The panel looks back at Yale’s NCAA Tournament run, Columbia’s CIT championship and Princeton’s NIT matchup, analyzes the Ivy coaching carousel and looks ahead to the 2016-17 season. Peter Andrews and Mike Tony are joined by IHO founder Ian Halpern, IHO writer George Clark and Jonathan Tannenwald of Philly.com for this final episode of the 2015-16 season:
(Part 1)
(Part 2)
Great Super Sized Episode!!!
While it is always tough to see a non-Penn team succeed in the league, reading and hearing from TT, Ian, and Peter over the last few seasons has personalized the other schools. As a result, I am genuinely pleased for the success of their teams and glad that they were able to share in the excitement of March basketball.
Looking at the off season, it will be interesting to see where Cornell, Columbia and Dartmouth go with their choices. Of the three, I have the most confidence in Lions AD Piling, since he has done a great job hiring Al Bagnoli for football, and a very solid choice in Megan Griffith for the women’s basketball team. He has also done a very good job working with the administration with regards to public and/or financial support for the athletics department.
So far, Jim Engel of NJIT (former Columbia Assistant), Carlin Hartman (Associate Head Coach at Rice; former Columbia Assistant), and Derrick Phelps (Columbia Assistant) have been mentioned for the spot.
While the firing of Paul Cormier was a big surprise, Harry Sheehy at Dartmouth does have experience at Williams as AD and basketball coach, so it would seem that he is capable of making a good hire. I heard Glenn Miller’s name mentioned during the podcast. That is not an unreasonable choice, but it would seem unlikely that Connecticut would let him go, especially after one of its assistants left to join the Rutgers staff a few days ago. Even though Ollie has done well in his first few years, it would seem that the Huskies would want keep an Associate Head Coach who has experience and was instrumental in the team’s national championship success. If Dartmouth runs into trouble with its choice, at least the AD could take over on an interim basis.
With regards to Cornell, it seemed unlikely that the school would spend the money needed for salary and his buyout. While Columbia has recent success, an aggressive AD, administrative support and a willingness to spend money, the Big Red (and maybe Cornell) does not seem to have similar positives. As a result, it would seem that a lower profile and cost Assistant Coach or Division III coach will get the job. Right now, Penn (and former Cornell & BC) Assistant Coach Nat Graham is the name most mentioned.
For next season, my top four would be 1) Princeton 2) Harvard 3) Yale and 4) Columbia. Penn would be 5th followed by Dartmouth, Cornell and Brown. In terms of coaching, Mike Martin will be let go at Brown and James Jones will leave Yale, unless he goes in the next few weeks.
Thanks for TT for volunteering Mike as Ivy Tournament Host next March! I positively rsvp and look forward to the live broadcast at Abner’s Cheesesteak, President Gutmann’s office, or DRL Laboratory.
apologies for the typos in the Cornell paragraph. It should read:
With regards to Cornell, it seemed unlikely that the school would spend the money needed for Spiker’s salary and buyout. While Columbia has recent success, an aggressive AD, administrative support and a willingness to spend money, the Big Red (and maybe Dartmouth) does not seem to have similar positives. As a result, it would seem that a lower profile and cost Assistant Coach or Division III coach will get the job. Right now, Penn (and former Cornell & BC) Assistant Coach Nat Graham is the name most mentioned.