As someone who grew up watching ACC basketball, it is hard to watch the league struggle to get respect as it has in recent years. This year has started off very poorly, and as I said before once you get into conference play there aren't many opportunities to prove that your conference is strong. So that begs the question: why is the ACC so down? One of the more popular theories is that there has been a lot of coaching turnover. So I want to take a look at the teams that have replaced their coaches in the last two years.
Before I start, I acknowledge that for some of these coaches there really isn't a very large sample size. They haven't had a chance to prove themselves. Plus, coaching isn't everything. Wins and losses are also determined by talent, injuries, schedule, etc. But let's see how these teams shake up.
BC replaced Al Skinner before the 2010-2011 season with Steve Donahue. Here's how Skinner did in his last two seasons compared with Donahue's current tenure:
Al Skinner - 37-28 (15-17 ACC) *NCAA bid in 2008-2009
Steve Donahue - 23-20 (9-7 ACC)
Clemson
Oliver Purnell bolted for DePaul after the 2009-2010 season, replaced by Brad Brownell. Here are their numbers:
Oliver Purnell - 44-20 (18-14 ACC) *NCAA bid in both seasons
Brad Brownell - 26-16 (9-7 ACC) *NCAA bid in 2010-2011
As an added number, Purnell in his stint at DePaul is 13-27.
Wake Forest
Jeff Bzdelik took over as coach at Wake after Dino Gaudio was shown the door. I think you'll see the most dramatic numbers here:
Dino Gaudio - 44-18 (20-12 ACC) *NCAA bid in both seasons
Jeff Bzdelik - 14-28 (1-15 ACC)
In each of these three cases, the current coach has a worse winning percentage than the coach they replaced. At Wake and BC, the previous coaches were fired. Bad moves? Maybe. These are three programs that have been to NCAA Tournaments in recent years but have now fallen on hard times, which affects that public perception.
Ok now let's take a quick look at first year coaches. Their numbers will most certainly be incomplete at this point, but it's worth looking at.
Georgia Tech
Paul Hewitt is now the coach at George Mason. Brian Gregory came over from Dayton. Again, these stats for the old coaches are the past two seasons.
Paul Hewitt - 36-31 (12-20 ACC) *NCAA bid in 2009-2010
Brian Gregory - 6-4
Maryland
Gary Williams retired after a long time as the Terps head coach. Mark Turgeon came over from Texas A&M.
Gary Williams - 43-23 (20-12 ACC) *NCAA bid in 2009-2010
Mark Turgeon - 5-3
Miami
Jim Larranaga is the head coach, coming over from George Mason. He replaces Frank Haith, who is doing quite well so far at Missouri.
Frank Haith - 41-28 (10-22 ACC)
Jim Larranaga - 5-4
Look at those numbers for Haith! Miami feasted on less than stellar non-conference competition and then crumbled in the ACC the last two years.
NC State
Mark Gottfried is the new head coach, replacing Sidney Lowe, who isn't going to have very good numbers on here.
Sidney Lowe - 35-32 (10-22 ACC)
Mark Gottfried - 6-3
So what does all this mean? It means a lot of teams are starting from scratch. When new coaches come in, there are often players transferring out, and a lot of turnover. It takes a while for coaches to get to recruit their own players and perform. That doesn't necessarily mean things will get better in the next year or two: of the first-year coaches the only hire that most people agree is an improvement is Gottfried at NC State. New doesn't necessarily mean better. You do have to question some of the decisions to replace coaches and wonder if the league would be better off if people like Gaudio and Skinner had stayed.
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