Coaching movement that might affect SLU

[cheeseman]

14 hours ago, Clock_Tower said:

Alot.  And you know better yourself.

For one, he could have made it clear from the beginning that Jim Crews was a going to be a 1 year temporary head coach and not the permanent head coach regardless of how the team does and that the new coach will need to be the following ......  As nearly everyone on this Board agrees, B Broy's aunt could have coached that team to success.  In short, getting out in front of the story and not waiting to be run over by the story is what a leader would have done.  Nothing from Jim Crews' past, or his efforts while at SLU, showed that he could truly relate with the players, teach them and recruit them. Keeping a steady hand and not making changes to RM's well oiled machine was his best attribute but this is certainly not proof of future success as a head coach.  Shame on Mays for sitting by idle and letting the sympathetic national college media award Crews Coach of Year and hire him as our next head coach.

Apparently my sarcasm may have been missed or I was not clear.  I agree that Crews never should have been hired.  I stated that even before we did hire him.  

[cgeldmacher]

Dave Matter was just on with Bernie.  He said that Mizzou does have interest in Ford.  They talked about several other candidates also.  Matter said that the interest in Ford is do to the success that Ford has had in recruiting area kids while at SLU and that it should be viewed as a compliment to Ford's success in that area.

Bernie followed up by saying that he didn't think that Ford was a big enough hire for Mizzou.  He actually said that Ford was a good hire for SLU, but not a big enough splash for Mizzou.

[HoosierPal]

Dave Matter was on with Bernie this AM and talked some about the coaching search.  He said there was intrigue with Ford, particularly from some of the high level boosters because of his recruiting.  He also said that it is well known in Columbia that Ford did not deliver in OKState, and that was why he was fired. He said that Crean and Martin are clearly the top two candidates.  He did not say that Ford was third, or in any other slot.  He also said Ford's name has already come up with the LSU job and with the not yet open Illinois job.

Here is my take.  If Ford is still at SLU in five years, there is a good chance that is because the results have not been spectacular.  So it is a good thing that his name is coming up for openings.  Get used to it, and consider it a good thing.

To me, the best thing that Ford has done to date is surround himself with the right people.  It is HUGE that he got Macon and Tate.  Macon brought Foreman with him and was involved with French.  Without Tate, do we have Goodwin and Gordon?  Who knows, but with Tate, we have them. 

[cgelmacher - you were three minutes ahead of me!]

[Bills_06]

His name coming up with Illinois makes me want to question Matters sources completely as being more trying to stir up stuff on Ford leaving.  Ford has shown to be a good recruiter that couldn't win with the talent he had in a tough conference.  Groce has a top 11 ranked class coming in but will be fired for not winning with talent he has in a tough conference.  Makes no sense to me if Illinois would even look at him with no additional tournament success from when he was fired.  

[Billikenbooster]

On 3/7/2017 at 9:57 AM, Glorydays2013 said:

Maybe this is why I am not a basketball coach since I don't understand, but why not make your own legacy at a school instead of trying to follow an older one (Indiana, Kentucky, Kansas). To me, you're expected to be a top 15 team year after year and is just expected, anything short of that is a disappointment. Why can't Ford be his own McDermott like at Creighton?

this

[Glorydays2013]

What is Ford's contract? SLU knows their basketball program is one of the most important recruitment tools. Having a down year in academics or some random controversy? Well all of a sudden you make the sweet 16 and a bunch of excited high schoolers send in their commitment to SLU in April.

SLU will price match with other competitive schools. Ford also wants basketball to be a priority, and well if you know anything about anything, LSU only cares about one thing and that is football. Hopefully Ford also realizes there is much more to do in stl than Columbia and Champaign. 

[wgstl]

I have a hard time believing Tate hasn't told Ford how bad of a job it is, or he wouldn't have darted himself.

[SLU_Nick]

The idea that SPUMAC is going to get any of their top targets is laughable.  Mizzou grads, who seem to populate all of St Louis media, seem to think their school is deserving of a top flight coach. 

Come back and call me out of they successfully land Cuonzo Martin or whoever else is on the their short list.  It is gonna be an up and comer like Kevin Keatts or Joe Dooley. 

[HoosierPal]

12 minutes ago, Bills_06 said:

His name coming up with Illinois makes me want to question Matters sources completely as being more trying to stir up stuff on Ford leaving.  Ford has shown to be a good recruiter that couldn't win with the talent he had in a tough conference.  Groce has a top 11 ranked class coming in but will be fired for not winning with talent he has in a tough conference.  Makes no sense to me if Illinois would even look at him with no additional tournament success from when he was fired.  

