An interesting article posted on the TU board

[tmh8286]

From the NY Times

The article is about the difficulties that mid-majors have in holding coaches, and the effects of the coaching merry-go round. It looks at TU as the quintessential example of the struggles that mid-majors have in that regard.

It's a pretty interesting read:

When a Midmajor Is as Good as It Gets

By SELENA ROBERTS

Published: March 22, 2006

THE Ozark foothills roll beneath a surprising oasis of culture and art deco

design in a green patch of Oklahoma where the mayor promises 227 days of

sunshine will pour over a city saluted as one of "America's Most Livable

Communities."

And yet, Tulsa hasn't been a hitching post for college basketball whizzes as

much as a convenience store where coaches stop in with the engine running,

grab what they need, then speed away.

Nothing has turned lovable midmajor programs into tumbleweed towns like the

N.C.A.A. tournament < the most breathless job fair this side of midterm

elections. From 1994 to 2003, the University of Tulsa was a regular bracket

darling, but it lost four coaches to the elite: Tubby Smith, Bill Self, Buzz

Peterson and Steve Robinson.

Instability led to collapse. Tulsa has finished below .500 for three

consecutive seasons. It's enough to drive an athletic director into

euphemism. Instead of labeling Tulsa as a steppingstone program, Bubba

Cunningham prefers to call it "a cradle for coaches."

"It's more flattering," Cunningham said in a recent interview.

How can anyone predict a flight risk? Incoming hires talk about putting down

roots, extol their landing pad's family values, then purr local knowledge

upon discovering their favorite burger dive.

But, as lords of the tournament upset, they are hailed as whistleblowers

each March Madness for exposing the industry giants as soul-less basketball

factories < until, of course, these same coaches sign lucrative deals to

become factory executives.

Who's next to be wooed by the headhunters of corporate basketball? Maybe

Bradley's Jim Les or Wichita State's Mark Turgeon or George Mason's Jim

Larranaga. Maybe Gonzaga's Mark Few will finally heed the siren song of,

say, Indiana.

Dan Monson understands the attraction. He was an original architect behind

Gonzaga's journey from skinny pushover to Charles Atlas before Minnesota

offered him a fortune to reclaim the greatness of a Gophers program mired in

an academic fraud scandal.

"I could have prided myself on saying, 'I'll stay at Gonzaga forever and

never chase the money,' " Monson said in a recent telephone interview.

"Then, I got recruited in. I've never looked back, but it has been difficult

at times."

In seven seasons, with five lost to probation, Monson has righted the

Gophers' image but has struggled to be the turnaround artist of Minnesota's

dreams.

So what's the lesson? Don't do it; that's what midmajor coaches are

discovering with each cautionary tale. If Tulsa is a bellwether, only 25

percent of those who make the leap will find their magic potions travel.

Of the four coaches who dumped Tulsa, only Smith parlayed his upward

mobility into a raging success < with a national title at Kentucky < even

though his tired eyes reveal the constant pressure he is under.

Misery is commonplace among the ex-Tulsa club. The joy has been squeezed out

of Self while competing with Roy Williams's ghost at Kansas. And Peterson

became frayed overnight after Tennessee seduced him after his one season at

Tulsa.

"I try not to look back, but Tulsa was a great place to be," Peterson said.

At Tennessee, he was asked to be more pitchman than basketball coach. It was

exhausting. And it didn't last. He was fired last year, and is now coaching

in a 1,000-seat gym at Coastal Carolina, with a reported $140,000 salary.

"I call it coaching with freedom," Peterson said.

Peterson's gutsy team of no-names nearly made the N.C.A.A. bracket, but lost

the Big South tournament title on a final possession. This is how the life

cycle works in the college hoops version of Six Degrees of John Travolta

(who holds the record for career highs and lows): Tennessee's Bruce Pearl,

last year's midmajor wonder, was bounced from March Madness by Turgeon at

Wichita State; Les Bradley's crew took out Self; and Larranaga's George

Mason underdogs stunned North Carolina, where Robinson, of ex-Tulsa fame, is

an assistant after his brief run at Florida State ended in his firing.

This year's kings of ascension could be next year's victims of an upset.

This doesn't have to be inevitable. There are reasons for hope. First,

midmajors are not paying in charm anymore, but in nice money, as Few can

attest with his $600,000 salary, sprawling manse and use of a private plane

for recruiting.

More important, coaches must see the national trend: fundamental players are

kicking the fancy pants of big-time ballers in basketball death by a

thousand backdoor cuts.

Some argue that the rise of the midmajor will be unsustainable, particularly

once the new rule kicks in forcing N.B.A.-bound high school seniors to stop

over for a year of college.

But where are plug-in superstars winning? Pick any American Dream Team <

baseball, basketball, hockey or even the Olympic ski team < and witness the

irrelevance of highlight poseurs.

Fly-by supernovas offer no guarantees. It may just be that a hardwood guru

has a better chance to assemble a winning team at a cozy gym over a

basketball factory.

At times, coaches flee the small time not because of the money but because

of fear, a sensation that they've captured lightning in a bottle and must

capitalize before it escapes.

Where a coach's confidence meets his commitment, you'll find a hoops genius

who dares to make a midmajor town his permanent hitching post.