VUGrad1314 wrote:The alum's name is Greg Tonagel. He coaches at Indiana Wesleyan and supposedly really wanted the Valpo job and was hurt he wasn't even interviewed. Hopefully he wouldn't harbor any hard feelings this time around. Supposedly the job was offered first to lead assistant Roger Powell who turned it down (again this is rumor and conjecture) and the job only went to Lottich because VU was desperate to "hire from within" to maximize it's chances of retaining Alec Peters and the core of Bryce's players for their final season. Peters got hurt late in Valpo's final year in the Horizon. Valpo missed the tournament and bowed out in the first round of the NIT. The roster was turned over to Lottich Valpo joined the MVC and not much has gone right since. Tonagel still has a fair number of supporters on our message board but at this point we're just desperate for anyone who can take the program back to respectability because what we have now is utterly embarrassing.
Tonagel is not going to let any so-called hard feelings from taking a job, especially at his alma mater if it is a step up, and it certainly is.
In 2018, David Ragland was a finalist for the UE job, and according to many, blew away the others during the interviews, and was the choice of nearly everyone on the search committee. Our AD at the time went against them for a splash hire with McCarty. Now consider the fact when McCarty got canned, AD Spencer had too much pride and didn't even contact Ragland, instead going straight to Sleepy Todd. Now, despite those two snubs, Ragland obviously still took the job. Tonagel has done a great job at Wesleyan, and I would be curious to see how he does at this level.