Fair statement, but obviously Matter did not reveal his sources.  He did say that he simply reports what he hears.  The reason Illinois might be interested in Ford is the very same reason Missouri is interested - he has captured two high level local recruits.  [To me that is a rather feeble reason, getting two local's onboard is fabulous but results speak louder.  Mitchell, Evans, Jett and McCall - none were local yet they had produced very nice results.]   

[slu72]

Jeez, this thread is making me think Travis Ford is  a HC candidate as hot as Greg Marshall, or Shaka Smart, or Archie Miller, or John Wooden.

No doubt he's done a fantastic job of recruiting to little ol' SLU and overachieved on the coaching  this current roster to 12 Ws, which is way better than the 5 Ws I predicted. I'm not even sure Rickma could have got this team to 12 Ws. Still, since Mizzery is floundering in both Football and Hoops in the SEC, they need to go bigger than Travis Ford. I'm surprised Marshall or Archie's name has not been raised.

[slu72]

This thread is going to get really long once the coaching carousel gets speeded up over the next 30 days. So, I'll just get my hypothetical Ford successors out of the way right now. Keats or Kelsey.

[Billiken4life5]

What I've heard is that Ford in the past has put his name out there for almost every major job available just to see if his current AD will panic and offer him a bigger contract.  AKA Matt Painter.  

[Glorydays2013]

2 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Jeez, this thread is making me think Travis Ford is  a HC candidate as hot as Greg Marshall, or Shaka Smart, or Archie Miller, or John Wooden.

No doubt he's done a fantastic job of recruiting to little ol' SLU and overachieved on the coaching  this current roster to 12 Ws, which is way better than the 5 Ws I predicted. I'm not even sure Rickma could have got this team to 12 Ws. Still, since Mizzery is floundering in both Football and Hoops in the SEC, they need to go bigger than Travis Ford. I'm surprised Marshall or Archie's name has not been raised.

More money is going to probably go to Mizzous football program over their basketball program by a large margin. Ford also left Mizzou when there was a scandal correct? Why the hell would he go back when there have been more everyother year it seems

[wgstl]

11 minutes ago, SLU_Nick said:

The idea that SPUMAC is going to get any of their top targets is laughable.  Mizzou grads, who seem to populate all of St Louis media, seem to think their school is deserving of a top flight coach. 

Come back and call me out of they successfully land Cuonzo Martin or whoever else is on the their short list.  It is gonna be an up and comer like Kevin Keatts or Joe Dooley. 

Thanks to KA contract they have been able to save up a lot of money over the last few years.  They know without a big name hire, their program is finished, I literally mean they havent seen rock bottom yet. 

They will spend every available dime on a big fancy name.  THEY HAVE TO.  

[JMM28]

Dave Matter is a liar. Plain and simple. In this era of sound bytes and social media, No one will ever go back and say "wow this guy was all over saying this and that wasn't even close to the truth." You'll see it with talking heads in NFL and NCAA the next several weeks. If you preface with "sources say" or "may be" you can report literally any pile of crap you want and people will believe it. 

As an example, I'm sure some high level booster at Illinois has said "why don't we go after Bill Self again" which could easily be reported by Dave Matter or his ilk as "Illinois has interest in Bill Self". But in his world it accomplishes two things. Makes Illinois look bad when they hire someone other than Self and that Self is somehow less committed to KU. And gets him a couple dozen retweets. 

[Glorydays2013]

They said recently that they want a finalist by the Final Four

[brianstl]

43 minutes ago, Bills_06 said:

His name coming up with Illinois makes me want to question Matters sources completely as being more trying to stir up stuff on Ford leaving.  Ford has shown to be a good recruiter that couldn't win with the talent he had in a tough conference.  Groce has a top 11 ranked class coming in but will be fired for not winning with talent he has in a tough conference.  Makes no sense to me if Illinois would even look at him with no additional tournament success from when he was fired.  

Matter is a Mizzou fan boy.  He will put Ford's name in contention for every job in the country because he thinks it will hurt Ford in recruiting the area.

[RiseAndGrind]

If I was a Mizzou fan I would demand Sterk's head if he hired Ford. 

Guy was fired from a Big 12 job AND has already left Mizzou once. 

Oh, and he stole Corey Tate, therefore, crippling Anderson's chances to recruit St. Louis.

 

[wgstl]

4 minutes ago, Glorydays2013 said:

They said recently that they want a finalist by the Final Four

I would think so. 

