I give the Woodson hire a C-
He’s a well respected NBA guy. Which I think is good. Assuming he knows how to parlay all of those connections into an “NBA prep” atmosphere, it’ll be a big deal in Bloomington.
He’s an IU guy. I don’t really think that, in and of itself, is positive or negative. It becomes a big positive if he wins, and then if he brings all the boys home. But that only works if he wins.
On the bad/questionable side...he’s never coached in college before. The college game has changed a recently, but it’s still very different than the NBA.
He’s also 63. I don’t really worry about his age as much as others are. As I think the next 4-5 years are critical, and more important than us landing a younger guy that could have coached for a decade or two. His job is just to reestablish IU as a B10 contender again. It didn’t need to be a guy that will have his name on the court someday. But, any time you have qualified guys out there like Beard, Oats, Drew, etc... that are much younger. The age card will always be scrutinized.
I give the decision to get rid of Archie now, and then however it came to be that someone paid for it...an A-
Very risky move by Dolson. Shows me he truly does care deeply about IUs flagship program. And that has carried a lot of weight with me with this whole process.
And the fact that we have people out there still that are willing to stroke that kind of check...tells me we’re still a big time program. No one at Minnesota or Iowa State was going to be footing 10 million to change their basketball coaching situation.
I give the Matta hire an A+... Woodson is going to need some guidance on the college game. Matta has deep and varying experiences, all very successful, on how to succeed in college. Small, medium, and big schools. Recruiting top 10 type kids. Changing your program philosophies when said too 10 kids move on, and you have a new crop of kids to coach. At worst, he’s there to help guide Woodsons program. At best, he gets healthy enough in the next few years to take over when Woodson is ready to be done.
Overall grade...B
There are probably better Head Coaches out there we could have gotten. But there are guys that I’m convinced would be worse. Moser as an example. But I’m excited about the mindset and “Give a $hit” that Dolson and others have shown. And thinking out of the box a little bit. He could have puked out the same decision that Glass made with Archie, and just hired Moser. Who likely wouldn’t have wanted Mattas help. And wouldn’t have had any immediate success. This way, you have an experienced NBA guy as the face. And an experienced college guy helping behind the scenes.
He’s a well respected NBA guy. Which I think is good. Assuming he knows how to parlay all of those connections into an “NBA prep” atmosphere, it’ll be a big deal in Bloomington.
He’s an IU guy. I don’t really think that, in and of itself, is positive or negative. It becomes a big positive if he wins, and then if he brings all the boys home. But that only works if he wins.
On the bad/questionable side...he’s never coached in college before. The college game has changed a recently, but it’s still very different than the NBA.
He’s also 63. I don’t really worry about his age as much as others are. As I think the next 4-5 years are critical, and more important than us landing a younger guy that could have coached for a decade or two. His job is just to reestablish IU as a B10 contender again. It didn’t need to be a guy that will have his name on the court someday. But, any time you have qualified guys out there like Beard, Oats, Drew, etc... that are much younger. The age card will always be scrutinized.
I give the decision to get rid of Archie now, and then however it came to be that someone paid for it...an A-
Very risky move by Dolson. Shows me he truly does care deeply about IUs flagship program. And that has carried a lot of weight with me with this whole process.
And the fact that we have people out there still that are willing to stroke that kind of check...tells me we’re still a big time program. No one at Minnesota or Iowa State was going to be footing 10 million to change their basketball coaching situation.
I give the Matta hire an A+... Woodson is going to need some guidance on the college game. Matta has deep and varying experiences, all very successful, on how to succeed in college. Small, medium, and big schools. Recruiting top 10 type kids. Changing your program philosophies when said too 10 kids move on, and you have a new crop of kids to coach. At worst, he’s there to help guide Woodsons program. At best, he gets healthy enough in the next few years to take over when Woodson is ready to be done.
Overall grade...B
There are probably better Head Coaches out there we could have gotten. But there are guys that I’m convinced would be worse. Moser as an example. But I’m excited about the mindset and “Give a $hit” that Dolson and others have shown. And thinking out of the box a little bit. He could have puked out the same decision that Glass made with Archie, and just hired Moser. Who likely wouldn’t have wanted Mattas help. And wouldn’t have had any immediate success. This way, you have an experienced NBA guy as the face. And an experienced college guy helping behind the scenes.
