Montgomery back in the game (kinda)

General NCS Basketball17

It’s relevant. And, its a nice diversion from the bad news train of NC State football.

Mike Montgomery’s return to college flew under the radar last week.

Personally, I thought that Wake Forest may have made move for Montgomery in the aftermath of the Skip Prosser tragedy. I am glad that they didn’t.

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General NCS Basketball

17 Responses to Montgomery back in the game (kinda)

  1. noah 09/04/2007 at 9:50 AM #

    An excellent hire. Montgomery was my choice to replace Sendek once Barnes turned us down. (The more I read about John Calipari, the happier I am that he stayed in Memphis.)

    When we replaced Les Robinson, Sendek was probably the best of a bad lot. We were, I believe, a year behind the big coaching surge. We had missed out on a big wave of coaching talent and were stuck interviewing guys like Bob Barnes.

    We were involved with much better talent this time. Montgomery, Rick Barnes, Calipari (scumbag that he is), the UNLV coach, and of course, Lowe…

  2. tractor57 09/04/2007 at 9:59 AM #

    I for one am glad WFU decided to give the current staff a chance to continue to grow. Maybe it was due to the timing of the need or maybe it is a affirmation of the Prosser approach. I wish them well in all games except those involving the Pack.
    And I like my Calimari deep fried and on my plate rather than as a basketball coach.

  3. StateFans 09/04/2007 at 10:00 AM #

    noah,

    Don’t forget Belein (a legimitately good coach but not a good fit for NC State) and, of course, STEVE LAVIN!

    As we’ve explained at length in the past – Mike Montgomery was lined up to be NC State’s Head Basketball coach IF Golden State would have fired him at the end of the NBA’s regular season. He couldn’t walk away from the approximately $5 to $10 million of guaranteed money that they were going to owe him when they fired him.

    They ultimately fired him. They just waited until it was too late. It was a smart business move by their front office.

  4. noah 09/04/2007 at 10:06 AM #

    I did forget Beilein. And I didn’t forget Lavin at all. I was mentioning the GOOD coaches we were involved with.

  5. PacknSack 09/04/2007 at 10:14 AM #

    The Lavin thing still baffles me to the point of nausea if I stop and think about him being our coach. Ugh. Where’s the Pepto?

  6. RickJ 09/04/2007 at 10:22 AM #

    “Personally, I thought that Wake Forest may have made move for Montgomery in the aftermath of the Skip Prosser tragedy. I am glad that they didn’t.”

    The Wake opening and hiring of Dino Gaudio was interesting. I really expected Wellman to buck the “easy hire” and go for someone like Montgomery. The situation was so unique that maybe he had no other choice. If Prosser had left for another job at the end of this season, it is hard to imagine Gaudio being seriously considered unless 10 other candidates turned them down. With the 3 recruits he has coming for the 2008-09 year, he actually has a good chance of getting off to a good start.

  7. EverettBeez 09/04/2007 at 11:36 AM #

    What was so frustrating to me, personally, and why I support Herb for so long was that he kept bringing in great talent. It always appeared, from here in Alabama, that we were on the cusp of breaking through – and the team did have a deep deep hole to crawl out of. I give Herb a lot of credit for what he did, but it was clear he’d taken the Pack as far as he was going to.

    Lowe sure made the most of the talent Herb brought in. Lets hope that he proves himself to be as good, if not better, recruiter then Herb. So far, things are looking pretty good.

  8. EverettBeez 09/04/2007 at 11:42 AM #

    going with the the in house guy makes sense to me considering the magnitude of the tragedy the team suffered. Coaches the guys know already has to make the transition easier – though time will tell if it will pay off on the court.

  9. RAWFS 09/04/2007 at 11:59 AM #

    I think that Wake is going to be more than fine, because it was the incumbent coaches and of course S. Prosser working with that super-duper class they have coming in. If Wake goes to another coach, especially one that hasn’t got the regional contacts up and running (we’ll assume that Montgomery has plenty of national level contacts) then they are starting over and down in the lower bowels of the league for a while.

    Wake’s fans are just as hungry for hoops success as are we IMO.

  10. StateFans 09/04/2007 at 12:19 PM #

    The Lavin thing still baffles me to the point of nausea if I stop and think about him being our coach. Ugh. Where’s the Pepto?

    This is why the posiiton of ‘give Lee Fowler credit for hiring the right guy’ drives me NUTS!!

    Had Lee Fowler had his way then Lon Kruger, John Belein and STEVE LAVIN (along with God-knows-who-else) would have been coaching NC State before Sidney Lowe. Lowe was floated as a candidate in the first week of the search and Fowler completely dismissed him out of hand until support for Lowe continued to grow from both the inside and the outside.

    This is why I don’t understand how people can “give Fowler credit” for hiring a guy that he didn’t want to hire for a job opening that he never wanted to be open!

    It’s absurd

  11. joe 09/04/2007 at 12:30 PM #

    Lowe had no degree at the time the search started and that was well known – wasn’t that a primary reason he was off the list to start? There were a few fans who said his lack of a degree didn’t matter.

    The other issue is how much was known about how close he was to getting a degree.

  12. StateFans 09/04/2007 at 12:31 PM #

    ^ That is a complete cop out. Lowe had no degree when the process ended…so, what was the difference?

  13. haze 09/04/2007 at 1:42 PM #

    ^ I agree that Fowler deserves nearly no credit for the Lowe hire. Barnes was good but, frankly, not worth the money offered. Either Calipary or Lavin would have been a disaster, albeit for different reasons. Bielein was a very good coach but to bring in a PO-derivative after Herb would have been tragic (like lynch mob tragic).

    However, it’s nonetheless true that many/most disregarded Sidney from the beginning due to the degree issue. Now, Lee should/did(?) know more but, still, it was an issue. Also, a lot of people were less than enthusiastic about hiring Sidney, at least at first. It was not a slam dunk amongst the fans like grossly overpaying for Barnes would have been. Naturally, people came around pretty quickly and Sid has us all in the boat after the PC but to candy coat Lowe into a clear and obvious solution from search week 1 seems revisionist, to say the least.

  14. noah 09/04/2007 at 2:34 PM #

    How many job offers has Lavin received since he got fired at UCLA?

    Are we it?

  15. StateFans 09/04/2007 at 2:37 PM #

    ^ Please don’t interpret my comments into thinking that Lowe was an “obvious solution from the beginning”. He certainly was not and I completely agree with all of your comments.

    But, shouldn’t Lee “I know basketball” have been smarter than the rest of us about all of that? Especially for those folks who want to say all is forgiven today just because the coach he didn’t want to hire for the job that he didn’t want to be available is turning out to be a good hire?

  16. joe 09/04/2007 at 3:06 PM #

    I think the difference is that Lowe made it known that he was very close to getting his degree which he did get shortly after being named coach.

    Now if Fowler knew from the start that Lowe was very close to having a degree but did not put him on the list then he must have had another reason to not put him on the list.

    I’m not saying this to defend Fowler , but to add some thoughts behind his thinking.

  17. Rick 09/05/2007 at 10:04 AM #

    “But, shouldn’t Lee “I know basketball” have been smarter than the rest of us about all of that”

    The only people Lee is “smarter” than ride the short bus.
    He is incompetent and stumbled into the hires.

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