Tony Bennett: A Bigger Loss to Washington State than John Calipari Is to Memphis

(Photo by Victor Decolongon/Getty Images)

There’s obviously much ado right now about the Memphis-John Calipari-Kentucky brouhaha, and rightfully so.

It’s not every day one of the most legendary programs in the sport fires a relatively successful coach after just two years, then pulls a Steinbrenner on one of the most successful coaches in the game at one of the most dominant programs in the game.

But, by my count, there have been roughly 10,473 articles written on the Memphis-Calipari issue over the past few days. That subject has more than enough words in print to properly explore every angle at least a dozen times over.

But get this: Even if Memphis does lose Coach Cal, they won’t be nearly as screwed as another program that just lost its coach.

Washington State certainly doesn’t carry the same caché as Kentucky or Memphis, and Tony Bennett doesn’t play the role of media star nearly as well as Calipari. But make no mistake about it, the loss of Bennett to Virginia is an absolutely crushing blow for the Cougars.

Before Bennett took over for his dad, the Cougars hadn’t finished over .500 or made a postseason tournament since 1996 (17-12, NIT). In the 10 seasons between the 1995-96 season and Bennett’s first season in 2006-2007, the Cougars finished in last place six times. That included a five-season stretch between 1997-98 and 2002-03 where they went 16-92 (.148) in conference play.

In his first year at the helm, Bennett led Wazzu to a 26–8 record (13–5 Pac-10, second place) and the second round of the NCAA Tournament. It was their first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1994 and Bennett was named the AP college basketball Coach of the Year and the Naismith College Coach of the Year.

The next season, Washington State went 26–9, 11–7 in conference, and made the Sweet 16. It was the first time a Cougars team had won more than one NCAA Tournament game in a single season since 1941.

And though this season was somewhat of a rebuilding job after losing seniors Kyle Weaver, Robbie Cowgill, and Derrick Lowe, he still managed a winning record (17-16, 8-10) and took the Cougars to the NIT, where they lost to St. Mary’s in the first round.

Now, Washington not only loses seniors Taylor Rochestie, Aron Baynes, and Daven Harmeling, they lose the best coach in program history (with respects to George Raveling and Kelvin Sampson).

The cupboard isn’t entirely bare. The Cougars return two members of the Pac-10 All-Freshman Team in Klay Thompson, who is the son of Mychal Thompson, Wazzu’s third leading scorer and best three-point shooter, and DeAngelo Casto, a 6'8" forward who was the Washington State Player of the Year his senior season in high school.

There’s also—again, at least for now—a decent recruiting class led by Aussie power forward Brock Motum and shooting guard Xavier Thames, a 20-point scorer out of Elk Grove, California. (Though reports today are that Thames will ask for a release from his commitment and re-open his recruitment.)

According to a report in The Seattle Times, Wazzu AD Jim Sterk is ruling out Bennett's assistants for the position, so now the pressure is on to find a new face for the program.

Pullman isn’t exactly a hotbed of...anything, so a “national” search might not be worth the time and expense. This will most likely be a search confined to those with histories in the Pacific Northwest.

Some names bandied about so far are (andI’m stealing from Times reporter Bud Withers here):

•Portland State head coach Ken Bone has two consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances and a previous relationship with Sterk at Seattle Pacific.

•San Diego coach Bill Grier is a former Gonzaga assistant.

•Gonzaga assistant Ray Giacoletti is a former head coach with Eastern Washington and Utah.

•Long Beach State head coach Dan Monson spent 11 years at Gonzaga as a head coach and assistant, is a former Minnesota coach, and a native of Spokane, Wash.

Three other names Washington State should consider (now doing my own work):

•Cameron Dollar is a former UCLA point guard and is now the top assistant and recruiter for Lorenzo Romar at Washington.

•Donny Daniels is the top UCLA recruiter, who also served as head coach at Cal State Fullerton and was an assisant at Utah under Rick Majerus. Among those players recruited by Daniels were Darren Collison, Kevin Love, Russell Westbrook, Andre Miller, and Keith Van Horn.

•Eric Reveno was voted one of the top 25 recruiters in the nation by rivals.com in 2006 during his tenure at Stanford, where he spent nine seasons under Mike Montgomery. He took a Portland team that went 4-10 in the West Coast Conference in 2005 and brought them to 9-5 last year, finishing third to Gonzaga and St. Mary’s. His team beat both Washington and St. Mary’s last year.

Who will Sterk go with? It’s tough to say. But not one of the guys listed above has the head coaching success of Bennett in his brief three-year career as the Cougars' head man.

To get back to my headline, it's not that Memphis won't take a step back by losing Calipari. They most certainly will. But their step back will still leave them far, far ahead of Wazzu without Bennett.

Memphis may be the biggest headline, but Washington State is by far the biggest loser.

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