New Maryland Head Coach: Mark Turgeon

[OregonBird]

I predicted this hire on Saturday.

This is a good hire. Let's take off our fan goggles and be realistic. No one who has busted their rear end building a program to be Top 20 and who has a good situation is going to give it up. That ruled out Miller, Dixon, Brey, Wright. I don't blame them. Why work for a school whose administration has a reputation for being an obstacle and who has somewhat unreasonable (compared to other powerhouses) admissions standards, not to mention an AD who is inexperienced working in a big time athletic dept?

I think most people would find it difficult to give something they've built and a good situation they're in. Not only that but we don't KNOW who was truly interested in the job.

[ccbird]

Turgeon is solid. He'll recruit better than Gary by default. He's not been known to pull 4 and 5 star guys but he hasn't been in a great position to do it either. We'll wait and see what happens. I still think he's mid 90's Gary. Can get us back to being a consistent top 20 team but we won't take the next step. The good thing is if he starts to slip like Gary has in recent years we can at least consider letting him go. Gary's status as untouchable and the FOG(Friends of Gary) boosters have hampered this program the last 5 years.

[The Rick]

Another quote from Turgeon:

From Mark Turgeon...“I told the players it was the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make. Marriage was easy for me, I knew I was in love. Going to KU was easy, that’s where I always wanted to play college basketball. Going to Wichita State was easy. Going to Texas A&M was an easy choice. Today was one of the hardest choices I’ve had to make because of the young men in that locker room.”

[PrivateO]

Another quote from Turgeon:

Obviously the Miller rumors put our expectations way too high, but I'm warming up to Turgeon. I also really respect the fact that he went and met with his players/assistants. Says a lot.

[The Rick]

Great article on Turgeon in the Washington Post.

[Sports Guy]

I won't pretend to be that knowledgeable about him, but it does seem like a good hire. Still a bit of a let-down though, given that it seemed like Miller was in the bag and guys like Wright and Dixon were strongly interested in the job.

I don't get why people were so enamored about Dixon.

Yea, he is a good coach and has done a good job building Pitt but do you know how many McDs AA he has brought to Pitt? ONE!

He recruits like Gary, which wouldn't make any of you happy.

On top of that, his teams have generally been failures come tourney time.

[ccbird]

Honestly, of all the names mentioned the only ones I'm convinced would have done a better job than Turgeon were Miller and Jay Wright. Not Dixon, not Stevens, not Barnes and certainly not Brey. That doesn't mean I wouldn't have taken any of them over Turgeon just that I think Turgeon can be as good here as any of them. I think most people are sold on his coaching ability, it's just going to come down to how well he recruits. I would have had the same questions about Dixon, Stevens, and Brey here. I think Barnes would recruit really well here but he can't coach his way out of a paper bag.

[The Rick]

Mark Turgeon's remarks to Texas A&M press following the announcement to his team that he was leaving:

Any reason why I can't embed that video here?

[BaltimoreTerp]

Turgeon is solid. He'll recruit better than Gary by default. He's not been known to pull 4 and 5 star guys but he hasn't been in a great position to do it either. We'll wait and see what happens. I still think he's mid 90's Gary. Can get us back to being a consistent top 20 team but we won't take the next step. The good thing is if he starts to slip like Gary has in recent years we can at least consider letting him go. Gary's status as untouchable and the FOG(Friends of Gary) boosters have hampered this program the last 5 years.

Methinks that if he wins a champion within half a decade like "mid-90s Gary" did, he'll have his share of "FOMs" making him pretty well untouchable for a while

[SouthRider]

The more I read about Turgeon the more I like the hire. He was an assistant to Roy Williams. He's rebuilt two programs from scratch. He recruits from all over the country and once landed a kid from Dematha. He has had good success in the tourney given the schools he has coached. He's had enough success to attract a top 15 recruiting class for the upcoming season. He's used to playing big time, highly ranked opponents - although I'd like to see his record against ranked opponents. All in all, sounds like a good fit for Maryland and Turgeon.

