college basketball season, the year after Kevin Garnett opened the floodgates to the NBA. Kobe Bryant was still a high school senior, and the following players were playing college basketball that season:


Freshmen
Stephon Marbury
Shareef Abdur-Rahim
Chauncey Billups
Paul Pierce
Ron Mercer
Antawn Jamison
Vince Carter
Tractor Traylor


Sophomores
Allen Iverson
Antonie Walker
Lorenzen Wright
Adonayl Foyle
Michael Doleac
Matt Harpring
Felipe Lopez
Bonzi Wells
Danny Fortson
Maurice Taylor


Juniors
Tim Duncan
Keith Van Horn
Ray Allen
Kerry Kittles
Erick Dampier
Brevin Knight
Derek Anderson
Austin Croshere
Bobby Jackson


Seniors
Steve Nash
Tony Delk
John Wallace
Othella Harrington
Todd Fuller - eh, he was good in college...not "pick him ahead of Kobe good," but still.

So anyways, yeah...it was an awesome season and an excellent tourney, highlighted by a Tubby Smith-coached, senior-heavy Georgia team reaching the Sweet 16 and losing in triple overtime to eventual national runner-up Syracuse on a last second 3-pointer by John Wallace. Rick Pitino's final Kentucky team won the whole thing with a loaded roster featuring seven future pro players (Toine, Mercer, Delk, Anderson, Walter McCarty, Mark Pope, and ole boy Jeff Sheppard- I'm pretty sure he was on a crappy Hawks team at some point).

Anyways, since that season, the talent level, quality of play, Georgia's success and my overall interest in college basketball has diminished over time. It has now reached a point where other than following the Hoop Dawgs, I don't even know what's going on in the sport until the tournament. In fact, I get pissed it seems that 95% of all prime-time sports programming in January-mid March is some college basketball game I couldn't care less about. Hey, it happens. I used to be a hockey fan as well.

Still though, there is nothing like the NCAA tournament. Don't worry, I'm not about to pull a Wilbon turn this into a pulpit on why college football needs a playoff, but since I really don't have a vested interest in the regular season, the tournament makes for a fun three weeks of single elimination basketball, similar to the World Cup or the WBC. Who can't get behind that?

Anyways, enough of my gay thoughts and feelings about college basketball. Onto some final thoughts and then predictions from two guys that have watched a combined 16 minutes of action thus far this season (14 of which were by accident):

• I've finished in the Top 3 of my bracket pool each of the last three seasons. Prior to that, I'd never finished in the Top 10. On a related note, the only thing lamer than listening to someone talk about their fantasy team is hearing them talk about their fucking bracket. Oh you almost picked B.C. over Michigan State? WHO FUCKING CARES?

• Anyways, if you want to do well in your bracket, here's a trick: pick (mostly) all the favorites. Just to prove I'm not a sadist, I make it a point to take one "sleeper" to the Sweet Sixteen each year - this year's is WKU. I guess their win over that hoss UGA team just suckered me right in - but other than that, I'm playing it safe the rest of the way. Because, after all, that's why these teams are favored, damnit. You wouldn't bet the moneyline on an underdog just because it's "more fun to pick that team!" So why would you not apply the same mentality to a pool where you could win hundreds of dollars?
  

• Memo to ESPN: "President has 11 of 16 picks correct on first day" is NOT a fucking news story.
  

• If Big East fans want to borrow the SEC Snobbery handbook for this tournament, you've earned it. As many #1 seeds as the SEC has teams in the whole tourney is impressive, no doubt. Just make sure it's returned by August.

• And finally, here's Runaround Sue's degenerate gambling game for NCAA '09. $25 to each other for every Sweet 16 team correctly picked. $50 for every Elite 8 squad. $75 for each Final Four participant, $100 per team in the championship game, and another $100 for the champion (yes, even gamblers feel the economic crunch). This may seem like alot of scrilla is changing hands but not so, seeing as how OBJ is apparantly following the "pick the favorite" strategy, which will make for one boring pool! Onto the picks:

Sweet 16 (teams we both picked in black, OBJ picks in red, my picks in blue):
Louisville
Wake Forest
Kansas
Michigan State
UCONN
Missouri
Pittsburgh
Xavier
Duke
North Carolina
Oklahoma
Mississippi State
Maryland (Shanoff alert!)
Arizona State
Gonzaga
UCLA
Purdue
Memphis
Villanova
Western Kentucky
Syracuse

Elite 8:
Louisville
Kansas
UCONN
Missouri
Pittsburgh
UNC
Oklahoma
UCLA
Duke

Final Four:
Louisville
UCONN
Pittsburgh
North Carolina

(I'm telling you...BALLS OF STEEL, ladies)

Championship Game:
Pittsburgh over Louisville
Louisville over UNC

Just to let y'all know ahead of time...I almost picked Oklahoma over North Carolina.

