On the move

When you have success people will notice, and when they notice it is most certain that opportunity will be knocking.

Last week long-time assistant Tommie Lloyd was announced as the next head basketball coach for the University of Arizona Wildcats. It was just a few years ago that Arizona was considered the best basketball program in the west. Gonzaga has taken over that spot with their many consecutive years of success both during the season as well as the NCAA tournament.

Recently Arizona fired Coach Sean Miller because of recruiting violations involving former assistant coaches. These violations weren’t initially investigated by the NCAA, but by the FBI. Arizona placed themselves on probation this year eliminating any chance to play in the postseason. Two weeks ago Arizona announced that it was parting ways with Miller. I think the biggest surprise is that Miller wasn’t fired before this season, but then I’m sure that the UA was hoping to find the right replacement and get through the uncertainty of C-19.

When the coaching vacancy was announced, longtime GU Assistant Tommie Lloyd’s name was listed as a front runner. There were several other names with ties to Arizona that may have been alumni favorites. Sitting alongside Head Coach Mark Few had a huge impact but Coach Lloyd’s ability to recruit and help develop international talent is legendary if you pay attention to those people in the know.

Coach Few has lost assistant coaches in the past. Billy Grier went to San Diego and had early success actually beating Gonzaga in the WCC championship game. He was let go several years later and San Diego is still trying to get back to those days of yore.

Grier is now an assistant at Colorado.

Leon Rice has had success at Boise State and he has definitely found a good home. His teams have competed well in the tough Mountain West Conference.

Ray Giacoletti took his success at EWU to the head job at the University of Utah, where he had early success until he was let go. He was then hired as an assistant coach at GU and was there for a few seasons and before taking over the head reins at Drake University. He resigned after a few seasons of limited success and is now an assistant at Saint Louis.

The things that these guys have in common are that they wanted to find their own niche in college basketball, and be able to recruit and develop basketball players. They wanted to develop a game plan and utilize a philosophy that they are comfortable with. I’m sure each one of these guys would have loved to do this at Gonzaga if only they were given that opportunity.

Now Tommie Lloyd will have his fingerprints on a program that needs to get its glory back and work past the scandal of violations. The question is how much of a penalty will be enforced by the NCAA and for how long.

Coach Lloyd is smart in the fact that he was selective in where he wanted to go, and not just go somewhere because some team needs a coach. Lloyd can recruit and he knows you can get kids to go to Tucson to play basketball. His biggest challenge will be winning over those people who say he doesn’t have head coaching experience. He has the experience that few if any people would ever be able to obtain on the biggest stage of college basketball the NCAA championship game, twice.

What is interesting to me is the fact that as a GU fan I was disappointed when each of these guys left for an opportunity to coach their own team. I guess you could say that I was selfish not realizing that Coach Few has the ability to find high-level coaching talent and put them to work keeping the Zags as one of the premier basketball programs in the nation.

At this point in time, both Coach Few and Coach Lloyd have some big shoes to fill. Few need to fill the seat that was occupied by Coach Lloyd, and Coach Lloyd needs to find a guy that is the next Tommie Lloyd that he can trust to do that job. Fellas, good luck!