Winning the Press Conference

Coaching Carousel Debbie Yow NCS Basketball95

As the Internet continues to grind out speculation regarding the the coaching vacancy in the Wolfpack men’s basketball program, the now legendary thread on the StateFans Nation forums got me to thinking; what really drives this collective desire to find out any information on who the next coach might be? Why would hiring Rick Barnes/Billy Donovan/Sean Miller excite a larger percentage of the fan base than hiring Shaka Smart or Gregg Marshall? As we pointed out last week, truly educated opinions on coaches are few and far between, it’s primarily a perception game that drives fan excitement.

And then it hit me.  The press conference to announce the new hire is the program’s first “win” under new leadership. Let’s just say that Debbie Yow rolls up to the podium with Billy Donovan in hand in a few days. The press will go nuts, the coverage will be national and the admins at StateFans Nation will probably have to get even more powerful servers to handle all the traffic. We’ll all stroll into work the next day with our chest stuck out and that Tarhole who works for you will have to grudgingly concede that little ‘ol NC State pulled off a big hire.

Under that scenario, we haven’t won the first game yet, but we have won the press conference and fired a strong first shot in the perception war. The payoff is immediate and it would feel really good to get that first win.

Contrast that with the announcement that we hired Shaka Smart/Gregg Marshall/insert mid-major here. I’d be pleased and not disappointed in the least.  However, in terms of fan excitement, we’d all have a very hopeful wait and see attitude. We wouldn’t get the immediate payoff of winning the press conference.

The irony is that winning the press conference is certainly no guarantee of restoring Wolfpack basketball to its previous greatness. It would will be nice to win the press conference, but there are much bigger fish to fry.

 

 

 

About SMD

SMD graduated from NC State at a time when beating UNC-CH in both major revenue sports was a regular occurrence. This was well before a time when I could express my frustrated attempts at being a writer on the "internets." When I'm not talking about the Pack, I'm probably arguing politics.

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95 Responses to Winning the Press Conference

  1. JSRy2k 04/04/2011 at 2:22 PM #

    Alternative viewpoint on big-name hire:
    An established name will come with more demands (rightfully so), and his contract terms will therefore take longer to hammer out.

    @nav – There is no curse. The ’04 Red Sox won the World Series because they didn’t believe in ‘the curse’, and the Wolfpack will return to glory because we will rise above such self-fulfilling prophecies and instead see the possibilities. Our leadership (Chancellor Woodson, AD Debbie Yow) is already there, so why don’t we join them?

  2. boonami 04/04/2011 at 2:23 PM #

    this is bad when the ECU fans at my office are telling me that we could try and get their coach.

  3. BJD95 04/04/2011 at 2:31 PM #

    He who laughs last, laughs best.

  4. Bowlpack 04/04/2011 at 2:36 PM #

    The sky is not falling. Seriously, some of you guys/gals really need to get a grip and stop being so irrational. You hear or read a few pieces of relatively unsubstantiated news good or bad and freak the ef out in accordance. I for one will remain positive until given a fact based reason that might cause me to behave otherwise.

  5. Tampa-Pack 04/04/2011 at 2:40 PM #

    I have placed what remains of my faith in this situation in Yow’s hands, along with the SFN staff. When BJD or others say its time to panic, then I will. Until then, I’ll go with the fact that they likely have some information that is unknown to the media at this time. Go PACK!

  6. NCSU84 04/04/2011 at 2:42 PM #

    You have to forgive us Bowlpack. Some of us sat through the Lee Fowler matinee – we have seen this movie before and we know how it ends.

  7. tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc 04/04/2011 at 2:47 PM #

    The sky isn’t falling? A three week search has given us a public rejection from a mid-major coach.

    Once again, I’ll support just about anyone but the Nike money and a sold out RBC are more than likely gone. I could be wrong but I don’t see the silver lining with a Smart rejection.

    If Cronin is announcing that he is staying, it looks like Marshall or someone else will soon be announced.

  8. boonami 04/04/2011 at 3:10 PM #

    we all hope BJD is right and Yow has a ace up her sleeve that will silence everyone. What I don’t like is that all the FUD out there isn’t good for the program. tough to watch while we wait….

  9. Rochester 04/04/2011 at 3:15 PM #

    I’ve lost 35 pounds so far. The stress is killing me.

