College Basketball: 10 Coaches in New Places Who Can Make the NCAA Tournament
It has been a month and a half since the 2011 NCAA Tournament came to a close with Kemba Walker leading Connecticut to the school's third national championship in a "slog-fest" over Shelvin Mack and Butler, and still the college basketball world is as unsettled as ever.
Why, you ask? Even with the late signing period in the rear view mirror?
A close listen through the still air of the college basketball world will yield the faint and distant sounds of the coaching carousel still spinning round and round.
There are still a number of schools looking for new coaches, though the most of the major openings, from Gary Williams' vacated seat at Maryland to Mike Anderson's spot on the bench at Missouri, have already been filled.
So now that those vacancies have been settled, how will these coaches fair in their new digs? More importantly, who among them will lead their teams back to the NCAA Tournament?
Read on to find out!
Mark Turgeon, Maryland
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The first coach with a chance to take his team to the tourney also happens to be among the ones most recently moved.
Mark Turgeon is set to take over at Maryland in the wake of legendary coach Gary Williams' sudden retirement. The Terrapins have been rather moribund since Williams led them to the national championship in 2002, which some believe prompted his resignation.
The Terps missed March Madness in 2011, but seem poised to make a run back to the tourney in 2012—even with the departure of sophomore forward Jordan Williams, who was the team's leading scorer and rebounder last season.
Turgeon will have a solid core of backcourt talent to work with, including freshmen Terrell Stoglin and Pe'Shawn Howard and junior Sean Mosley.
Now, Turgeon won't easily replace the defected Williams or graduates like Dino Gregory, Cliff Tucker and Adrian Bowie. However, given the weakness of the ACC outside of Duke and North Carolina, and the fact that this departed group of Terps wasn't quite good enough to make the tourney in 2011, it's not unreasonable to think that a fresh face like Turgeon's would help to revive this long-dormant powerhouse sooner rather than later.
Billy Kennedy, Texas A&M
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Of course, there's also the chance that Turgeon may regret ever leaving Texas A&M, where he helped to build on the past success of Billy Gillespie and develop the Aggies basketball program into a perennial contender in the Big 12.
As such, new coach Billy Kennedy will have an excellent opportunity to take A&M back to the NCAA Tournament in his first year in College Station.
The former Murray State coach will be taking over the reigns of a team fresh off a 24-9 season and a third-place finish in the Big 12 that returns leading scorer Khris Middleton along with junior David Loubeau, freshman Kourtney Roberson and sophomore Naji Hibbert.
The additions of four-star point guard Jamal Branch and three-star shooting guard Jordan Green should help to sure up even further a team that will have only to contend with depleted squads at Texas, Kansas State and Kansas—along with a pretty good Missouri team—for conference supremacy.
Mike Anderson, Arkansas
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Speaking of Missouri, Tigers coach Mike Anderson made the big leap back to his alma mater when he took on the job at Arkansas this spring.
The Razorbacks never quite took off under Mike Pelphrey as had been hoped, leading the school to fire Pelphrey and bring back Anderson, who was a long-time assistant under legendary coach Nolan Richardson.
The Hogs missed the tourney in 2011, but will return leading scorers Rotnei Clark and Marshawn Powell from a team that finished firmly on the bubble before being left out of the final field of 68.
Additionally, Anderson has a terrific recruiting class coming in to Fayetteville, highlighted by five-star point guard B.J. Young and four-stars Rashad Madden and Hunter Mickelson, which should help the Hogs rise to the top of a rather weak SEC West.
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Frank Haith, Missouri
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Picking up where Mike Anderson left off at Missouri will be Frank Haith, who will have ample opportunity to take his team to the Big Dance in 2012.
The Tigers return all the principal players from a squad that went 23-11 and made March Madness as an 11-seed this past season, including Laurence Bowers and Kim English, who both decided to test the NBA Draft waters but ultimately returned to school.
Haith won't have any incoming recruits to work into the mix, but frankly, he won't need any, as just about all of Mizzou's most important players—aside from "Flip" Pressey and Michael Dixon—will be seniors.
Jim Larranaga, Miami
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Certainly, the situation Frank Haith now finds himself in is better than the one he left behind at Miami, though that's not to say that new coach Jim Larranaga can't mold the Hurricanes into a tournament team.
