Friday, March 23, 2007

The Prospective coaches...

Folks, expect a while for political news to resume. That's the first thing I'll say right now. It will likely be Monday but who knows. We'll see. Give me some time to get over Tubby Smith being run out of town, and you know that he was run out of town.

Anyway, Matt Jones, over at Kentucky Sports Radio, has this piece of news posted today dealing with the head coaching search.
I am going to continue to give updates on what I hear about the coaching search as we go through the next couple of days. At times of coaching searches, the rumor mill is at its highest and churns out the craziest stories that you have ever heard. But part of the point of this blog is to relate those stories as we hear them. Yesterday, I was given a list of names by someone relatively close to the situation and they were given to me in groups. I have now spoken with someone who I think is much closer to the situation and whose list is likely more accurate. The individual told me that the “group” at this point looks like this:

Billy Donovan
Tom Crean
Tom Izzo
Mark Few
Billy Gillispie
Jay Wright
Aside from Rick Pitino being considered, and you know that he likely will. There were some reports that said he was in Lexington this morning but I don't know whether those where confirmed or unconfirmed reports.

Anyway, the best names on those list for the style of play that fans love to see in Kentucky would be Billy Donovan, Billy Gillispie, and Jay Wright. They have a proven record. However, my preferred choice would be Billy Donovan on the list of those three since he's been through the Pitino system of play and worked at Kentucky.

Billy Donovan can't even get a sell out crowd at Florida and they only have like 12,000 seats, which is two thousand more than the new arena that is being built at Northern Kentucky University. You know that he wants to be here more than anything. I have long said that he would be the successor to the position whenever Tubby Smith retired.

The job at Kentucky is one of the best jobs in college basketball. It's one of the most storied programs along with Kansas, UCLA, UNC, and Duke.

I just hope that Mitch Barnhardt makes this decision very carefully and not rush through things. As for me, I just want to reiterate that Crean and Few must not be considered. I like Tom Izzo but I don't know how well his style of play will play here.

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