Conference Coaching Rankings

lawmanfan

lawmanfan

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Last night at the Garden my section ended up in the usual conversation about Shaka Smart, who is a polarizing figure when it comes to assessing his coaching. Setting aside the Marquette fans who think he's John Wooden, everyone else agreed that he is probably someplace between the 5th and 7th best coach in the Big East (Pitino, Hurley, McDermott, Matta, Miller were mostly consensus picks above him; most of the debate was if you put him above or below Ed Cooley).

This led to the observation that this is not so much knock on Smart as it is a statement about the level of coaching in the Big East. From there the question became: how do the other conferences stack up?

We all agreed that the ACC has no high-level coaches left outside of Bennett, and his Achilles heel (offense) is well known. But no other coach in that conference worries you from a tactical standpoint.

The Big 12 obviously has Self, Sampson, Drew, and then a lot of depth after that.

The SEC has Barnes, Pearl, Calipari and more.

The Big 10 has Izzo who may be past his prime. Matt Painter has managed to lose with some pretty good teams - I like him but can't defend the record. We won't mention Juwan Howard, I guess you could make an argument for Collins but he would be like the 9th best coach in the Big East.

So long story short: which conference do we think has the strongest group of coaches? I think my (very preliminary) take is:

Big East
Big 12
SEC
A10
Big 10
Mountain West
ACC

Thought it was an interesting topic to think about, especially this time of year.
 
Amaseinyourface said:
Come on Villanova.. we could be batting 1000
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Consensus was that the only thing saving Neptune from being the worst coach in the league was DePaul.

There was also a thought that depending on the next few years, Smart could rise ... or he could fall behind Cooley and English (this assumes all coaches stay where they are and I am not at all sure that Matta, Miller, and Neptune will be in the same jobs 3 years from now).
 
lawmanfan said:
Consensus was that the only thing saving Neptune from being the worst coach in the league was DePaul.

There was also a thought that depending on the next few years, Smart could rise ... or he could fall behind Cooley and English (this assumes all coaches stay where they are and I am not at all sure that Matta, Miller, and Neptune will be in the same jobs 3 years from now).
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Matta lost me when Butler played at Providence. Up 3 with a few seconds left, Providence has the ball and Matta doesn't tell his players to foul. Providence sinks a 3, the games goes into OT and Providence wins. Matta took responsibility after the game, but no excuse for it.

PS: Getting ejected from the game at CA this season wasn't a good look either.
 
lawmanfan said:
Consensus was that the only thing saving Neptune from being the worst coach in the league was DePaul.

There was also a thought that depending on the next few years, Smart could rise ... or he could fall behind Cooley and English (this assumes all coaches stay where they are and I am not at all sure that Matta, Miller, and Neptune will be in the same jobs 3 years from now).
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Was this before or after the Holtman news broke? If hes the 10th best coach in your league (I dont think he is) you have a murderers row of a league!

English would need a hell of a BE run to surpass Smart. He's about to have back to back top #2 NCAAT seed seasons at Marquette.
 
lawmanfan said:
Last night at the Garden my section ended up in the usual conversation about Shaka Smart, who is a polarizing figure when it comes to assessing his coaching. Setting aside the Marquette fans who think he's John Wooden, everyone else agreed that he is probably someplace between the 5th and 7th best coach in the Big East (Pitino, Hurley, McDermott, Matta, Miller were mostly consensus picks above him; most of the debate was if you put him above or below Ed Cooley).

This led to the observation that this is not so much knock on Smart as it is a statement about the level of coaching in the Big East. From there the question became: how do the other conferences stack up?

We all agreed that the ACC has no high-level coaches left outside of Bennett, and his Achilles heel (offense) is well known. But no other coach in that conference worries you from a tactical standpoint.

The Big 12 obviously has Self, Sampson, Drew, and then a lot of depth after that.

The SEC has Barnes, Pearl, Calipari and more.

The Big 10 has Izzo who may be past his prime. Matt Painter has managed to lose with some pretty good teams - I like him but can't defend the record. We won't mention Juwan Howard, I guess you could make an argument for Collins but he would be like the 9th best coach in the Big East.

