Surprise, Hewitt is staying put in Atlanta

Much to my surprise, Paul Hewitt has decided to stay put at Georgia Tech.   Here’s a sampling of reaction from Yellow Jacket nation, one message board contained the following:

NYJacket:  Looks like Dave Braine really did create a contract that is too lucrative to walk away from.  Oh well, at least we have baseball and football before we get to watch Hewitt’s coaching genius again.

rum creek:  Bad day for GT. We are stuck with PH. This program is in deep do-do. Let’s hope the football team can offset the revenue to be loss with BB.

Jeffgt00:  Wow… Hewitt seems really serious about chasing that most career ACC losses record, doesn’t he?

Another Tech board contained these musings of the disgruntled:

LLTW:  If I’m ever walking down the streets of Atlanta, and I see this guy, I might go apes*** crazy and do something stupid. I hate him more than any other coach in the world now.

PerfectOption:  Can Hewitt get an indefinite furlough? He is employed by the state…

I haven’t seen a nerdy fan base this upset since, well, since last night, when Cornell got blasted by Kentucky.

I’m doing the walk of shame away from Cornell’s apartment

Man oh man, did Cornell look confident this week.  They posted two impressive wins to get to the Sweet Sixteen and strutted around like they knew all along it would play out this way.

The Cinderella label?  They refused it, insisting that they shouldn’t be judged by their Ivy League roots.  Heck, the Onion even did a parody of them this week, that’s how far into the nation’s sporting consciousness this group of guys had managed to insert themselves.

Everyone started loving this nerdy bunch…including me.  I saw their shots fall with ease against Temple and Wisconsin and figured what the heck, they should keep on falling against Kentucky as well.

And for a couple of minutes after the opening tip I thought the Big Red were poised to do it again.  They were up 10-2 and the Carrier Dome was rocking. Cornell faithful from all over the region had descended on Syracuse and a good time was being had by all in the House of Boeheim.

It’s at that point that Kentucky started playing a perimeter defense so stifling that Cornell couldn’t even rotate the ball around, much less get good looks.  I haven’t seen a disappearing act like the one Cornell pulled in the first half since this outfit.

UK’s Darius Miller played the role of white while Cornell’s Ryan Wittman played the rice.  In other words, Wittman was blanketed.  And his teammates weren’t faring much better.

By halftime it was 32-16 and I honestly thought the Wildcats had a shot at winning by 30.  All the fan adulation and media hype melted away for Cornell, and they looked as Ivy League as an Ivy League team can get.

They showed a little pride in cutting it to 40-34 following a Louis Dale 3-pointer.  But by that point I knew that no comeback was at hand.  To borrow a Barry Switzer term, they just got out-athleted.

When the dust settled Kentucky had won by a 62-45 count and held Cornell to a 5-for-21 shooting night from behind the arc.  That 17-point margin of defeat could have been much worse had the Wildcats not started so slowly.

Fool me once, Cornell, shame on me.  But with eight seniors on its roster, I doubt Cornell will get a chance to fool me twice…well, at least not in 2011.

Paul Hewitt is gonna up and r-u-n-n-o-f-t

If ever there’s been a hoops coach at a power conference school who could use a fresh start, it’s Paul Hewitt. Since taking Georgia Tech on that Final Four run back in 2004, he’s done…nothing.

Mark Bradley of the AJC summed it up nicely:

I’ve said it before, but here it is again: I don’t know if any other coach could have taken Tech further than Hewitt did in 2004, but I can think of three dozen who could have done better since. Tech hasn’t finished above .500 in its conference or reached the Sweet Sixteen over the past six seasons. His record over his first five seasons was 96-66; his record over the past five is 81-78.

It appears that St. John’s is the school willing to allow Hewitt to press the reset button.  According to the New York Post, the switch could come pretty quickly if some of the financials involving Hewitt’s current deal with Tech can be worked out.

Following 26 combined wins over the previous two seasons, you’d think a 23-13 record and a first round win in the NCAA Tournament (his first since 2005) this season would give the Tech fan base cause for hope.

But with Derrick Favors and Gani Lawal primed to jump early to the NBA and Iman Shumpert thinking about doing the same (Draft Express has him projected at the 26th pick if he comes out), Georgia Tech’s roster will pretty much be gutted next season.

That implosion that Ben Howland experienced at UCLA this season when the early departures caught up with him? Multiply that times ten for whoever’s coaching Tech next season.

I say it that way because it sure ain’t gonna be Hewitt.   The guy grew up in New York, was an assistant at Villanova and coached at Siena.  When things are imploding down south, why not get back to your roots?

While St. John’s is most definitely a lower tier Big East program right now, things aren’t all doom and gloom there. The team finished a game above .500 and there’s only one senior on the current roster.

Most coaches don’t get this kind of chance, to flame out at one power conference school and land at another. And since nobody realizes that more than Hewitt, I say he’s already looking for moving boxes.

Chippiness at Headband U.

There was an interesting exchange yesterday between Tennessee players Wayne Chism and J.P. Prince during their team’s 83-68 victory over Ohio in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.

With 6:15 left, Chism picked up his dribble in the Tennessee frontcourt near his bench. Prince called for the ball, but instead of passing it to him, Chism simply held it out in a “Come and get it” manner. Prince walked up and snatched the ball, and within seconds he turned it over.

At the next time out, Chism and Prince actually had words, with Chism getting so pissed off that he tore off his beloved headband on the bench. And this was all out it in the open, it was noticeable enough that announcer Bill Raftery commented on the surreal scene.

I don’t expect every player on a team to hold hands around a campfire and then make gooey smores together. But it’ll be interesting to see what kind of interactions there are in the Volunteer locker room once this team gets eliminated.

Mike Bellotti’s had enough

After less than a year on the job, Oregon AD Mike Bellotti has quit to take a broadcasting job with ESPN. The timing is a little curious when you consider the fact that the school is searching for a basketball coach to open up a new $227 million arena.

Everything was tulips and daisies for Bellotti until the football team he handed over to Chip Kelly got as lawless as a Mexican border town on Cinco de Mayo.

DUI, assault, burglary - name a crime short of murder and an Oregon Duck football player has probably committed it in the last five months. I certainly wouldn’t want to be the AD when the floodgates completely break and the team is implicated in a counterfeiting scheme or a Medicare fraud ring. At this point, I don’t put anything past these guys.

Even though finding creative ways to spend Phil Knight’s money brings a cool dimension to being Oregon’s AD, I think Bellotti’s life will be infinitely easier with the job in his rearview. No more late night calls from Kelly with questions like, “Do you know any good bail bondsmen?”

« Previous Page — Next Page »