Knightmare on Carlton Street

For some reason, the Bobby Knight to UGA rumors won't die down, even though the only person with knowledge close to the situation is an unidentified "friend" of Knight that provided a senile old journalist with his first scoop of the millenium. Somehow it seems appropriate that the first story Furman Bisher breaks in over a decade involves a sports figure old enough to be a member of the AARP. Go back to finding links between Dice-K and Pearl Harbor, Furm.

Anyways, when trying to find out if something is a good idea or not, I find it useful to make a pro and con list. I really didn't think that was necessary at this time, as I couldn't understand why any Georgia basketball fan would promote the idea of hiring a coach with a record over the last five seasons that is a whopping three games better than Dennis Felton's, but OBJ seems to like the idea of Knight in Athens, so... onto the list, yo.

Pros of Hiring Bobby Knight:

1. UGA basketball becomes relevant on a national stage: Given ESPN's hard-on for the guy - he's got Dick Vitale and Digger Phelps (two other former coaches that had their last taste of success 25+ years ago!) openly endorsing him for the job - it's pretty clear that win or lose, UGA hoops would receive national exposure it hasn't had, well, ever. Ask Texas Tech how that's worked out for their program.

2. His teams make the NCAA Tourney: 19 out of his last 21 teams have made the tournament. More on this in a minute.

3. He runs a clean program, and his players graduate: Admittedly a biggie for Georgia, following Harrick's epic failure in this area and Felton's admirable effort but eventual failure as well.

And that's it for the pros, as far as I can tell. Feel free to add more in the comments if you see 'em. To the cons:

1. He's a friggin' sociopath: National attention for big wins = good. National attention for that crap = weak-ass gimmick.

2. His teams no longer win in the NCAA Tourney: Speaking of "big wins," Knight doesn't get 'em anymore. Since the 1994-1995 season, his teams are 5-10 in the NCAA Tournament. He has one Sweet Sixteen appearance in that time. Our mediocre program, the one Knight-supporters think would be so lucky to land a coach like Bobby Knight, has as many Sweet Sixteen appearances during that timeframe. The ultimate goal of Georgia basketball, with the money being poured into facilities and this hire, is to compete on a national level like Florida and Tennessee are doing. It is not to be on the "Bubble Watch" every February. Knight's teams' inability to win big games is likely due to the fact that...

3. His coaching style is outdated: Post screens to get jump-shooters wide open on 80% of your offensive plays was effective as hell in the 70's and 80's. In today's SEC and ACC, where Grade-A athletes can get to an immobile spot-shooter in a split second, not so much. In order to compete in the SEC and nationally, Georgia needs to recruit top-notch athletes; but,

4. Knight can't recruit: It is imperitave that the next UGA coach follow's Richt's lead from 2001 and "build a proverbial wall" around Georgia to lock down the plentiful in-state hoops talent. With Georgia Tech's recent downturn, it would not take much success in the recruiting area to make UGA the premeire program in the state of Georgia. Right now, a dozen or so blue-chip prospects from the state turn down Georgia to go elsewhere each year. There is no evidence whatsoever that Bobby Knight would change this. The last blue chip recruit he landed was Jason Collier in 1997, who lasted all of one-and-a-half seasons at Indiana before transferring to Georgia Tech due to Knight's coaching philosophy. Before that, his last big recruit was Calbert Cheaney...in 1992.

5. He's 68 years old: You saw how he left Texas Tech high-and-dry. How many more years does this guy have left in him? You really want this guy as a stopgap replacement so you can redo this whole process over in 4-5 years? Screw that. Hire a young, hungry coach that has experience recruiting in the south and can actually relate to the players, families and AAU coaches he will be dealing with. Look for the basketball program's version of Mark Richt. Maybe you end up with another Felton; but if records are any indication, that's not going to be much worse than what you get out of Bobby Knight.

