Buzz Williams interview

[Bill Marsh]

Look, I loved Buzz as our coach. He was a character. He LOVED being the underdog. He recruited terrific athletes and created teams that routinely made the NCAA tournament. He several kids to the NBA too (Butler, Crowder, Blue, Buycks, DJO, Hayward). I would actually argue that he experienced more success than Tom Crean (who took our school to the Final Four). I think he, possibly, got overwhelmed with the constant success he had (especially after the struggles this past season), and needed to make a change.

However, in the article, he says he went into "information-gathering mode". What did his information turn up regarding a coach's success AFTER they left Marquette? Tom Crean has a winning percentage of .510 at Indiana in 6 seasons - one of the BEST basketball programs in the country. Mike Deane had losing records at both Lamar and Wagner after being let go from Marquette. Kevin O'Neil almost bounced around as many teams as Larry Brown did, having losing records at Tennessee, Northwestern and USC.

Virginia Tech will be a TREMENDOUS challenge. He may succeed there, he may not. Constantly facing the likes of Duke, UNC, Syracuse, Virginia, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Notre Dame, and the rest of the gauntlet of the ACC, will pose a consistent challenge just to be middle of the pack. I will still root for him (not over my Warriors), but the odds are not in his favor.

I wouldn't say that saying that about Tom Crean at Indiana is really fair. He inherited a hazmat situation when he got there. You take out the 1st season and he's got a .569 winning pct at Indiana.

I think if he had gone anywhere else, no one would have argued his points at all. Like it or not- not being on ESPN is a very real factor. Is the Big East viewed as well as it was 2 years ago? No way. Are the football schools going to pick up momentum in a way that we've not seen yet? Very possibly and you just look at the old Big East- tournament champs last 13 years- only UConn in 2002 and Georgetown in 2007 won it w/o FBS football. From '96-'13 only St John's in 2000 and Georgetown in '07 doesn't have FBS football now. You say why use '96 or '01? I'd say using '99 is very fair because that was the dawn of the BCS era. So in the 15 years of being a BCS conference, only 3 times was the basketball champ not in the BCS conference. With the money involved in football now- is that going to make that trend go even quicker?

What in the world is the winning of BE championships by FBS schools supposed to prove? Things that correlate do not necessarily have a causal relationship.

UConn won a national championship in 2004 before it joined the BE in football. Yes, it had FBS football that year - technically. It was still in transition, playing an independent schedule and waiting to join the Big east. Hardly anything that could be considered to have powered its basketball program.

While we're at it, let's look at all the national champions in recent years with terrible football - FBS or otherwise:

2014 - UConn
2012 - Kentucky
2011 - UConn
2010 - Duke
2009 - North Carolina
2008 - Kansas
2005 - North Carolina
2004 - UConn
2003 - Syracuse
2002 - Maryland
2001 - Duke
1999 - UConn
1998 - Kentucky
1996 - Kentucky

What do all these programs have in common? They all care deeply about their basketball and prioritize basketball over football. Exactly what benefit does basketball receive from their mediocre to very bad football programs?

How about the fact that we've seen an upsurge in recent years by non-FBS schools making it to the Final Four:

2013 - Wichita State
2011 - Butler
2011 - VCU
2010 - Butler
2009 - Villanova
2007 - Georgetown
2006 - George Mason
2003 - Marquette
1999 - UConn

One-and-done has enabled non-FBS schools to be more competitive in recent years so that such schools are consistently challenging for championships - and even winning in the case of the 1999 UConn team. Historically we can demonstrate that very few schools have ever been able to achieve national championships in both sports. Even those that have done it have rarely done so while both sports are thriving, e.g. football NC in 1959 when that sport was a priority, basketball NC in 2003 when basketball was the priority. Florida is the only true football power to win NCs in basketball in recent years. If anything, football is a drag on developing a national power in basketball, not an asset.

[BillikensWin]

Crean has been a disaster at Indiana. Even taking out the first season (which is BS in an of itself), .569 @ Indiana is pathetic.

[Xudash]

Unless there is something we don't know about below the surface, he made a terrible decision leaving Marquette for VT.

I still get a kick out of the poor idiots who assume Fox is going to fail with its sports programming strategy.

[stever20]

my point on Fox is you can't assume they're going to fail- but at the same time, you can't just assume they're going to be a success. Fox HAS to get Big Ten or NBA. They can't survive 5 years with just what they have right now. Especially quite frankly in late fall and winter- when all they have is Big East basketball and UFC. Also, the question becomes how concerned does ESPN get with Fox? ESPN has some pretty deep pockets so if they wanted to block Fox from getting NBA or Big Ten- they could do that. Or make it so cost prohibitive that they couldn't get both.

