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Jim Whitesell - UB's New Head Coach


Kevin

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Happy with the hire. Irate with the process. The optics of this make UB look amateur. If you were sold on Whitesell, why involve a search firm and make a big deal about casting a wide net? You had him here for four years. His support from the players didn’t magically increase over the past 10 days.

Even if, as DC suggests, ADMA did his due diligence and had an epiphany, that initial hesitation may ultimately cost us an entire recruiting class. Outside candidates who applied can’t be happy with the process, and likely feel as though they wasted their time and energy in interviewing. And peering from above this certainly looks like we settled for an internal candidate after being rebuffed by the outside options. One would think this weakens Whitesell in finding assistant coaches and in re-recruiting our own players and recommits as opposed to naming him decisively from the outset.

Ultimately I like the hire and will support Whitesell. I still have hope we’ll maintain the core, find some bugs, and compete for a MAC title next year. I have lost all confidence in Mark Alnutt, however, and feel embarassed by the entire process as an alum (x2). Unless we hear of mitigating factors I think that MA’s job should be in jeopardy over his handling of the past two weeks.

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22 minutes ago, McBulls said:

Outside candidates who applied can’t be happy with the process, and likely feel as though they wasted their time and energy in interviewing.

It is never a waste of time to interview.  Every interview helps you for the next interview.

Edited by BrooklynBull
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7 hours ago, Tee4three said:

I wonder if one of the reasons for the length of this process was about keeping hodgson on staff somehow. Maybe just weird timing but hodgson releases his goodbye to buffalo right before whitesell is named head coach

I think there were more legal implications with the vacation to  Florida BH took then anything else.  

There could of been the only way to keep players from transfering.

Whitesell may of put some pressure on the school as well. The risk of him leaving and having a final four coach say no might of been to great.

 

There are too many reasons . Hopefully there is some kind of story explaining all this

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24 minutes ago, BrooklynBull said:

It is never a waste of time to interview.  Every interview helps you for the next interview.

Yes if you’re the person being interviewed. If you’re doing the interviewing, hire a search firm and spend 2 weeks only to circle back to an in house candidate it makes UB look cheap, indecisive and under cuts Whitesell. We look like we settled. 

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2 hours ago, dutchcountry7 said:

Whitesell has kept the team together. You would normally hear of transfers in this situation. He has the support of the players. It is possible he was a key part of the success and the players recognize it. 

I like the hire.  

He is only person from the old staff that was actually committed to the players and focused on them. 

Kept the team together? There wasn’t much of a team to keep together. Next years success was dependent on the incoming recruiting class, especially the JUCOS, and Whitesell lost every single one of them.

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1 hour ago, 121Merrimac said:

Who are the assistant / recruiting coaches that JW has worked with in the past?  Might any of those old coworkers want this new job? 

I'd have to imagine Hodgson was offered Associate Head Coach, had his salary boosted and more responsibility.

He clearly picked Alabama

UB should spend as much as needed to get an associate HC/lead recruiter

Keep Coach Q in seat number 2 up from seat 3, and find a new 3rd assistant. 

Edited by Kevin
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2 minutes ago, dk2414 said:

Kept the team together? There wasn’t much of a team to keep together. Next years success was dependent on the incoming recruiting class, especially the JUCOS, and Whitesell lost every single one of them.

Our 2 highest rated recruits ever, Jordan, Graves, and 2 high talent transfers. Other than that, yeah not much.

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7 minutes ago, dk2414 said:

Kept the team together? There wasn’t much of a team to keep together. Next years success was dependent on the incoming recruiting class, especially the JUCOS, and Whitesell lost every single one of them.

I’m going to respectfully disagree. Sure we lost the entire incoming recruiting class but we still have a championship foundation. 

We need growth and development more than ever from Segu and Williams. Another year with Jordan. Two more years with Graves. And two senior transfers itching to play. No doubt we need more players and some front court help but recruiting is just beginning. 

UB: we’re still here!

Edited by DooleyBull06
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2 hours ago, Tee4three said:

I'm kinda shocked he didnt get paid more. His resume is solid. His last head coach job was his first coaching job in division 1. Since then he has coached with steve lavin, rick Majerus and nate oats

Hopefully they are putting the money saved to good use

It’s possible they are beefing up the assistant coaching salaries. If he can land some great assistants he could put together some great teams. 

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2 minutes ago, dutchcountry7 said:

It’s possible they are beefing up the assistant coaching salaries. If he can land some great assistants he could put together some great teams. 