[ADAMWD_OsRavens]

Happy with the hire, now I just want to know if we can keep Faust, Gibbs, and Stoglin.

[The Rick]

The more I read about Turgeon the more I like the hire. He was an assistant to Roy Williams. He's rebuilt two programs from scratch. He recruits from all over the country and once landed a kid from Dematha. He has had good success in the tourney given the schools he has coached. He's had enough success to attract a top 15 recruiting class for the upcoming season. He's used to playing big time, highly ranked opponents - although I'd like to see his record against ranked opponents. All in all, sounds like a good fit for Maryland and Turgeon.

In fairness, the A&M program was in pretty decent shape when he got there. Gillespie had turned it around, propelling him to the UK opportunity.

[The Rick]

And we've got our first thumbs down to the hire with this piece by Mike DeCoury of the SportingNews.

Through all of that, what might be most disconcerting about placing Turgeon in the position of Maryland head coach is that the opportunity that exists for the new man to improve upon the otherwise extraordinary work done by Gary Williams—to broaden their recruiting reach to include elite players, to deepen the program’s ties with area AAU teams—is not Turgeon’s specialty as a coach.

In four recruiting years at A&M, including the Class of 2011, Turgeon once collected a class ranked in Scout.com’s top 25. How long has it been since he was part of a staff that regularly was "in" with the nation’s top players? Years? No, decades—since he was at Kansas under Larry Brown and Roy Williams in the late '80s and early '90s.

Is it possible Turgeon suddenly can repair all the rifts that exist between the Maryland program and the best area AAU programs, the ones that in recent years have produced Kevin Durant and Ty Lawson and Michael Beasley and Nolan Smith and Quinn Cook—and too many others to fit into a single paragraph? Absolutely. Turgeon is a bright, decent person.

Is he the ideal fit for this job, though?

Not even close.

What we saw in this case, and in so many other coaching positions that opened and closed this spring, is how much less common it is becoming for even the best jobs to wind up in the proper hands. That’s largely because so many athletic directors have no idea what a qualified basketball coach looks like. It’s also because ADs that have such quality coaches are compensating them so well that climbing the coaching ladder no longer is essential.

Maryland had everything a coach could want: pristine facilities, passionate public support, a recent history of success and perhaps the country’s most fertile talent base. But Maryland couldn’t get Miller, even though it was closer to his Western Pennsylvania roots and the part of the country where he has spent most of his life, even though he clearly recognized the advantages of recruiting in the corridor that runs from Baltimore to Washington, D.C., to Northern Virginia.

When Miller rejected the offer, Maryland might have turned to any number of gifted coaches with demonstrated prowess in coaching and recruiting: Shaka Smart of VCU, Chris Mack of Xavier, Mick Cronin of Cincinnati, perhaps Anthony Grant of Alabama, if his interest could be stimulated.

Instead, the Terps wound up with a choice that seemed safe, mostly because Turgeon’s name had been in other stories about other coaching searches.

DeCourcy is all over the place here:

1.) You won't find anyone who will say anything bad about him.

2.) MD needed a good recruiter, but that's not what he's known for.

3.) Can he fix the broken relationships with AAU coaches? Absolutely, he's a bright decent person he says.

4.) But is he right for the job? Not a chance says DeCourcy.

He conflicted himself several times in this piece, IMO.

[Remember The Alomar]

If we keep Bino and Faust/Anderson I'll be happy. I like Turgeon--he's underrated. He may not be known for his recruiting, but hopefully he'll do the things that Gary refused to (actually meeting with recruits, etc). Any one who calls this an Edsall is flat out wrong.

However, I will say that I'm not to thrilled about the prospect of playing at such a slow pace, but hopefully Turgeon will adapt.

[BaltimoreTerp]

If we keep Bino and Faust/Anderson I'll be happy. I like Turgeon--he's underrated. He may not be known for his recruiting, but hopefully he'll do the things that Gary refused to (actually meeting with recruits, etc). Any one who calls this an Edsall is flat out wrong.

Why is that?