Where to start, so much fodder.
Odom, yes he won two ACCT, he also won 1 ACCT game with a team that didn't have Duncan on it. Odom could coach defense, he benefited from having a floor leader like Childress and a future NBA HOF Duncan. And before we get any 'he recruited Duncan' we all know the story, we also know the first plan was to redshirt Tim before Maktar and Peral were made ineligible.
The team quitting on Odom in the ACCT vs MD followed by the Butler disaster was a great sing of future success. And let's all remember, Odom was offered a contract at the start of the season that he turned down. But Odom followed up the KS win with the close loss to UNC and then reigning in the team in a panic.
And Odom had Howard on the team but he did not hand Skip an NBA level player. If there ever was a clear sign of a Coach 'coaching' up a player Skip and Howard was it. Skip doesn't come along and Howard is playing in Europe instead of the NBA. Under Odom, fans called Howard a team cancer, Skip took Howard and taught how to channel all his energy into his game.
We can use the ACCT logic all we want with Odom, but how did L'vill get ride of Crum, who won a national championship, or GT get ride of Hewitt that got to the final 4. The goodwill from those things do not go on forever (see Grobe).
Gaudio, IMO the Wake fan base was split 50/50 between: Wellman had the guts to do the right thing and Guadio should have gotten another year. Neither a ringing endorsement. Dino's entire post season experience is about blow outs and upsets to lower seeds. He won one game against an equal challenged Texas team on a last second runner by Ish. The team no-shows for it's first 4 post season games and one miracle play makes it all right.
Not sure how anyone can go back to the Ari and JTT well anymore. Ari got his fresh chance and did nothing for team nearly as bad as Wake. JTT, talks about getting things straight this year and shortly after is off the team for academics. I think history has proven that they have spend more time with non-basket ball issues than playing basket ball.
Summary
- Odom great success but had stayed too long and could not recapture previous success. It was time for him to go
- Skip - good hires (if he could teach defense then it would have been a great hire).
- Dino - Nobody could say it out loud and the timing of Skips death made the decision tough. Most here said there was no way we could go outside the program at that point. He had more talent on his team that many wake teams that did more with less, but he not only underperformed his teams were embarrassing in the post season.
- Bzz - The most obvious coach to fire out of the group.