It's a simple choice. Don't contact him.

Retrospecticus: Dennis Felton

Yes, of course I'll be changing out the UGA logo curtains in my home. And frankly I think that's a very unprofessional question.

The Dennis Felton era at UGA ended this morning after a tumultuous five and a half seasons of mostly disappointing basketball in Athens. When Felton was hired in April 2003, I knew of no Georgia fans that were unenthusiastic about the hire. Unenthusiastic about the situation our new coach was inheriting? Yes. But the thought process then was that we were getting a successful young coach that had succeeded at a mid-major program from a hoops crazy state, averaging 20 wins a season during his time at Western Kentucky. For those who were disgusted with the state of the basketball program under Harrick, it was refreshing to see the disciplinarian approach Felton immediately brought to the team, jettisoning repeated-troublemaker Steve Thomas before he had even coached his first game. It was clear that things were going to be done Felton's way, or they weren't going to be done at all.

With some holdovers from Harrick's uber-successful (at least by UGA standards) teams, Felton's 2003-2004 squad finished the season strong to earn an NIT berth, where they were eliminated in the first round. Save for another NIT stint in 2007 and last year's insane ice-storm/two-games-at-Tech-in-one-day run to win the SEC Tournament, which would prove to be one of the few highlights from Felton's time in Athens.

Because of the brutal situation inherited, Felton was given a longer leash than is usually provided in Division 1 basketball. Not much was expected of the 04-05 or 05-06 squads, and those teams obliged, combining for a 23-35 record. This period wouldn't have stung so bad had two of the three blue-chip recruits Felton had landed (Louis Williams, Mike Mercer and Robert Dozier) ever set foot on campus. Unfortunately, Williams went pro right out of high school and Dozier ended up at Memphis after failing to qualify academically. Beyond those three players, however, Felton had made basically no inroads in the fertile Atlanta and Georgia recruiting markets, a unacceptable trend would continue through today.

Also, while no one doubted that Felton was a principled man that held his players to a high academic and personal conduct standard, his players continued to find trouble off the court. Mercer was kicked off the team last season following a string of academic and disciplinary suspensions. Steady JUCO transfer Takias Brown, the leading rebounder on the 06-07 team, was suspended twice and dismissed after failing to meet academic and class-attendance requirements. High-scoring shooting guard Billy Humphrey was likewise dismissed last summer after three arrests in eight months. For all the preaching about rebuilding the program with men of character that Georgia fans could be proud of, it became apparent that Felton had lost control of the program and was on borrowed time.

Even after winning that bizzarre SEC Tournament and playing a good Xavier team tough in the first round of the NCAA tournament, it never seemed Felton had regained the trust of the UGA faithful or the administration. For me, the low point came during a loss at Western Kentucky on December 2nd. That was a game that UGA had scheduled as part of a deal when they signed Felton away from WKU. Not only did lose the game, but they weren't even favored against a program that had once appeared to be a no-brainer stepping stone to a better job, such as UGA's.

Felton was out of excuses and again on borrowed time. As Georgia Sports Blog has pointed out, programs (i.e. Baylor) have come back from worse situations quicker than what Dawg fans were seeing play out in Stegman. An 0-5 start to the SEC schedule, and last night's 26 point loss to Florida, were the final nails in the coffin. I wish Felton nothing but the best of luck in the future and I hope he succeeds in his next gig. I have no doubt he tried his damndest to succeed at Georgia. Unfortunately, he failed and it was time to cut the cord. There will be time to speculate on who the next Georgia coach will be (list!), but for now, the program and the athletic association can finally move forward in that direction.

Hopefully sometime soon, UGA students can form a line outside of Stegman, eagerly awaiting the opportunity to purchase season tickets to watch an exciting team, as I did prior to the '01 and '02 seasons. Because say what you will about Harrick, but he always got the most out of his players and his teams won. There's got to be a happy medium between his coaching style and Felton's admirable approach, and I hope Adams, Evans, et. al. can find it. Georgia basketball fans deserve that much.