The 'Canes went 21-15 and reached the quarterfinals of the NIT under Haith, and will have pretty much everyone back for the 2011-2012 season aside from graduating senior Adrian Thomas.
And if it comes down to it that The U needs a miracle to make the Big Dance, they certainly have the right man at the helm to make it happen. After all, it was Larranaga who coached 11-seed George Mason to the Final Four in 2006.
Paul Hewitt, George Mason
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The long and winding road of this particular branch of the 2011 coaching carousel leads back to the door of George Mason, where former Georgia Tech coach Paul Hewitt will be knocking for a quick shot at redemption.
And he'll have an excellent opportunity to do so with a team coming off an appearance in the 2011 NCAA Tournament that yielded a first-round win.
Now, the Patriots will certainly miss the services of leading scorer Cam Long, but Hewitt will still have plenty of talent and experience left on the roster from a team that went 27-7 and won the regular season title in the Colonial Athletic Association.
Aside from Long and Isaiah Tate, the Pats will have back the rest of their rotation players, including Ryan Pearson and Luke Hancock, who were both double-digit scorers last season.
As such, Hewitt should once again have this team in the thick of things for a tourney bid out of the CAA.
Mark Gottfried, North Carolina State
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While Hewitt is leaving the ACC behind, Mark Gottfried is just arriving now as the head coach at North Carolina State.
Former Wolfpack player and coach Sidney Lowe resigned from his post following his team's 15-16 season in 2011 after going 25-55 in conference games during his five-year tenure.
Gottfried, the former coach at Alabama, is in to pick up the pieces in Raleigh, where Lowe left behind a decent crop of talent to work with. The Pack will get back freshman sensation C.J. Leslie—whose social media stupidity recently landed him in hot water—along with rising sophomores Lorenzo Brown and Ryan Harrow and juniors-to-be Scott Wood and Richard Howell.
These players all garnered significant minutes for an inexperienced NC State squad during the 2010-2011 season, thereby setting up the Pack for a prolific campaign next year that should land them back in the NCAA Tournament.
Cuonzo Martin, Tennessee
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Back in the SEC, all eyes not already fixed firmly on the reloading effort going on at Kentucky will be turned toward Knoxville, where Tennessee will be looking to recover from the botched end of the Bruce Pearl era.
New coach Cuonzo Martin will have a tough task ahead of him trying to get the Volunteers back to the Big Dance after last season's senior-laden team got bounced in the first round by Michigan 75-45. He'll also have to find a way to replace the production of star swingman Scotty Hopson and Tobias Harris.
That being said, the cupboard won't be completely bare, as Martin will still have rising senior Cameron Tatum to build around with a collection of talented but underutilized players that Pearl brought in during his tenure.
The biggest obstacle for the Vols in their quest to return to the Big Dance may be the NCAA itself, which has yet to come down with its final ruling on the infractions incurred by Bruce Pearl while he was at UT, and may decide to ban the Vols from participating in postseason play.
Lon Kruger, Oklahoma
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Lon Kruger is on to his next rebuilding job, this time cleaning up the mess left behind by Jeff Capel at Oklahoma.
The Sooners went 14-18 in Capel's last go-round and will enter the 2011-2012 season without Cade Davis, last season's leading scorer. However, Kruger will have a decent nucleus to build around, headlined by the trio of Andrew Fitzgerald, Steven Pledger and Cameron Clark.
Furthermore, the Big 12 figures to be a bit down next season with Colorado and Nebraska off to new conferences and teams at the top like Kansas, Texas and Kansas State losing so many important players, thereby leaving an opening for a rather rapid revival at OU under Kruger.
Dave Rice, UNLV
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Lon Kruger leaves behind a pretty good situation at UNLV, where he led the Runnin' Rebels to four NCAA Tournament appearances in his last five years in Las Vegas.
A situation that new coach Dave Rice should be able to capitalize on rather quickly: He'll have a talented and experienced core of players at his disposal, including rising seniors Chace Stanback and Oscar Bellfield and juniors-to-be Anthony Marshall and Quintrell Thomas.
That crew has made it to March Madness each of the last two years, and now that BYU is off to the WAC and San Diego State is without Kawhi Leonard and Billy White, the Rebs should be in perfect position to rise back to the top of the Mountain West.
.png?w=480 "NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament Championship")
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