Chick Ludwig covers the Cincinnati Bengals. He also writes about his other passions: college football, basketball and golf.Home > Blogs > Chick Ludwig At Large > Archives > 2008 > March > 17 > Entry
THE most overrated & underrated college coaches
The Chickster’s Top 10 Most Overrated College Basketball Coaches
- Mike Krzyzewski, Duke (Should’ve won more than 2 NCAA titles with all the talent he had; can’t win the big one now).
- Gary Williams, Maryland (Ohio taxpayers are still paying off his telephone bill from all the calls he made while at Ohio State).
- Pat Knight, Texas Tech (Couldn’t coach his way out of a cornflake box; got the job with zero head coaching experience).
- Steve Alford, New Mexico (Snazzy dresser; has great hair; but couldn’t win consistently at Iowa, and is struggling to elevate the Lobos).
- Tommy Amaker, Harvard (From the head coach at Michigan to the head coach at Harvard, his career is going into the dumper).
- Tom Penders, Houston (Tufts, Columbia, Fordham, Rhode Island, Texas, GW and Houston; this guy is as bad as Larry Brown).
- Mike Davis, UAB (After a rocky tenure at Indiana, he got outta Dodge and returned home, where he can coach in obscurity).
- Brian Gregory, Dayton (Came in with the reputation for being a great recruiter, but hasn’t been able to conquer rival Xavier).
- John Pelphrey, Arkansas (The Razorbacks fired a good coach in Stan Heath in favor of a young, unproven ex-UK Wildcat).
- John Thompson III, Georgetown (The 2007 NABC Coach of the Year should unleash his thoroughbreds instead of putting fans to sleep).
The Chickster’s Top 10 Most Underrated College Basketball Coaches
- Jim Christian, Kent State (Best coach in the nation you’ve never heard of; Golden Flashes have won 20 games 10 straight seasons).
- Oliver Purnell, Clemson (Turned around one of the worst programs in the land; the up-tempo Tigers now have plenty of bite).
- Homer Drew, Valparaiso (People skills are tremendous; so is his motivational ability; Valpo’s presence has elevated the Horizon League).
- Brad Stevens, Butler (Looks like a student manager on the sidelines, but is smart, savvy and extremely cool in the heat of battle).
- Jim Larranaga, George Mason (Still enthusiastic after all these years; he knows how to keep his team loose under pressure).
- Anthony Grant, VCU (The next coach of the Dayton Flyers learned his craft at the foot of the master in Dayton, Don Donoher).
- Brad Brownell, Wright State (Does more with less than any coach in the nation; has a team-oriented system in place that works).
- Matt Painter, Purdue (A Muncie native, Painter played for Gene Keady at Purdue; now he has Mackey Arena rockin’; “Boiler Up!”).
- Tony Bennett, Washington State (Played for his papa, Dick, at UW-Green Bay, and instilled that Phoenix toughness in the Cougars).
- Ron “Fang” Mitchell, Coppin State (Has been around for what seems like forever, and keeps cranking out competitive clubs).
DEFENDING ‘COACH K’
From Jim Reynolds, Beavercreek, Ohio: “Your ‘hope’ in this morning’s paper regarding Coach K is probably one of the most ill-informed (I almost said “dumbest”) comments I’ve read by a sports reporter in my 72 years on this earth. No doubt this year’s team is lacking in several areas, and they live or die with the three-pointers, but they won 27 games including a win over top ranked UNC. Does the coach not get some credit for this? Coach K will most likely win over 1,000 games before he’s through. Not even ‘the legendary’ Bobby Knight won that many. Cut Coach K a little slack. One season does not a legend make.”
LUDWIG, SCHLEMMER LIVE & UNLEASHED!
I can hear Dick Enberg shout, “Oh, My!” Because the Chickster will join host Mark Schlemmer live, in studio, on Dayton’s WONE-AM (980) radio tonight (March 17) from 6-8 p.m. Turn on, tune in and let us inform, entertain and persuade you … “and we’ll have a real good time, yes sir. We’ll have a real good time!”
