Duquesne coaching search: Possible replacements for Jim Ferry

March 14, 2017 9:20 AM

By Adam Bittner / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Jim Ferry is out at Duquesne. The coach was fired Monday after five seasons, which means it’s time to speculate about who athletic director David Harper and the university might tap to try to lead the Dukes to their first NCAA tournament since 1977. Some possibilities:

King Rice (Gerry Broome/Associated Press)

King Rice — Monmouth

Why he makes sense: The Hawks have been the best team in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference the past two years, winning the regular-season title twice. And they’ve made some national splashes, too. Last season, they beat Power 5 programs UCLA, Notre Dame, Southern California and Rutgers as well as Big East stalwart Georgetown. And let’s not forget that Rice has presided over some pretty killer sideline dances.

Why he doesn’t make sense: That national profile. One figures that, if and when Rice is ready to make a move, he’ll be angling for a Power 5 job, or at least a mid-major with more resources than Duquesne.

Brandin Knight (Keith Srakocic/Associated Press)

Brandin Knight — Rutgers (assistant)

Reasons he makes sense: He has a lot of fans in Pittsburgh after an eight-year assistant stint under Jamie Dixon that followed a sparkling playing career in which he led Pitt’s rise to prominence in the aughts. He’s so popular that many suggested him as the replacement for Dixon last spring before the program went with Kevin Stallings instead. He knows this scene as well as anyone, and the New Jersey native would also appear well-positioned to tap the New York/Jersey recruiting pipeline that served Pitt well for so long in its Big East days.

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: Experience. He’s probably ready for a head coaching job, but with his whole career in front of him at 35, Duquesne seems like an unnecessary risk for both sides. It’s a program that’s struggled for 40 years in a tough league. Better to cut one’s teeth at a mid- to low-major with some momentum than jump straight into the Atlantic 10 meatgrinder at a program that’s struggled to find answers for decades.

Brian Gregory (Lenny Ignelzi/Associated Press)

Brian Gregory — Michigan State (consultant)

Reasons he makes sense: He had a successful Atlantic 10 tenure at Dayton, going 172-94 en route to two NCAA tournaments with the Flyers before jumping to Georgia Tech in 2011. Things didn’t go quite as well in Atlanta — he was fired after going 76-86 with the Yellow Jackets, including a sorry 27-61 record in ACC play. But there’s still a track record a program in Duquesne’s position could find appealing, and it never hurts that he’s studied under Tom Izzo in East Lansing.

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: He’s a bit of a retread. Not a disqualifying trait, but one that’s unlikely to fire up fans or high school prospects the way a hotshot assistant or young low-major head coach might.

UPDATE: Gregory’s out, via Jon Rothstein:

Sources: South Florida will hire Brian Gregory as its next head basketball coach. STORY @FanRagSports: https://t.co/FJN7QOxcoU

— Jon Rothstein (@JonRothstein) March 14, 2017

Matt Driscoll (Phil Sandlin/Associated Press)

Matt Driscoll — North Florida

Reasons he makes sense: He’s from here. The Northgate High School and Slippery Rock graduate worked in the local basketball scene before becoming a top lieutenant for Scott Drew at Valparaiso and Baylor. Since taking over at North Florida in 2009-10 — the school’s first as a full Division I member — he’s led the Ospreys to national relevance. They won the Atlantic Sun Conference for their first tournament appearance in 2014-15 and won 22 games last season before falling back to third place in the league this year.

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: He’s built the North Florida program almost from scratch, and he might want to leverage that into more than another rebuilding job, even one back home. From Duquesne’s perspective, Harper might want to see more in a new coach than a couple good years at a low-to-mid major, even with the Drew connections.

Mark Gottfried (John Heller/Post-Gazette)

Mark Gottfried — Unemployed (recently fired from North Carolina State)

Reasons he makes sense: He’s a big name who’s had a fair amount of success at Power 5 schools. Before heading to Raleigh in 2011, he took Alabama to five consecutive NCAA tournaments and won two regular-season SEC championships in 2002-03 and 2004-05. With the Wolfpack, he won at least 22 games and went to the NCAA tournament in each of his first four seasons before sputtering in the past two.

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: Retread city, and probably out of Duquesne’s price range. Sure, he’s crashed and burned in his last two gigs, but desperate programs at the bottom of the Power 5 and high-major leagues are often willing to overpay for someone with that many tournament appearances on his resume. Not completely out of the realm of possibility that he could fall to the Dukes, but it seems pretty unlikely at the moment.

Mike Rice (Matt Freed/Post-Gazette)

Mike Rice — Unemployed

Reasons why he makes sense: He won the regular season NEC championship in his first season at Robert Morris in 2007-08, then took the Colonials to the NCAA tournament in each of the following two years. That’s a proven track record of mid-major success at a program with many of the same obstacles facing Duquesne, namely Pittsburgh’s dearth of local high school talent. He told 93.7 The Fan last year he would be open to returning to college basketball should a chance arise. But…

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: … he was canned by Rutgers — the program he left RMU for in 2010 — for throwing basketballs at his players in fits of rage, as well as generally behaving abusively toward them. The behavior set off a national firestorm the likes of which makes it unlikely he’ll ever get a job in major college basketball again. He was last seen coaching for the Hoop Group — a sponsor of camps, AAU and travel tournaments — near his home in New Jersey.

Bruiser Flint (Garry Jones/Associated Press)

Bruiser Flint — Unemployed

Reasons he makes sense: His name always seems to come up when Pennsylvania programs are hiring, and for good reason. He found some success — though not consistently — in 15 seasons at Drexel before being fired last year after a 6-25 campaign. His experience and connections to talent-rich Philadelphia, as well as Kentucky coach and Moon native John Calipari, could be a plus.

Reasons he doesn’t make sense: It’s likely Duquesne would infuriate its fans if it hired a coach who was fired from any school — let alone one in the Colonial Athletic Association — after going 6-25. Maybe that’s unfair to Flint after a long career. But hey, maybe don’t go 6-25.