Mike White, Florida head coach. Did not see that coming!
Georgia basketball hires…..
- Thread starter Gamecockben1979
- Start date
Wow! That’s a shocker. Maybe he thought (like Shaka did at Texas) that the axe was going to fall in the near future, maybe next year?, so he headed for greener pastures.
I agree with everything you said, till the last segment. Greener pastures ? Georgia ?
UGA MBB is a graveyard.
It’s called resetting the clock. Going from the hot seat to the 5 year plan. Frank is trying to do the same thing as we speak.
White is bailing while he can. Sort of like USC hiring Muschamp. Both he, and White, proved they couldn't win at a better setting at Florida. But yet USC and UGA think they will be a hit at a place that is harder to win. Stupid hire by Georgia.
You're right. White was slowly getting worse at a school with everything needed to win - even a recent championship history. It's just like the Muschamp to USC move. Baffles the mind a bit.
I guess they are thinking that if White could just recreate what he did at UF (getting to the tourney multiple times), then he'd be a slam dunk at UGA. But he did't build UF to that point, he inherited it and made it worse. There's no evidence that he could build an SEC program - quite the opposite actually.
How is this a bad hire? You looked at UGA basketball? Crean looked like a can't miss hire. Won two Big 10 titles with Indiana and took Marquette to a final four. Look at how it ended in Athens. That might suggest to other proven coaches that it ain't easy to recruit and win there. What successful coach do people think UGA was going to go out and get? White took over a Florida team coming off a losing record. Four of his UF teams were in the tournament, one reaching the Elite 8. Yeah, we'd take that in Athens.
Sure they had a losing record the season before White took over (16-17), but two years prior to that they were in the Final 4 and prior to that 3-straight Elite 8's. White took over a juggernaut, and wasn't terrible - but they got worse and worse the further away they got from Billy Donovan's teams. (To the point where he was going to get fired next season without a good run.)
But at UGA he isn't taking over one of the top 2 programs in the SEC, he's taking over the bottom-feeder. He's shown he isn't a guy that can keep a program at top of the conference, perhaps he can pull a program up from the bottom? But there's nothing that would support that at the moment.
Interesting to get a Dawg fans perspective. I don’t think White is a bad coach and a change of scenery could re energize him. People forget that prior to Billy Donovan, Florida basketball was a dumpster fire. It’s not like Florida basketball is anything like football resource wise.
If he can recruit Georgia he can be a solid hire. Problem is very few coaches have been able to do that successfully. Georgia basketball has been a strange case study with all the prospects in the area, but few to none choosing to stay home.
People can talk of Billy Donovan all they want. My point is UGA isn't going to get a Billy Donovan. Why would a Billy Donovan-level coach (whomever that is) take a gig in Athens when UGA just fired a guy with a pretty good track record of past success, who also recruited well, and it all still went to hell. I'm not suggesting White is the only guy or even THE guy. I just don't know who people think the AD at UGA is going to get.
To your point about recruiting, it's a bit perplexing given the location and resources UGA hasn't been more successful. I don't think Dawg fans expect to be KY, but it would be nice to make the tourney every few years.
They did go to a Final Four under Kruger three years prior to Donovan, but Donovan made their history - he was there for two decades. They're a solid basketball school now. The prior 22 years to White (Donovan and Kruger) they went to 5 Final Fours and won it all twice.
And Florida is like Bama and other schools with more money than they know what to do with and so they support basketball with all they've got.
I think White was a good hire. Only time will tell. Hugh Durham had success at Georgia. Maybe Coach White can find another Dominique.
