| Subject: How Many Coaches Build Their New School Into A Power Which Beats Down Their Alma Mater? |
Author:
An Observer
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Date Posted: 23:26:17 03/25/24 Mon
In reply to:
Ed S.
's message, "Brian Earl resigns takes the William & Mary opening" on 10:20:08 03/23/24 Sat
I can think of a few, but not too many.
Others will have to refresh my memory on highly successful Ivy League head coaches who played at a different Ivy.
Brian Earl didn't just play at Princeton. He was Ivy player of the year there and is associated with the 1998 Tigers, one of the all-time great Ivy squads. He was an assistant coach at Princeton and no doubt would have loved to have been promoted before Henderson was brought in from Northwestern. Earl showed his loyalty by staying on as assistant under the new man, perhaps biding his time.
I think that there are three main categories of head coaches in the Ivy League:
(1) the kind who is happy to work at an outstanding academic institution with great kids and, if given the opportunity, will stick around for a long time through thick and thin. Think Pete Carril for mostly thick and think Frank Sullivan for mostly thin. James Jones is the current example and is also interesting in that his tenure was mostly middling for 15 years (though only once finished as low as fifth, in his first season in New Haven), but then improved to mostly thick.
(2) the kind who is more ambitious and wants to succeed at the Ivy as a springboard for greater things. Kyle Smith is the latest coach to show us how this is done.
(3) the kind who coaches at his alma mater and has all the special emotional ties which result from having once sweated and bled on that same hardwood floor. Mitch Henderson is the current example.
Then there are guys who start in one of categories (1), (2) or (3), but circumstances change:
(4) Sydney Johnson might have been a career Category (3) head coach, but Tommy Amaker's arrival at Harvard and the new era of admissions policies in Cambridge probably made Johnson re-evaluate his status. Coaching at Princeton after you played there is professionally and personally rewarding, but it's different when you're half of a Penn-Princeton duopoly versus finishing behind Harvard every year. Being paid a lot of money by Fairfield and going out on top after a championship probably made leaving his alma mater a little easier. Does anybody know what Johnson is doing today?
I can't think of any examples of men's basketball head coaches who stuck around for a long time at a different Ivy program after playing at a different Ivy. What's my point?
When guys like Craig Robinson or Brian Earl take jobs at Brown and Cornell, respectively, I'm guessing that they know the gig is not their last coaching stop, but rather a step in the right direction. They know that they are Category (2) coaches unless they get the opportunity to become a Category (3) coach.
Both Robinson and Earl improved their new programs significantly, but could you imagine them putting in the time to build Brown or Cornell into a League power and then year after year putting Princeton down?
I don't think that would be easy to do.
I know there are examples of Ivy coaches in other sports besides men's basketball. But none are coming to mind in hoops.
I'm guessing that Brian Earl knew when he took the Cornell job that either he could parlay it into the Princeton job if Henderson left or that he would take the Big Red as far as he thought he could and then look outside the League. All idle speculation based on my observation of human nature rather than any insight on the individual involved.
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