  10. nav 04/04/2011 at 3:17 PM #

    So who is laughing harder now: Lee Fowler or Gary Williams.

  11. tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc 04/04/2011 at 3:19 PM #

    Apparently DY has been consulting with Sidney Lowe concerning Lowe’s replacement. After a 4 week search the two agreed that Lowe is the best man to replace Lowe. DY said that she thinks his 5 years as a head coach at State will serve him well in his new role as head coach at NC State.

    State has offered Lowe a 6 year deal worth $18 million and a $1 million dollar signing bonus. Along with his buyout, Lowe will make $5 million this year as NC State’s new head coach.

  12. RememberV 04/04/2011 at 4:03 PM #

    highstick Says:
    April 4th, 2011 at 1:44 pm

    Dang, we sure have a lot of stupid fans! None of which should ever be close to serving on a search committee for a coach!

    I couldn’t agree more, this “Sky is falling” crowd is making me sick, not a single one of you have a clue what is going on, no one outside of DY inner circle does either. It is true that SS is not coming to State, but that does not mean that DY made a offer and got turned down.

    Stop freaking out like a bunch of teenage girls and let DY do her thing. Wait until we have a new coach, then you can wet yourselves.

  13. SMD 04/04/2011 at 4:06 PM #

    Boy, there’s nothing like a so-called bombshell of a news story to kill a blog post that was meant to be thought provoking. 🙂

    Reading the comments on this thread proves the point of the column exactly – we (the collective we) are living and dying by every tweet because in the short run, the only win available to us is the press conference.

    And like BJD has indicated, I don’t think you can judge whether this hire will win the press conference until it’s announced. Whether we win the press conference or not, we really won’t know how good the hire is until probably about the middle of February next year. We’ll know how good we “perceive” the hire to be. But like I’ve said a thousand times – Donovan doesn’t guarantee glory and some mid-major doesn’t guarantee more of the same.

    I’ll grant you that this suspense is killing me because I want to know, but let’s climb down from the ledge of judgements on a coaching search that we know very little about.

    Breathe deep people. If we win the press conference, enjoy that for a few days and them come back to earth. If not, there’s no need to hide the sharp objects, remain cautiously optimistic and let’s see what happens.

  14. wolfonthehill 04/04/2011 at 4:31 PM #

    Given that Cronin, Smart, AND Marshall are all apparently announcing today that they’re staying, I’m suddenly far more in the “we got a bigger fish” category. Otherwise, Smart turns us down, we move on to Marshall… then to Cronin… and it’s sequential.

    I’m thinking we got our man… and we let these guys know we got our man… and we’re going to let them show their schools some loyalty by announcing they’re staying – BEFORE we announce our hire. They win… then we win.

    I just can’t fathom that we’re dropping below Cronin/Marshall… and it’s either that or home run. So I’m going home run.

  15. PackerInRussia 04/04/2011 at 4:50 PM #

    tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc, maybe it’s just cuz it’s late here and I can’t sleep, but I got a big laugh out of the “Lowe announcement”

  16. Bowlpack 04/04/2011 at 5:11 PM #

    The reason that you’re hearing about coaches staying put in relation to the NC State job is that we made a hire today. That is the word on the street. Presser/Announcement on Wednesday most likely.

    No idea whether it is a big fish or little fish, but we have something on the line. The optimist in me says that we’re going to need a bigger boat.

  17. tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc 04/04/2011 at 5:57 PM #

    “I couldn’t agree more, this “Sky is falling” crowd is making me sick, not a single one of you have a clue what is going on”

    I know well run coaching searches don’t end up with 2 mid-major coaches rejecting offers with the stories appearing all over the internets. True or not the perception is sealed.

    The only way that could of happened the way Yow wanted it to happen if she immediately announced her press conference. At last check that hasn’t happened yet.

  18. roandaddy 04/04/2011 at 6:41 PM #

    Big Name = Big Success (see Spurrier at USC – talk about Mission Impossible)

    You will have to forgive my short fuse on this.. but why are other schools hiring like crazy (ala Missouri) and we are stuck waiting? No need to repeat last time, but the longer the wait, the bigger the payoff. Otherwise we look like the bridegroom stuck at the alter.

  19. bradleyb123 04/04/2011 at 7:33 PM #

    How do you know we don’t already have our guy, roandaddy?

  20. roandaddy 04/04/2011 at 9:07 PM #

    The lack of press conference is my first clue??

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