I hope that’s the case, a lot of work to be done this summer 

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3 hours ago, dutchcountry7 said:

That’s what @dk2414 says isn’t much. 

And we know he knows his stuff because he has made four posts to this board...

I dont want to jump on him. A ton of new people have signed up over the last couple days and have said things that just boggle my mind.

This being one of them. We didn't lose any of our current players so far which is a fantastic roster including many highly rated recruits. We literally lost the expected thing, the incoming recruits...

Im very happy about this outcome if nothing changes with the current roster. Its all about filling the extra spots, JUCOs, next recruits etc.

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Honestly was expecting Whitsells salary to be between 250-350k. I wasn't expecting 500k or anything like that. Im not sure we needed to pay JW extra money just for the sake of optics. I think the bigger names we were after were going to cost well over 500k, but JW could be had for much less.

With the money saved i was thinking something similar to dutch, the possibility of beefing up the AC staff with the extra saved money. Or better yet, the practice facility for long term growth.

 

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4 hours ago, 961819 said:

I’m fine with the hire as long as we keep Quarles who apparently was our offensive mind along with Oats, and run the same tempo of offense.

If Coach Q was in fact part of the offense then Im all for him being #2. Next most important thing is to keep the play style similar with the roster we have. Add a solid recruiter and things could shape up nicely.

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In one of my early posts on  this topic I wrote that "though I don't believe he may want the position, JW should gain the title HC as IMO he has been the "Power behind the Throne". Personally I've known him since 2004 and my son's Butler days and when my son apprenticed in the NCAA office for the Horizon League my son spoke highly of him in meetings of JW's basketball foresight. Bridget Niland (former AD at Daemen, currently at the Community Foundation of Greater Buffalo) happened to work at that NCAA office at the same time. I also stated I have personal knowledge of Coach on the recruiting path as I'm involved heavily in high school hoops and he has been the one to offer at least 2 I'm acquainted with still on UB's radar. Those who read another post where I wrote contradicting Oats' claim that BH put the team together now have learned that Coach JW brought in CJM. Now I have to disagree with those objecting to the hiring of a search firm and the results. Though the optics may not look it, Coach JW most likely checked more boxes on thje search firms forms than anyone else. HC experience, recruiting experience, hiring experience, continuity, maintaining players and recruits, temperament, local area knowledge, MAC area knowledge, etc., etc., etc. I also think the big difference will be developing 4 year players and not 2 year JUCOs. 

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1 hour ago, ButlerAlumDad said:

In one of my early posts on  this topic I wrote that "though I don't believe he may want the position, JW should gain the title HC as IMO he has been the "Power behind the Throne". Personally I've known him since 2004 and my son's Butler days and when my son apprenticed in the NCAA office for the Horizon League my son spoke highly of him in meetings of JW's basketball foresight. Bridget Niland (former AD at Daemen, currently at the Community Foundation of Greater Buffalo) happened to work at that NCAA office at the same time. I also stated I have personal knowledge of Coach on the recruiting path as I'm involved heavily in high school hoops and he has been the one to offer at least 2 I'm acquainted with still on UB's radar. Those who read another post where I wrote contradicting Oats' claim that BH put the team together now have learned that Coach JW brought in CJM. Now I have to disagree with those objecting to the hiring of a search firm and the results. Though the optics may not look it, Coach JW most likely checked more boxes on thje search firms forms than anyone else. HC experience, recruiting experience, hiring experience, continuity, maintaining players and recruits, temperament, local area knowledge, MAC area knowledge, etc., etc., etc. I also think the big difference will be developing 4 year players and not 2 year JUCOs. 

If JW is the guy, that's fine. My beef is with the delay in hiring him. It's hard to argue he was your guy when you spent a week chasing other candidates. It just looks bad and the uncertainty might have led to a few recruits de-committing.

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6 minutes ago, promotherobot said:

If JW is the guy, that's fine. My beef is with the delay in hiring him. It's hard to argue he was your guy when you spent a week chasing other candidates. It just looks bad and the uncertainty might have led to a few recruits de-committing.

It does look bad, I don’t think anyone will argue that. I’m hoping it went like this though:

- alnutt does due diligence, no stone unturned etc 

- candidates that declines were high level, guys that UB was reaching for and not likely to get 

- of the candidates we were choosing between, Whitesell ended up offering the best opportunity for continuing the success we’ve had. 

Nothing wrong with searching for the best guy for this team and having it end up being a current assistant. More than anything it just looks bad. 

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