This doesn't happen often, but it happened Tuesday: Iowa State outmaneuvered big brother Iowa for the perfect coach while -- as an added bonus -- showing up the more respected basketball programs at Indiana and Missouri.
|
|
| Former Panthers coach Greg McDermott is the perfect man for the Iowa State job. (AP) |
Judging from Internet chatter, Iowa State fans don't know what to make of McDermott. They'll learn. McDermott is the perfect hire. Perfect. That clear enough? He won huge at Northern Iowa, where winning small is hard enough. He's a state native. His local roots run deep, which means he might never leave Iowa State. And he's candid and charismatic, the kind of guy who will win over new fans every time he speaks publicly.
Frankly, considering its low national profile and recent run of ethically suspect coaches, Iowa State basketball doesn't deserve Greg McDermott.
Iowa does.
But Iowa won't get McDermott, because Iowa State athletics director Jamie Pollard knows how to run a coach search. Unlike Indiana and Missouri, whose multimillion-dollar athletic departments have sought the help of outside consultancy firms, Pollard did this thing mostly on his own. That's what athletics directors used to do. They were hired to run their department, not to outsource the most important tasks to a headhunter firm located in another state, a headhunter firm that tomorrow will help a hotel hire a CEO.
As of late Tuesday morning, Indiana still hadn't contacted Iowa's Steve Alford while Missouri's search for Quin Snyder's replacement was moving along molasses-like as well. Can you believe that? Five weeks into their coaching searches, Indiana and Missouri are still doing their due diligence. Iowa State, meanwhile, has done a firing and a hiring, and soon Greg McDermott will be kicking Iowa's and Indiana's butts for available recruits.
Don't feel bad for Alford, because he's making a fortune at a good school, but still ... he has been twisting awkwardly in the wind since Mike Davis' pending resignation went public Feb. 16. That was five weeks ago.
Five days ago, Iowa State had a coach. And his name was Wayne Morgan.
The biggest loser in Iowa State's schooling of Indiana isn't Indiana, though unless Indiana makes a brilliant hire -- Mike Montgomery or (yes) Thad Matta would do the trick -- the Hoosiers are going to be pretty darned big losers.
No, the biggest loser from Tuesday's developments in Ames, Iowa, was the University of Iowa.
See, Iowa wanted McDermott too. Had Indiana hired Alford shortly after the Hawkeyes' NCAA Tournament loss to Northwestern State, Iowa would have been all over McDermott. He's been the best coach in that state for years, and anyone who follows basketball there knows it. Iowa athletics director Bob Bowlsby, a former chairman for the NCAA Tournament selection committee, knows it. He's never told me that he knows it, but that's OK. Bowlsby's way too smart a basketball guy not to have realized in about 2004 that McDermott, not Alford, was the right man for the Hawkeyes.
Bowlsby will never get to hire McDermott now. Poor Iowa is on Plan B of its coach search, and still doesn't know if it even needs a coach search.
Today Iowa is the traffic cone. Iowa State is the Porsche driving circles around it.
And then there's Missouri and Indiana. They're still stuck in the garage, surrounded by too many mechanics, too frazzled to fix anything.