Fox really wasn't smart when they launched. If Fox had been smarter, they launch about 2 years earlier- before NFL, NHL had negotiated their deals. FS1 looks entirely different if they have NFL or NHL. To me, one thing if I was fox, I'd go to the NHL and see if I could carve out a 2nd package.

Also, where football is concerned- for the P5 schools that we're competing with- they will be getting as much money from the college football playoff as we do our tv contract. The gap that had been just a few years ago maybe something like 15 million for the bigger schools to like 5 million for us- it's now going to be like 30 million plus to like 7-8 million for us. That's the major concern for us.

[stever20]

Look, I loved Buzz as our coach. He was a character. He LOVED being the underdog. He recruited terrific athletes and created teams that routinely made the NCAA tournament. He several kids to the NBA too (Butler, Crowder, Blue, Buycks, DJO, Hayward). I would actually argue that he experienced more success than Tom Crean (who took our school to the Final Four). I think he, possibly, got overwhelmed with the constant success he had (especially after the struggles this past season), and needed to make a change.

However, in the article, he says he went into "information-gathering mode". What did his information turn up regarding a coach's success AFTER they left Marquette? Tom Crean has a winning percentage of .510 at Indiana in 6 seasons - one of the BEST basketball programs in the country. Mike Deane had losing records at both Lamar and Wagner after being let go from Marquette. Kevin O'Neil almost bounced around as many teams as Larry Brown did, having losing records at Tennessee, Northwestern and USC.

Virginia Tech will be a TREMENDOUS challenge. He may succeed there, he may not. Constantly facing the likes of Duke, UNC, Syracuse, Virginia, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Notre Dame, and the rest of the gauntlet of the ACC, will pose a consistent challenge just to be middle of the pack. I will still root for him (not over my Warriors), but the odds are not in his favor.

I wouldn't say that saying that about Tom Crean at Indiana is really fair. He inherited a hazmat situation when he got there. You take out the 1st season and he's got a .569 winning pct at Indiana.

I think if he had gone anywhere else, no one would have argued his points at all. Like it or not- not being on ESPN is a very real factor. Is the Big East viewed as well as it was 2 years ago? No way. Are the football schools going to pick up momentum in a way that we've not seen yet? Very possibly and you just look at the old Big East- tournament champs last 13 years- only UConn in 2002 and Georgetown in 2007 won it w/o FBS football. From '96-'13 only St John's in 2000 and Georgetown in '07 doesn't have FBS football now. You say why use '96 or '01? I'd say using '99 is very fair because that was the dawn of the BCS era. So in the 15 years of being a BCS conference, only 3 times was the basketball champ not in the BCS conference. With the money involved in football now- is that going to make that trend go even quicker?

What in the world is the winning of BE championships by FBS schools supposed to prove? Things that correlate do not necessarily have a causal relationship.

UConn won a national championship in 2004 before it joined the BE in football. Yes, it had FBS football that year - technically. It was still in transition, playing an independent schedule and waiting to join the Big east. Hardly anything that could be considered to have powered its basketball program.

While we're at it, let's look at all the national champions in recent years with terrible football - FBS or otherwise:

2014 - UConn
2012 - Kentucky
2011 - UConn
2010 - Duke
2009 - North Carolina
2008 - Kansas
2005 - North Carolina
2004 - UConn
2003 - Syracuse
2002 - Maryland
2001 - Duke
1999 - UConn
1998 - Kentucky
1996 - Kentucky

What do all these programs have in common? They all care deeply about their basketball and prioritize basketball over football. Exactly what benefit does basketball receive from their mediocre to very bad football programs?

How about the fact that we've seen an upsurge in recent years by non-FBS schools making it to the Final Four:

2013 - Wichita State
2011 - Butler
2011 - VCU
2010 - Butler
2009 - Villanova
2007 - Georgetown
2006 - George Mason
2003 - Marquette
1999 - UConn

One-and-done has enabled non-FBS schools to be more competitive in recent years so that such schools are consistently challenging for championships - and even winning in the case of the 1999 UConn team. Historically we can demonstrate that very few schools have ever been able to achieve national championships in both sports. Even those that have done it have rarely done so while both sports are thriving, e.g. football NC in 1959 when that sport was a priority, basketball NC in 2003 when basketball was the priority. Florida is the only true football power to win NCs in basketball in recent years. If anything, football is a drag on developing a national power in basketball, not an asset.

those schools may have had terrible football, but still in almost all situations had BCS money coming into their overall sports program. The fact is, since 1985- the only non football program to win it all was UConn. That's it. In the 16 year BCS era- every single champion except UConn 2x was in a BCS conference. 52/64 teams in the era that made the final 4- were in BCS conferences. 4 of the 12 that were outside the BCS was Big East teams- who did have a BCS connection. So really only 8 teams were outside the BCS.

