by purple&orange » March 7th, 2017, 12:11 am
I strongly disagree with Purdue passing Indiana as far as in state. Not too long ago Purdue wasn't making NCAA Tournaments and although they are clearly better this year Indiana won the Big Ten last season. If you argued Notre Dame and Butler have passed both as of late, I'd buy that.
Indiana promoted Davis who has said he wasn't ready for that job when he got it, then turned to Sampson, a terrible hire who had NCAA/graduation issues at Oklahoma, just a terrible fit for Indiana. Graduate players, win, and do it cleanly......that's important at Indiana and not in that order. Then Crean took 3 years to clean up the mess left in the wake of Sampson and the last 4 years have been so up and down.
2013: Big Ten title, 1 seed, L to Syracuse in Sweet Sixtenn
2014: Missed NCAAs
2015: 10 seed, Lost to Wichita State in Round 1
2016: Big Ten title, 5 seed, L to North Carolina in Sweet Sixteen
I personally don't think Crean goes after this season, his buyout is $4 million until summer where it drops down to $1 million. Now he may choose to leave on his own, but I don't think Indiana fires him. That buyout is a lot, even for Indiana who doesn't print money hand over fist due that some football schools can, but there's always a chance a booster or collection of boosters take care of the buyout and move on.
Indiana is a great job because of tradition, 5 National Titles, 22 Big Ten Titles, last undefeated National Champion. Indiana is a great state for talent, although recruiting is as national/international as ever. Indiana is certainly a basketball school, it's a destination job. As I said earlier bigger isn't always better and I don't think Marshall feels like he has to move to a bigger name to validate his career at all. If he loves Wichita as much as some have said, then he may not move for a long time because I think he's proven and proving here in the moment that he can win, compete with just about anyone in the country.
Regardless I'm pretty sure nobody will be happy to see Wichita State in their bracket this Sunday, personally I hope they get Kentucky at some point so Cal will whine about it and so they can knock his Cats out of the tournament.