Until we stop bargain bin shopping for coaches, the result will mostly be the same.

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We should go Full Colorado in replacing Ben.

Latrell Spreewell or Steph Marbury would be perfect in this capacity since we probably can’t afford Dennis Rodman.
 

bga1 said:
Richard Pitino should be a cautionary tale for coaches that are looking at our situation. He had very little success here and suddenly he is looking a lot better at stinking New Mexico. There is no doubt his team would beat ours right now and would have last year as well. What is it that is going on here that is killing coaches? Even Tubby failed.

Until that issue is resolved why would coaches who are having decent success, like Medved, risk getting their career scuttled by this mess? Ben was set up to fail, should never have gotten the job, and now the situation is far worse with 4 more years of losing and we are now in a professional sport where we don't have the resources to compete for high end guys.
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Money and ego.

None of these guys got where they are in this profession without significant ego. They all think "they're the guy" to run or "fix" a downtrodden program.
 



STPGopher said:
Ummm. He's a Gopher. He's from a local Catholic HS. He has coaching experience. He's young. He was up and coming. Often times that gets a look if you can't swing for the fences budget wise. A high risk, potential high reward hire. Such decisions are made all of the time.

The gamble may have been deemed worth it.
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It was a total DEI hire in the wake of George Floyd. Thanks Joan!
STPGopher said:
Niko is still out there to be had. And if he wasn't, there is most likely someone else. Not sure there was an affordable Tubby Smith type hire at the time. IMHO Niko wasn't on that tier.

Sometimes labeling someone as a DEI hire is being lazy. What appears to be his biggest problem is player retention. He's not the only coach struggling with NIL.
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Dutcher was there. Mussy was there. Why do we always talk "affordable here"? The U gets 120 million from TV contracts. Furthermore it is ROI not cost that should be the deciding factor. How affordable is it to go down to 4000 season ticket holders when we used to have 9000? Pay the 5 million a year and get a big name coach and the revenue will come in to pay that off easy. Sometimes cheap is the worst bargain you can get.
 

SelectionSunday said:
Money and ego.

None of these guys got where they are in this profession without significant ego. They all think "they're the guy" to run or "fix" a downtrodden program.
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I think every deal made by any coach that is really good from here on is going to be like the Mussy deal at USC. How much do I get paid to do this and how much NIL will you assure me. That's the formula. Niko will go down in flames if he doesn't get the NIL commitment.
 

bga1 said:
It was a total DEI hire in the wake of George Floyd. Thanks Joan!

Dutcher was there. Mussy was there. Why do we always talk "affordable here"? The U gets 120 million from TV contracts. Furthermore it is ROI not cost that should be the deciding factor. How affordable is it to go down to 4000 season ticket holders when we used to have 9000? Pay the 5 million a year and get a big name coach and the revenue will come in to pay that off easy. Sometimes cheap is the worst bargain you can get.
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Fair comments. IIRC the tv money we now see wasn't quite there yet. I will be surprised if there won't be a different approach this time.
 



STPGopher said:
Ummm. He's a Gopher. He's from a local Catholic HS. He has coaching experience. He's young. He was up and coming. Often times that gets a look if you can't swing for the fences budget wise. A high risk, potential high reward hire. Such decisions are made all of the time.

The gamble may have been deemed worth it. Niko is still out there to be had. And if he wasn't, there is most likely someone else. Not sure there was an affordable Tubby Smith type hire at the time. IMHO Niko wasn't on that tier.

Sometimes labeling someone as a DEI hire is being lazy. What appears to be his biggest problem is player retention. He's not the only coach struggling with NIL.
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I don't think you understand how DEI hires work.

Lets walk through your reasons.
  • He went to a local Catholic school. I am Catholic but this means absolutely nothing. I would hope the U does not prioritize people who went to Hill Murray or Cretin over candidates. If, for whatever reason, they did. . . this would also be a DEI hire (hiring a Catholic)?
  • He has coaching experience. Yep, he's coached basketball. However, he did NOT have the coaching background that we would have considered with any other candidate.
  • He's young. I guess I don't see how that could be seen one way or the other.
  • He was up and coming. No he wasn't. He had just been turned down for jobs at Montana and Northern Illinois. In the context of a Big 10 job, no, he absolutely was not up and coming.
  • "when you can't swing for the fences budget wise". Ben Johnson was not a bargain. His first contract was almost twice the amount of money that Iowa paid for TJ Otzelberger. It was more than Craig Smith. It was really close to Shaka Smart. The same contract would have landed Niko 10 out of 10 times.
These decisions are not made all the time. Ben Johnsons has never shown anything to suggest he had high potential. It is entirely a guess that he has high potential because he doesn't have a proven track record.
 