So long story short: which conference do we think has the strongest group of coaches? I think my (very preliminary) take is:

Big East
Big 12
SEC
A10
Big 10
Mountain West
ACC

Thought it was an interesting topic to think about, especially this time of year.
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Matta looks disinterested half the time on the bench. I do know if that is his demeanor, but he does get the look of a guy who would rather be fishing.
 
Shaka has a final 4 and a better ncaa record than mcdermott and he won the BET. He's also at least 10 years younger than the others. I think he's got to be in the group behind hurley and pitino.
 
I love the collection of coaches we have in the Big East and definitely agree with your assessment it's the best among any conference. Will be interesting to see if it's poached much in the next few years. But we seem to have some very high end coaches who found their ideal spot, like Hurley, McDermott, Pitino, Shaka, etc.
 
Not sure I put SEC one, but I think they have a murders row also:

Alabama - Nate Oates
Auburn - Bruce Pearl
Kentucky - John Calipari
Ole Miss - Chris Beard
Tennessee - Rick Barnes
Texas A&M - Buzz Williams
Arkansas -- Eric Musselman

Up and comers: Todd Golden - Florida, Lamont Paris - South Carolina, Chris Jans -- Mississippi State
 
Amaseinyourface said:
Was this before or after the Holtman news broke? If hes the 10th best coach in your league (I dont think he is) you have a murderers row of a league!

English would need a hell of a BE run to surpass Smart. He's about to have back to back top #2 NCAAT seed seasons at Marquette.
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I agree - English has a long way to go to be in the conversation with Smart and at the moment I'm not giving him much credit for Providence.

The LMF theory of coaches who inherit established and successful programs is that you ignore what they do in Year 1, you largely ignore what they do in Year 2 but you start to see some signs of whether it's them or program muscle memory; in Year 3 you start to get a real idea of whether the guy can coach or not, and in Year 4 you know what you have. Maybe a bit outdated, but has proven true often enough that I stick with it. Too easy to overreact to what a guy does in Year 1 with a program that somebody else already built and has humming along.

My view of Smart is that he is a wonderful recruiter and a terrific motivator but outside of the run with VCU has folded every year since at tournament time despite having superior talent. At some point you have to wonder if he's just getting outcoached routinely in big spots against well-coached teams.

I also agree with the comments that Matta is past his prime at this point and Smart is ahead of him. His ranking was based largely on resume as opposed to current performance.

Where Holtmann slots in is a great question. But league truly is a murderer's row of coaches. I fully expect Miller to take another job, Matta to retire or get fired, and Neptune to be gone within the next 24 months, so the league profile is going to change. If I had to guess i would say in 2026 the rankings will be something like Hurley, Pitino, then an argument about Smart, McDermott and Cooley, then Holtmann and English in some order, and then whoever the rest are.

Great job on the SEC list by DK - they may be deeper than the Big East, even.
 
otis said:
Anyone who saw the out of bounds play Smart called with 2.4 seconds left in last evenings Villanova game will know that he is a very- very good coach.
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The play BEFORE that (chuck it over halfcourt and call timeout as soon as Oso catches it so you start your last play in the frontcourt) was brilliant.

The last play, I do not agree. The odds of them getting that shot off after a catch and a pass were infinitesimal. They did an amazing job to make it that close. But if you can throw the ball to Igodaro at the free throw line (which they did) then IMHO the right play was to let him score or get fouled. Much easier to accomplish in the 2.3 seconds they had left.
 
kranmars said:
Matta looks disinterested half the time on the bench. I do know if that is his demeanor, but he does get the look of a guy who would rather be fishing.
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That’s because he is obviously twenty years older than his listed age. Mrs IDRAFT refers to Butler as the team with the “old man coaching.”
 
IDRAFT said:
That’s because he is obviously twenty years older than his listed age. Mrs IDRAFT refers to Butler as the team with the “old man coaching.”
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I've observed the same but not one to judge because understand he's dealt with health issues. But he's 56 and appears to be at least 10 years older than that.
 
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