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Buzz Williams to Va Tech

deacvision7 said:
Personally, if I was a basketball coach and didn't have ties to either one? I'd choose Illinois as the better job, but only just.
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Interesting. Wife says Illinois. Shockingly, I took Wake.

Illinois is a great basketball school, but I maintain that football still rules there. Further, to succeed at U of I you have to politically master the bullshit Chicago AAU circuit. Finally, though it seems like forever since we were nationally relevant, our history > Illini's.
 
siff said:
Settle an argument for me. Which is the better coaching job: University of Illinois or Wake?
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Illinois. If Illinois would hire the right coach, they would be set. Bear Bryant once warned that if Florida ever hired the right football coach they'd be a national power. Fast forward a couple of decades from that statement and they hired Spurier. Bobby Knight once said a similar thing about Illinois - a backhanded stab at Lou the Dew Henson. If Illinois hires the right coach they would be a national power because Chicago is a great recruiting ground. A great coach capable of putting a ring fence on the best players in Chicago = national power. Wake has a lot going for it, but it has to play a different and more difficult game.
 
siff said:
Interesting. Wife says Illinois. Shockingly, I took Wake.

Illinois is a great basketball school, but I maintain that football still rules there. Further, to succeed at U of I you have to politically master the bullshit Chicago AAU circuit. Finally, though it seems like forever since we were nationally relevant, our history > Illini's.
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Not sure you can say our history is better than Illinois' history. They have five final fours and a bevy of conference titles over the years. They also have two Big Ten Tournament titles - an event that has not been around all that long. I'd say the histories are comparable - with them having an edge.
 
DeacMan said:
Not sure you can say our history is better than Illinois' history. They have five final fours and a bevy of conference titles over the years. They also have two Big Ten Tournament titles - an event that has not been around all that long. I'd say the histories are comparable - with them having an edge.
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I guess by "history" I meant more than just final fours, but yes, I agree. I disagree with your comparison to Florida football, however.
 
Depaul used to have a fence around Chicago. I am inclined to agree that you could build a dynasty at Illinois with a great coach.
 
Illinois has had decent coaches since Ray left DePaul. In the past twenty years, DePaul has had five winning seasons versus IL winning five Big We Can't our Teams titles.

their past four coaches have all been good- The Lou Do Henson, Lon Kruger, Bill Self and Bruce Weber. The jury is still out on Groce.
 
Interesting since Groce is another one of those must have coaches this board jumped on.
 
Of course VT not only got Buzz but an entire day of free publicity to go along with it.

Thinking about it, how does VT say, 'hmm maybe we should contact Buzz about our open position'? You'd have to think that Buzz's people must have been putting out feelers for jobs.
 
Jobs that were open at the time, I presume.

Instead of saying we're hiring, Wellman said we're sad we're firing.
 
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Certainly and if that was the case VT probably immediately stopped their coaching search and focused on signing him.
 
buckets said:
This is crazy. I wonder if something is brewing because you think Buzz would have waited for the Wake situation to play out before jumping on VT.
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Why? No, I don't want 7 years and big money to go to VT. I want to hold out and see if Ron Wellman calls me before I accept that. Dude was on TV like 8 straight hours yesterday on CBS or whatever network it was. But fortunately we can be comforted by the fact many on this board say VT has sucked in the past, so that must continue....
 
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At this point, I have to assume RW has called to ask to talk to Shaka. If he hasn't, I am more than a little concerned about his sanity. He has to #1 on most everyone's list, and he can't wait to see if Wichita St loses to talk to Marshall. As the crickets continue to chirp, and VCU players and admin say they are not concerned about Shaka leaving, the odds appear to be going down even further for Shaka to Wake by the hour. God, I hated watching Buzz on TV yucking it up all day and night on TV with Charles & crew.
 
88Deac said:
At this point, I have to assume RW has called to ask to talk to Shaka. If he hasn't, I am more than a little concerned about his sanity. He has to #1 on most everyone's list, and he can't wait to see if Wichita St loses to talk to Marshall. As the crickets continue to chirp, and VCU players and admin say they are not concerned about Shaka leaving, the odds appear to be going down even further for Shaka to Wake by the hour. God, I hated watching Buzz on TV yucking it up all day and night on TV with Charles & crew.
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I would not put much stock in this part of your statement and it does not really change the likelihood of him moving on. I'd expect every school to publicly say that it thinks that their coach is staying. I would be very surprised if a school ever speculated that they thought their coach was gone before he actually signed a contract for another school.
 
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True. But clearly the longer this goes, the more likely that Shaka isn't going to even talk to us or anyone as he has in the past. It is being reported he is our #1 target, so I can't believe RW hasn't even called yet. And VCU's AD said he is meeting with Shaka, and expects it to go like it did last year, that they "were on the same page with everything," and VCU is doing its part by moving on the $25M new bball complex and everything else. There is actually a lot of talk about his top assistant receiving more inquiries this year. And he's got 3 Top 100 recruits coming next year, and it will be his first season with all his recruits for his style. They will be very good next year.
 
I like all these posts about him bringing in two four star players or three top 100 players next year. Every player the guy ever signed at WF would be a 4 star with the chance for occasional 5 stars.
 
Just because nothing is public in no way shape or form means no one is talking.
 
Illinois is the better job, but I would live on winston-Salem any day before living in Champaign. Illinois has a ton of high school basketball talent and not just from Chicago to recruit from. The AD at U of I has made a lot of mistakes in hiring, particularly on the football side that have really caused the deterioration of the program. Also, I still anticipate Groce will be a good hire. He is a tireless recruiter and will bring talent in.
 
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