Here is an article in the Birmingham News ranking how good each SEC school's Basketball Coaching job is. He ranks us 8th in the league. I disagree with this big time. Mr. Seacrest bases his rankings on 1) Support from the community (agreed) 2) Being a state university (huh? Duke anyone? Wake Forrest? Syracuse? Georgetown?) maybe in football but we are talking about basketball here. 3) Controlling the state in recruiting (I don't think controlling your state in recruiting is as important in basketball as it is in football). Recruiting is just as important but it is easier to recruit nationally. Florida gets alot of guys from NY for petes sake. 4) Being near a big media market (close here but should be do you have strong regional/national media coverage. Once again Duke isn't in the biggest city but has national coverage.
I think Vandy should def be ahead of Georgia and Alabama (which are clearly football schools) and possibly ahead of UT as well. What do you guys think?
http://blog.al.com/segrest/2009/02/ranking_sec_coaching_jobs_top.html
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8 comments:
I agree to a certain extent about the market. Less stringent acceptance requirements and access to the Atlanta market make it frankly unacceptable that Georgia is as bad as they are.
In coming years I think journalists might come to eat their words. Most who haven't been paying attention have overlooked the massive improvement in all of Vandy's sports programs. Basing their observations of two decades of futility (and rightfully so) they fall easily into the "same ol' vandy" trap.
If Stallings program continues the consistent rise in terms of recruiting and success it has enjoyed over the past five years, you'll likely see that situation completely change.
Yeah and St. Johns should be the class of the Big East because it is in the middle NYC but it isn't. I just think he is using football criteria to define basketball. Private schools can be just as effective as state schools in BBall and because of the much smaller amount of players required you don't have to dominate your state in recruiting the way you must in football.
March Madness levels the playing field for all teams, so a team like Davidson (in the middle of no where NC with approx 1200 students) can become a national headline.
I agree basketball is different than football, and you listed great examples.
The only reason a state school may be better is because they typically have lower academic standards.
I think, in reality, fan and community attention are the only important factors. If media market, state control, and "state school" mattered, Southern Cal and St. John's would be the most desirable jobs in the country. Instead, you have historically successful programs that are actually in the middle of nowhere, e.g. Kansas, Indiana, Michigan State, North Carolina, and Kentucky (UCLA is an obvious exception). The reason these programs have had success is because they are enthusiastically supported by their fan bases.
I think ranking Florida over Arkansas is a joke. As a rule, the SEC isn't a historically great basketball league outside of Kentucky, but some fan bases are more supportive than others, and Arkansas loves their basketball.
I'd consider LSU solely because of Dale Brown and Pete Maravich, but I watched a few of their home games this year and their fans know nothing about basketball.
While I agree that basketball is good because schools like Davidson can get exposure, they aren't in the middle of nowhere. The town of Davidson is to Charlotte what Franklin is to Nashville. So, they actually get a pretty large following in Charlotte.
Florida won back to back national championships in the past 5 years. Arkansas hasnt done anything. FLORIDA IS A MUCH BETTER JOB
It would be better on the fact alone that you get to be at the same school as Tim "Jesus" Tebow.
You have to look at this question if suddenly every school lost all its players and coaches and had to start from scratch. All they have is their name, facilities, local support and so on. I can't speak for Arkansas but I think Billy Donovan IS Florida basketball. Starting from scratch I don't know how high they would be.
I agree - Florida might have won some NC's in the past few years, but they don't fill their arena for home games. Sad.
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