Lonergan isn't exciting enough to some folks here. Hell, I'm not excited by him. But he has a Clawsonesque track record at Vermont and GW and took over a pretty darn bad GW program. That's why I have him in the acceptable tier 3 group and think more highly of him than some others here do.
If you went back through old threads from December, quite a few folks around here were "meh" on Clawson (especially vis-a-vis Lembo), and that sentiment just completely vanished after the press conference. I wonder if Lonergan was hired if you'd see the same thing -- don't know how his personality plays in real life, other than he sounds like Matt Seracen which is amazing.
On paper, Lonergan seems like a winner. Despite having 21 years of head coaching experience, he's only 48 (a year and a half older than Clawson). Won a D3 National Title at Catholic and won their league for 7 straight years. Finished 1st or 2nd at Vermont in 4 of 6 years there. Turned around GW and will have them in the NCAAT this year. Assisted Gary Williams for a year.
That's the type of resume I think Wellman goes for. All due respect to White, Miller and the Italian guy, I don't think Wellman will go for a dude with 3 years of HC experience. Through the previous coaching searches in basketball and football, Wellman has never had one of those young guys on any of his rumored short lists.
Also, this dude just kind of looks like a Wake Forest basketball coach:
Of course, he's another guy who is from the area and is basically coaching in his hometown where he has family, elderly parents, children, etc, so not sure how that factors in.