bga1 said:
I think every deal made by any coach that is really good from here on is going to be like the Mussy deal at USC. How much do I get paid to do this and how much NIL will you assure me. That's the formula. Niko will go down in flames if he doesn't get the NIL commitment.
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Part of the NIL commitment is also on the head coach. When you're an executive, sales is 100% part of your job.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
Part of the NIL commitment is also on the head coach. When you're an executive, sales is 100% part of your job.
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Sure - I'll buy that. You would have a hard time finding a coach that is worse at schmoozing and hyping a program than Ben. That's no knock on him, it is just who he appears to be. I am just saying that coaches coming to a new job are going to ask for that commitment. Right now unless you shock this town with a big name- most people are past believing that we are going to be good any time in the near future.
 

bga1 said:
Sure - I'll buy that. You would have a hard time finding a coach that is worse at schmoozing and hyping a program than Ben. That's no knock on him, it is just who he appears to be. I am just saying that coaches coming to a new job are going to ask for that commitment. Right now unless you shock this town with a big name- most people are past believing that we are going to be good any time in the near future.
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100%

The job of a college football/basketball program got a lot harder. Recruiting now involves recruiting your own players, evaluating players now includes evaluating potential portal players, and NIL fundraising is part of the job.

But you're 100% right, with that, there is also a necessity that the school supports the program's NIL efforts. You can't compete otherwise.
 



STPGopher said:
Ummm. He's a Gopher. He's from a local Catholic HS. He has coaching experience. He's young. He was up and coming. Often times that gets a look if you can't swing for the fences budget wise. A high risk, potential high reward hire. Such decisions are made all of the time.

The gamble may have been deemed worth it. Niko is still out there to be had. And if he wasn't, there is most likely someone else. Not sure there was an affordable Tubby Smith type hire at the time. IMHO Niko wasn't on that tier.

Sometimes labeling someone as a DEI hire is being lazy. What appears to be his biggest problem is player retention. He's not the only coach struggling with NIL.
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Nothing about Ben was up and coming. Are you kidding me? Look at his track record at Xavier. They didn't make the tournament once in his time at Xavier. And it's Xavier! They make it all the time!
 

Gophers7633 said:
Nothing about Ben was up and coming. Are you kidding me? Look at his track record at Xavier. They didn't make the tournament once in his time at Xavier. And it's Xavier! They make it all the time!
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I actually agree. I think your point was meant for someone else?
 


The coach and coaching matter. Yes it’s NIL era and that has influence but the coach and reputation matters in CBB. If the U would have say a Sampson, Drew or Hurley level coach or cultivate a coach even approaching that level I have a feeling the NIL money would follow pretty quickly.
 

I like Ben all indications are he’s a stand up guy who seems to have somewhat an eye for talent but this program continue to languish in the bottom of the B1G
 

Gophers7633 said:
No. In your post you said he was up and coming. He was anything but that. But maybe you meant something different?
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I stand corrected. What I was trying to say is that he was an assistant at another school and had some success. Sometimes such coaches are considered for bigger roles such as the one coach Johnson is currently in. I was defending a possible thought consideration that AD Coyle may have had.

I felt that saying he was just a DEI hire dismissed other potential reasons for giving him a look. Ben Johnson - Xavier
 

STPGopher said:
I stand corrected. What I was trying to say is that he was an assistant at another school and had some success. Sometimes such coaches are considered for bigger roles such as the one coach Johnson is currently in. I was defending a possible thought consideration that AD Coyle may have had.

I felt that saying he was just a DEI hire dismissed other potential reasons for giving him a look. Ben Johnson - Xavier
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But Xavier wasn't good while he was there. They didn't make the tournament one time.
 

I actually think one could argue that Ben Johnson was the opposite of "up and coming" when hired at Minnesota as head coach.

He had been a career assistant for 16 years prior to his hiring. The schools he was at made three (3) NCAA tourneys in those 16 years. Three. Twice at Northern Iowa (12 and 13 years before he was hired as head coach at Minnesota) and then once at Minnesota. That's it. Nothing about that screams "up and coming."

When he arrived at Xavier they had gone to 27 of the previous 35 NCAA tourneys, including 11 of the previous 12 Big Dances and the last five in a row. They missed the tourney all three years he was there and his head coach got fired. At Xavier.