Also- your list of non football powers making final 4- that's 9 schools in the last 15 years. the decade of the 80's had 7 teams make the final 4. so it's not been a real upsurge at all.

Also would have to say, if Adam Silver gets his way, the days of the 1 and done will be over in a year or two. That's going to make a program like a Kentucky that much tougher to deal with quite frankly.

[hoyahooligan]

1) How long is our contract with Fox? I think people are too concerned with the health of Fox. Honestly we just need them to do ok. We don't need them to take down ESPN or even come close, we just need them to continue until our contract runs out. If they're in a good enough position we may continue on with them, or we'll be attractive enough and Fox enough of a threat that ESPN will try and buy us back either way it's win win.

2) Most Athletic Departments lose money despite BCS money. I don't think BCS money really helps or influences basketball programs. Georgetown and Marquette spend as much or more than any programs in the nation. All the BCS money gets poured back into the football programs to keep those monsters afloat. You're just showing correlation which is not causation.

[Bluejay]

Also, the question becomes how concerned does ESPN get with Fox? ESPN has some pretty deep pockets so if they wanted to block Fox from getting NBA or Big Ten- they could do that.

When it comes to the Big 10, ESPN can't block anything. Fox owns a pretty substantial share of the BTN, making the B1G and FOX partners.

ESPN can bid up the rights if they want to, but they can't block the B1G from doing anything with Fox. I'd also add that since the B1G has the largest fanbase in the entire country, ESPN needs the Big Ten much more than the Big Ten needs ESPN.

[stever20]

Also, the question becomes how concerned does ESPN get with Fox? ESPN has some pretty deep pockets so if they wanted to block Fox from getting NBA or Big Ten- they could do that.

When it comes to the Big 10, ESPN can't block anything. Fox owns a pretty substantial share of the BTN, making the B1G and FOX partners.

ESPN can bid up the rights if they want to, but they can't block the B1G from doing anything with Fox. I'd also add that since the B1G has the largest fanbase in the entire country, ESPN needs the Big Ten much more than the Big Ten needs ESPN.

Big Ten- if ESPN bids 400 billion and Fox bids 300 billion- they're taking the ESPN bid. End of the day it's all business. If ESPN wants to keep the Big Ten off of Fox, they can pay the $$$ to do just that. Fox owning the Big Ten Network is in a lot of ways meaningless. Where it would come into play would be if ESPN and Fox had nearly the same bid. That's really it.

[DudeAnon]

That amount of worrying that goes on here is ridiculous. Ok, so this is the FIRST year of FS1 and already that have shown: MLB, UFC, NASCAR, PAC-12, Big East and they have a legitimate "SportsCenter" with Fox Sports Live with legitimate analysts.

This isn't CBSSN with an hour of Gottlieb staring into the screen or NBCSN with god knows what.

Can anyone tell me how we could've gotten a better deal? We got a long contract, cash, 0 demands to expand (so far) , every game is nationally televised we are with the only legitimate alternative to ESPN out there.

[stever20]

1) How long is our contract with Fox? I think people are too concerned with the health of Fox. Honestly we just need them to do ok. We don't need them to take down ESPN or even come close, we just need them to continue until our contract runs out. If they're in a good enough position we may continue on with them, or we'll be attractive enough and Fox enough of a threat that ESPN will try and buy us back either way it's win win.

2) Most Athletic Departments lose money despite BCS money. I don't think BCS money really helps or influences basketball programs. Georgetown and Marquette spend as much or more than any programs in the nation. All the BCS money gets poured back into the football programs to keep those monsters afloat. You're just showing correlation which is not causation.

11 more years for fox. I think even the most ardent folks for Fox would disagree with you about how FS1 just needs to stay afloat. If FS1 was like this 10 years from now, with limited ratings and not much programming, the Big East won't be where it is now- and ESPN may get us back, but at a much reduced price.

I would say 56/64 final 4 teams being from BCS conferences is pretty close to causation. I look at Big Ten for example. in the 16 years before the BCS they had 7 final 4 trips. Now, in the BCS era, they've had 14 trips in the same number of years. Not saying it's all BCS- but it's a factor for sure.