Would Bruce Pearl leave Tennessee for IU? History says maybe

[Tim Solon]

Since I wrote an article about the possibility of Bruce Pearl becoming IU’s head coach next season, I’ve been bombarded with e-mails, criticized by some comments and even light-heartedly mocked on other sites. Basketball fans can’t understand my opinion that Bruce Pearl could be lured away from the job and the program at the University of Tennessee. Sure, the job is a great one and Pearl has turned the program around, but it still lacks one thing: prestige.

By that, I simply mean that Tennessee doesn’t have the history of IU’s program. I know I mentioned that in my article earlier this week, but apparently some of you don’t think of that as a legitimate reason for someone to leave one coaching job for another. History has shown, however, that it can be a good reason. Lets take a look a at some recent examples.

(1) Roy Williams: Williams spent 15 years as the head coach at the University of Kansas. He won four Big 12 regular season titles and five Big Eight regular season titles while there. He was also named the AP Coach of the Year is 1992 and the Naismith College Coach of the Year in 1997 while he was head coach of the Jayhawks. Most coaches would kill for a gig like Williams’ at Kansas, but Williams wasn’t happy with it. When he was offered the job at the University of North Carolina in 2000, he turned it down. But in 2003, when he was offered the job again, he took the job with the Tar Heels. Sure, Williams had started as an assistant at UNC and played in college there too, but he still left one good program for a more prestigious one.

(2) Bill Self: After getting promoted from Tulsa, Self got his change to coach on the big stage when he took over as the head coach at the University of Illinois in 2000. He inherited a very talented team and won two Big Ten regular season titles and a Big Ten tournament title in his three years there. In all three of his years with the Illini, Self was a finalist for the Naismith Coach of the Year Award. But when Roy Williams bolted Kansas for North Carolina, Self left behind a good gig with the Illini for the program with a better basketball history, the University of Kansas. Despite a solid group of players, a good program and good recruits (including Dee Brown and Deron Williams) coming in, Self still left.

(3) Ben Howland: Howland took over the basketball program at Pittsburgh in 1999. It took him two years, but by the 2001-2002 season, Howland had put the Panthers back on the basketball map. That year, the Panthers went 29-6, followed by a 28-5 campaign the next season. Both years, Pittsburgh made it to the Sweet 16. Despite two Big East Championships and a Big East Coach of the Year Award, however, Howland left for perhaps the most storied basketball program in NCAA history, UCLA.

(4) Tubby Smith: Hold on, I’m not going to say anything about leaving Kentucky for Minnesota. That doesn’t go with the theme at all. But, I would like to point out that before Smith took the head coaching position at the University of Kentucky in 1997, Smith was doing similar things at Georgia to what Pearl is doing at Tennessee. He went into a school that normally only thought about football and turned its basketball program around. In his two years with the Bulldogs, Smith went 45-19 and took Georgia to two NCAA tournaments, including a Sweet 16. However, when Kentucky, a basketball powerhouse, came a-knocking, Smith left the turnaround program he had started for the Wildcats.

All of these coaches simply illustrate my opinion—fans, especially Volunteers fans, would be foolish to rule out the idea of Bruce Pearl leaving Tennessee. Changing schools is a common thing in the NCAA college basketball scene and to think that Bruce Pearl moving is out of the question discounts what history has shown. Ultimately, it probably depends on how the Volunteers do in this year's NCAA tournament. Pearl may end up returning to UT, but we shouldn’t put the idea to rest so early in the coaching search.

Here is more of IUplanet's coverage of the IU coaching search:
http://iuplanet.com/forum/iuplanet-h...ext-coach.html
http://iuplanet.com/forum/iuplanet-h...html#post30235
Indiana Basketball - IUplanet: Indiana Hoosier forums, sports, photos, and Bloomington life

[Big10Hoops]

I've got to say, I think you made some good points. Success doesn't also mean "happy". I'd like to think that IU's program is still at that "prestigious" level, but what are other fans' thoughts about that, are we?

[magic]

Roy Williams went home after turning down Carolina once. Carolina was in terrible shape and they begged him to come fix it and he did. To call Carolina a more prestigous program than Kansas is really poor journalism, even if it's opinion based. Show me the numbers that suggest Carolna is more prestigous. Kansas certainly has more tradition than Carolina with all the folks who have coached there. Carolina is not a step up but rather home to Williams and Carolina wouldn't be Carolina had Dean Smith not learned the game somewhere... a place called Kansas actually. Get your facts straight.