In his ten years as a P6 assistant coach - the ten years leading up to the Minnesota head coaching hire, the teams he was an assistant coach on finished above .500 in conference one time and made one NCAA Tourney (MN 2017). How is that "up and coming?" Up and coming would be an assistant coach off a Final Four team with a string of success, someone who was part of bringing in a top ten recruiting class or two at a school, etc.

After this current season ends without an NCAA tournament berth, Ben Johnson will have been involved in 20 seasons as a college coach (both assistant and head coach). He still will have only been in three (3) NCAA Tournaments. Three. That is almost impossible to pull off.
 
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Bob_Loblaw said:
Part of the NIL commitment is also on the head coach. When you're an executive, sales is 100% part of your job.
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This is truth. Part of the reason football is getting "most" of the NIL money is because PJ has been very aggressive in seeking it, meeting with big donors, and raising the money on his own, etc. The recent $1 million matching situation is a direct result of PJ's efforts.
 



short ornery norwegian said:
I don't think it's as simple as "hire a better coach."

in today's climate, NIL does matter. and from all accounts, most of the Gophers' NIL money goes to the football program. Dinkytown Athletes just did a big matching-funds campaign - and said openly the money would go to support Football and Volleyball.

Why not basketball? That's a question for Derek Burns - and also for Mark Coyle.

To be clear - I like Ben Johnson as a person. so far, his coaching record is not good. But, he came in planning to build through HS recruiting, and then the rules of the game changed to where HS recruiting is now less important that being able to afford the NIL to bring in higher-level transfers and keep your best players from leaving.

would switching coaches - with no other changes - result in more wins? it's certainly possible.

but as noted, the Gopher men's basketball program has not really mattered in the B1G - let along nationally, for a long time.

Ben Johnson may be part of the problem - but he is not the only problem. if the house has termites, a new coat of paint may make things look better, but it doesn't address the underlying problem.

The Gopher basketball program has termites. switching coaches - with no other changes - would be like a new coat of paint.
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Johnson is the biggest problem. We're not trying to go from 18th to 1st by changing the coach. We're trying to go from 18th to say 10th by changing the coach. Then to get from 10th to top 5 will require more $$ etc. That may not be possible. But we don't have to remain one of the absolute worst programs in Power 5 basketball by saying "we just can't do any better than Ben Johnson so why try."
 

Otis said:
We should go Full Colorado in replacing Ben.

Latrell Spreewell or Steph Marbury would be perfect in this capacity since we probably can’t afford Dennis Rodman.
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Deon didn't go to Colorado off the street. None of those guys have coached anything. The next coach must have multiple years of division 1 head coaching experience. No exceptions.
 

SelectionSunday said:
Money and ego.

None of these guys got where they are in this profession without significant ego. They all think "they're the guy" to run or "fix" a downtrodden program.
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Plus the bar is on the floor. If he gets the Gophers to .500 in the B1G and a 1st round NCAA exit, we'll be ready to build a statue or at least a trophy from broken bits of bench.
 

bga1 said:
It was a total DEI hire in the wake of George Floyd. Thanks Joan!

Dutcher was there. Mussy was there. Why do we always talk "affordable here"? The U gets 120 million from TV contracts. Furthermore it is ROI not cost that should be the deciding factor. How affordable is it to go down to 4000 season ticket holders when we used to have 9000? Pay the 5 million a year and get a big name coach and the revenue will come in to pay that off easy. Sometimes cheap is the worst bargain you can get.
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It's not like it's impossible for the U to pay a competitive salary. PJ is up to $6 million or more correct?
 

I've been advocating for leaving the Big Ten. We will NEVER be competitive here. No, Dutcher would NOT be competitive in the Big Ten.

Dutcher had ONE great year. BEFORE unlimited free agency. If he was here, he couldn't keep a team together. If the Gophers were in the Mountain West last year...we'd have made the Sweet-16 too...San Diego State beat UAB and Yale before getting routed by 30 by UCONN.
 

EasyThere Pilgrim said:
I've been advocating for leaving the Big Ten. We will NEVER be competitive here. No, Dutcher would NOT be competitive in the Big Ten.

Dutcher had ONE great year. BEFORE unlimited free agency. If he was here, he couldn't keep a team together. If the Gophers were in the Mountain West last year...we'd have made the Sweet-16 too...San Diego State beat UAB and Yale before getting routed by 30 by UCONN.
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You are truly delusional. How I would love to lose to the #1 team in the country in the Sweet 16, even in a rout. We're so far from that it's not even funny. So, he did pretty well last year, even in "free agency".

They host the Zags Monday. No idea, but bet it's a competitive game. Wouldn't it be fun to watch a game like that at Williams Arena.
 

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