RIGHT STATE, WRONG TEAM
Guess who’s coming to dinner at University of Dayton Arena on Wednesday night for a matchup with the Flyers in the first round of the NIT?
The Cleveland State Vikings of the Horizon League … not the Wright State Raiders.
I knew, just knew, that Wright State’s home loss to Cleveland State was the killer game in the regular season. It cost WSU the No. 2 seed in the HL tournament and an automatic berth in the tourney semifinals.
What baffles me is the fact that Wright State athletics director Mike Cusack has East Coast/New York City ties, yet the NIT continues to dismiss the Raiders.
If the suits in Manhattan are going to continue to dump on WSU, at the very least they should toss ‘em some toilet paper.
A ‘CHICKSTER’ SHOUT OUT …
—-To Doug Franklin, President & CEO, Cox Ohio Publishing. He’s headed to West Palm Beach, Fla., where new challenges await. All the best, Doug!
—-To Frank Lickliter II, who pocketed a cool $84,100 for his T-17 finish (69-71-68-70—278 (-2) at the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill. The Wright State Hall of Famer from Franklin climbed to 85th on the PGA Tour money list at $225,733. Now THAT’S more like it!
—-To all the studs I met on a recent night at Xavier University’s Cintas Center: Hep Cronin, UC head hoops coach Mick Cronin’s dad who enters his 27th year as an Atlanta Braves scout; Bob “Hambone” Grote, Wright State hoops and baseball All-America and father of WSU’s Scott Grote; Lee Day, baseball coach at Lebanon High School and fine prep basketball ref; Zach Wells, who does an outstanding job as a sportscaster for FOX19 in the ‘Nati; and the immortal Kevin “Corporal” Boyle, my Ohio State Evans Scholar “brother,” who continues to live large at Losantiville Country Club.
—-To “Touchdown Troy” Richards in Hillsboro, a passionate Bengals fan whose grandmother died last week, Troy may be confined to a wheelchair, but his spirit and enthusiasm motivates me. See ya at training camp, my good friend.
—-To all my “homies” at the Rapid Run Carry Out on Cincy’s west side. I only wish they’d sell me a winning Lottery ticket one of these days.
email cludwig@daytondailynews.com
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: College hoops
Comments
By Matt
March 17, 2008 8:10 PM | Link to this
It takes a while to recruit your own players. It looks like Chris Wright could be an NBA-propsect. More local talent is signing to play at Dayton. Re: Xavier. Maybe Xavier is just a better team right now? I’d much rather Dayton make postseason play then beat Xavier and finish 14-16. I hope Gregory gets another couple years to see what his core of players can accomplish.By null
March 17, 2008 9:47 PM | Link to this
I presume that you were just going for getting a reaction from your readers by putting in the Coach K comment. Leaving apart the factual error of him only winning two national championships(he’s won three), by what measure is someone overrated if he has taken Duke to ten Final Fours in his years of coaching? How many wins does a coach need to have in his career to measure up to your determination of his worthiness? How many ACC championships must he collect before some people would say that he has reached a successful amount? I have no idea who you think has been successful in their profession, but I do think that if you are putting him in comparisons with the all-time greats that have ever coached, it is reasonable to assume that he probably isn’t overrated. John Wooden is in a class by himself, but Coach K certainly has the credentials to compare with others, including Dean Smith, Bob Knight, Jim Calhoun, Rick Pitino, Tubby Smith over the last twenty to twenty-five years. I, probably like you, get really tired of Dick Vitale and Mike Patrick of ESPN telling us fifty times a game how Duke does “things the right way” and on and on. But a coach that has won or shared the championship title of one of the tougher conferences in basketball fourteen times can’t be considered overrated, It is just too difficult to do to not get reasonable credit for his success.By D8Nken
March 20, 2008 2:00 PM | Link to this
Brian Gregory does not belong on your list of overrated coaches. To be overrated would mean that he is considered to be a good coach and I don’t know anyone that thinks he is. I think most everyone has BG pegged correctly as decent recruiter but lousy coach whose players don’t get any better. Noone outside Dayton even knows who he despite his constant efforts to bring attention to himself.