A Frontrunner, Finally

For the first time I'd put money on one specific guy versus the field: Juwan Howard. A public discussion of a search firm getting in contact is somewhat unusual:

Juwan Howard tells me #Michigan has retained Turnkey Sports for its coaching search. Howard has spoken with them and has been informed that Wolverines AD Warde Manuel is very interested in speaking with him.

— Jordan Schultz (@Schultz_Report) May 17, 2019

The stuff that is filtering out after people start doing their diligence on him is universally positive. I mean, at this point just get it done and start trying to piece together the program again. If the next names on the list are Frank Martin and Ed Cooley they come with less upside and just as much downside—a new coach in a few years.

Meanwhile, time is ticking…

Exit Yak?

The fun, it continues. Shaka Smart interviews Yaklich…

Texas coach Shaka Smart spent Thursday talking with Michigan assistant Luke Yaklich about filling the Longhorns’ current opening on the men’s basketball staff, two sources familiar with the interview said.

Yaklich, known as Michigan’s top defensive assistant on former coach John Beilein’s staff, could not be reached Thursday. He’s spent the last two seasons with the Wolverines and widely credited with engineering a defensive overhaul.

…and it's going to be tough for him to turn to a solid offer when Michigan's in a state of flux. Yaklich's son is a junior in high school and maybe they don't want to move the family. But Michigan would be advised to make something happen quickly unless they want to lose him.

[After THE JUMP: Shaka day comes and goes; the NBA to college failure semi-myth]

As the prophecy foretold

Shaka Smart panic day has come, and it's seemingly gone. From the same Yaklich article:

Smart’s name has been mentioned by some in Michigan circles as a possible candidate for the Wolverines. However, two Texas sources indicated Thursday that nothing has happened.

Quinn says Smart is "not a candidate," flat out and LaVall Jordan is "quite unlikely."

Now we get to our first fun semantics period of this coaching search. Quinn responds when asked for clarification:

1) I can't and wouldn't speak to/for something someone else reports. 2) I consider a candidate to be someone who has been contacted directly by the school or the search firm and is a viable option to be hired.

— Brendan Quinn (@BFQuinn) May 17, 2019

Sam insisted that he's a guy getting serious discussion with guys high up in the search. So did Rivals. Both things can be true: Shaka is being seriously discussed but the trigger has not been pulled on any sort of approach. At this point that would seemingly put him behind in the pecking order. The fact that Howard is an assistant and Smart is a head coach does complicate that calculus significantly—people get way less mad about assistants interviewing elsewhere.

Juwan Howard isn't NBA player X who did a bad job

One of the complaints about hiring Juwan Howard is the generally dismal record of NBA stars who jump to college head coaching gigs. I'm not here to dismiss that concern. It is a bit ominous. But I would like to turn the volume on it down a bit. Many of the guys cited had absolutely no track record as a coach or were stuck in situations where it's tough to dig out. A brief survey:

N/A

Donyell Marshall and Damon Stoudemire spent most of their coaching careers as college assistants and don't really apply to this conversation. The jury remains out on Patrick Ewing.

NO EXPERIENCE AT ALL

Chris Mullin at St Johns and Clyde Drexler at Houston had never held a coaching job of any description before getting head coaching gigs at their alma maters. Both bombed out, though you could argue that Mullin's one play-in bid in four years isn't far off from St John's recent norm. They had just two bids in the decade preceding Mullin's hire. Isiah Thomas had a brief and hilarious tenure at FIU and given all his other issues should be held in a separate category of total galoot.

BAD EXPERIENCE

Terry Porter is the coach at Portland. Mike Dunleavy is at Tulane. Reggie Theus had a good year at New Mexico State in 2007, jumped to the NBA, and then wandered back to a Cal State Northridge program that had managed two 15 seeds since 2000.

None of these guys had success. All had tenures as an NBA head coach that went badly. Porter lasted two season in Milwaukee and then got fired 51 games into a single season in Phoenix. Dunleavy was coming off a Clippers tenure in which he made the playoffs once; he has a 46% career winning percentage. Theus lasted barely more than a season in Sacramento. All three got fired midway through the year.

The only guy to have any period of success was Dunleavy, who had a few solid years in Portland, and that was 15 years past when Tulane pulled him off the scrap heap. He had not coached for six years prior to that hire.

OKAY YEAH NOT GREAT

Mark Price got the UNC Charlotte job; they had taken a major step back from their aughts heyday under Bobby Lutz when Alan Major's five-year tenure resulted in no bids and no teams better than 129th in Kenpom. Price was gone after two losing years and appears to have cratered the roster. Charlotte's finished 308th and 297th in Kenpom the last two years, which is by far their Kenpom-era nadir.

Danny Manning had a two year tenure at Tulsa that ended with a 13-3 CUSA season and a bid; this got him the Wake Forest job, where he's had one play-in bid and four horrendous seasons.

FINE OR BETTER

Avery Johnson just got fired after four years at Alabama in which he had between 18 and 20 wins and between 15 and 16 losses every year. Three NIT bids; he got to the second round of the tourney once. This is more or less exactly what his predecessor did.

Dan Majerle is doing a solid job at Grand Canyon, a program that did not exist before his tenure.

Fred Hoiberg was an unqualified success at Iowa State. Eric Musselman was mostly an NBA guy before three years as a college assistant.

So?

Hiring coaches is always a crapshoot but the problem with NBA to college transitions is not inexperience with college but the fact that the coaches in question aren't any good. Three of the above listed never coached before or after their disastrous tenures; three more had been out of coaching for years after lots of poor results before being revived.

Hiring Howard would be a risk, and the NBA to college transition is part of it. But he's not your average NBA-to-college transitioner. Those guys are usually crazy fliers, retreads, or established mediocrities. Howard is none of those.