Ohio State fires Thad Matta, announces search for replacement

#3
#3
BowlBrother85 said:
That's exactly what I thought too when I heard this. It's a strange time of the year to fire a coach... I wonder what happened?
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He wasn't winning recruiting battles. so the AD talked with him on Friday and they came to terms that it was time to go. According to the ESPN article
 
#4
#4
Such a strange announcement. Weird/bad time of year to do it. The press release cites a bunch of health issues, but also makes it clear that Matta isn't leaving; he was fired.
 
#9
#9
Sounded like he was on the real world equivalent of a performance improvement plan, where your boss says you're sucking and you have 60-90 days to get better. His chance to do that was recruiting and he wasn't doing well enough so the AD said smell ya later.

That or something bad is about to come out.
 
#10
#10
VolsSportsFan said:
Sounded like he was on the real world equivalent of a performance improvement plan, where your boss says you're sucking and you have 60-90 days to get better. His chance to do that was recruiting and he wasn't doing well enough so the AD said smell ya later.

That or something bad is about to come out.
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This. Or the long shot being that the timing makes you wonder if potentially an NBA name showed some interest, maybe Urban's been recruiting Donovan
 
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#13
#13
Screen_Shot_2012-02-19_at_1.45.38_AM_400x400.png
 
#16
#16
They should not try to hire someone right now, but rather just tab an assistant as the interim. They can probably land a pretty big name next April.
 
#19
#19
Holtmann named head coach. Wow... 8 year contract, $3M per

Excellent hire, steep price.... Had they not waited to do this they could have landed Archie Miller, but Holtmann close IMO.
 
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#20
#20
Wonder where Chris Mack fell on their big board? Aside from the usual candidates like Gregg Marshall, he'd be my #1 if I were OSU.
 
#22
#22
golfballs said:
Wonder where Chris Mack fell on their big board? Aside from the usual candidates like Gregg Marshall, he'd be my #1 if I were OSU.
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Mack was probably their top legit candidate, if you weed out Phil Jackson, the ghost of Red Auerbach, and James Naismith himself.

He made his intentions to stay put known early on, as did Mick Cronin, Fred Hoiberg, and most recently, McDermott. Xavier is Mack's alma mater, and the only advantage tOSU has over them currently is name, conference, and resources. Mack is well compensated at Xavier, his family loves it there, and it's at least as good of a job as tOSU right now, with a lot less pressure. I always believed they would have to way overpay him to get him to move.
 
#23
#23
#24
#24
cncchris33 said:
This should be the default answer to thise who think we should just walk in with $4 million and just hire whomever we please. Tennessee is not a sexy basketball job, and even less so following Pearl and Tyndall debacles.
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It doesn't say why talks "didn't get serious" with Holtmann or even when he was approached by Tennessee. I disagree that Tennessee is not a good basketball job or that the Pearl tenure was a debacle. To the contrary, he proved what a good coach can do at UT and how much support the program will receive in return. Pearl's undoing was largely of his own making as most people can see. Not that UT can hire whoever they please... but with the money that you propose? They could do very well.
 
#25
#25
BowlBrother85 said:
It doesn't say why talks "didn't get serious" with Holtmann or even when he was approached by Tennessee. I disagree that Tennessee is not a good basketball job or that the Pearl tenure was a debacle.

I never called the entire Pearl tenure a debacle. That would be foolish to say. By "Pearl debacles, I thought it was fairly obvious that I was referring to his NCAA violation, lying to investigators, and subsequent firing.

To the contrary, he proved what a good coach can do at UT and how much support the program will receive in return.

I don't disagree, but he also proved Tennessee has to catch lightning in a bottle to achieve that level of success. Tennessee paid Pearl peanuts to come to Tennessee because no other P5 school was willing to touch him after he was blackballed following the Deon Thomas situation. He came in, won immediately with Peterson's players (not a knock on Pearl, just a fact), and made basketball relevant at Tennessee. He took a losing team and made them winners and had a personality that Tennessee fans embraced. It would have worked out long-term if he had only kept his nose clean and/or told the truth. The violation and lies were stupid and petty, but it was a black mark on Tennessee all the same. Only to be followed up 4 years later by hiring another coach who was immediately investigated, fired, and given a show cause penalty.

Pearl's undoing was largely of his own making as most people can see. Not that UT can hire whoever they please... but with the money that you propose? They could do very well.

The point I was trying to illustrate was that 1. Tennessee is never going to throw that kind of money at a head coach in basketball, especially not one who has 6 years HC experience at places like Gardner-Webb and Butler. Heck, they "only" gave a potential HOF coach in Rick Barnes $2.2 million, and most people feel like Tennessee overpaid to get a guy who was just fired at Texas. And 2., we have just never shown a history of paying young and upcoming coaches big money to come prove they can win at the P5 level. We shop from the bargain bin (Pearl, Peterson, Tyndall, Martin) or retread aisle (Barnes). Tennessee would never pay $3 million for 8 years to a guy like Holtmann, but every time we have a basketball coaching vacancy, I see people running out screaming we should pay Shaka Smart $4 million and make him say no, or go get Jay Wright from Villanova and pay him whatever he wants. That just isn't how our AD operates with regards to basketball, and our fans need to realize that.
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.
 
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