They have a 4* recruit that they need next year, who is waiting around for a new coach before deciding.  Plus you have transfers who will want to leave and you need more time so fill those spots in

[wgstl]

Just now, RiseAndGrind said:

If I was a Mizzou fan I would demand Sterk's head if he hired Ford. 

Guy was fired from a Big 12 job AND has already left Mizzou once. 

Luckily for Sterk, he has made all the right moves since hes got there. He could choose Ford and still be loved. 

[ACE]

52 minutes ago, HoosierPal said:

Dave Matter was on with Bernie this AM and talked some about the coaching search.  He said there was intrigue with Ford, particularly from some of the high level boosters because of his recruiting.  He also said that it is well known in Columbia that Ford did not deliver in OKState, and that was why he was fired. He said that Crean and Martin are clearly the top two candidates.  He did not say that Ford was third, or in any other slot.  He also said Ford's name has already come up with the LSU job and with the not yet open Illinois job.

Here is my take.  If Ford is still at SLU in five years, there is a good chance that is because the results have not been spectacular.  So it is a good thing that his name is coming up for openings.  Get used to it, and consider it a good thing.

To me, the best thing that Ford has done to date is surround himself with the right people.  It is HUGE that he got Macon and Tate.  Macon brought Foreman with him and was involved with French.  Without Tate, do we have Goodwin and Gordon?  Who knows, but with Tate, we have them. 

[cgelmacher - you were three minutes ahead of me!]

Haha! Matter is such a tool for the SPUMAC spin machine. Just spewing unsubstantiated nonsense from "boosters."

[brianstl]

Does anyone really think that LSU is going to be interested in a guy that had basically the same winning percentage at Oklahoma St. as Jones had at LSU?  

Does anyone think the the Illini is interested in a coach that has 3 less NCAA Tournament wins than Groce?

[Bills_06]

38 minutes ago, HoosierPal said:

Fair statement, but obviously Matter did not reveal his sources.  He did say that he simply reports what he hears.  The reason Illinois might be interested in Ford is the very same reason Missouri is interested - he has captured two high level local recruits.  [To me that is a rather feeble reason, getting two local's onboard is fabulous but results speak louder.  Mitchell, Evans, Jett and McCall - none were local yet they had produced very nice results.]   

But Groce has the top kid in the state coming in along with the 6th and 7th ranked kids in the state according to 247 for the 2017 class.  Ford wasn't an extremely well received hire I would say when he was hired here but with the talent he's brought in, the excitement is coming back and the fact he can win with talent in the A10 compared to the big 12 where all teams have talent.  In the B10, all teams have talent.  Illinois even thinking about firing Groce and getting Ford makes zero sense so like I said, you have to question if his sources are just saying Ford just to stir things up.  

The Mizzou beat writer for the KC star was asked about Ford when he was on the radio here a few days ago, said Mizzou would have to be told no by their first 5, 6, 8 even 12 options before Ford is a serious candidate.  And that's a school that has zero positives going for them in basketball right now and Ford at least makes some sense since they always want to keep St. Louis kids there which Ford has done here and SEC isn't an extremely strong basketball conference.  Illinois is a decent team with a really good recruiting class coming in, Ford makes no sense as an option.  

[Glorydays2013]

3 minutes ago, Bills_06 said:

But Groce has the top kid in the state coming in along with the 6th and 7th ranked kids in the state according to 247 for the 2017 class.  Ford wasn't an extremely well received hire I would say when he was hired here but with the talent he's brought in, the excitement is coming back and the fact he can win with talent in the A10 compared to the big 12 where all teams have talent.  In the B10, all teams have talent.  Illinois even thinking about firing Groce and getting Ford makes zero sense so like I said, you have to question if his sources are just saying Ford just to stir things up.  

The Mizzou beat writer for the KC star was asked about Ford when he was on the radio here a few days ago, said Mizzou would have to be told no by their first 5, 6, 8 even 12 options before Ford is a serious candidate.  And that's a school that has zero positives going for them in basketball right now and Ford at least makes some sense since they always want to keep St. Louis kids there which Ford has done here and SEC isn't an extremely strong basketball conference.  Illinois is a decent team with a really good recruiting class coming in, Ford makes no sense as an option.  

Illinois according to verbal commits has the most talented roster according to their average star rankings. I will make an assumption that they do not care about recruiting as much as an X and O coach. They already had a recruiter, and it didn't work

[ACE]

If Ford continues to kill it on the recruiting trail, as fans, we need to be ready that locally these "rumors" of Ford leaving will be floated out there by SPUMAC and Illinois cheerleaders. Recognize it for what it is.