AKHoosier

I predict this board will straight-up crash if we hire Donovan. No way can it handle all the lurkers who will have to sign up as posters and regular posters at the same time.

Furthermore, it would make the conference collectively sh1t their pants, not to mention any school that makes an effort to recruit the Midwest. We'd instantly have the best coach in the B1G.

Man, can you imagine the impact of IU hiring Donovan, especially if it was announced in the next few weeks? It would dominate headlines, even during the most important time of the year in NCAA basketball. Everyone - coaches, media, recruits, players, casual fans - would take notice. I'm getting way too giddy about this possibility.

He's still employed by Indiana University to the tune of $3M per year. He's doing his job. Fred Glass isn't going to take away his corporate credit card and change the locks to Cook Hall just yet.

Thread may be getting too long for the servers to handle. I click on the "take me to first unread message" icon and it goes right to page 260 or so.

If this had been the third time in 4 years Collins had made the tournament at Northwestern, after previously having taken them to a Sweet 16 and a few top-4 B1G finishes, then yeah I say go for him as one of the top choices. But that's not the case. He limped into the tournament during the worst B1G year ever and still has yet to really beat anyone good. Great coach for Northwestern, he'll be a legend there forever. But it's still way too early to take a gamble on him. He honestly reminds me of Tim Miles and how some fans wanted him on the short list after he took Nebraska to the tournament a few years ago. Since then? Nothing. Hard pass.

Yeesh. No way does he deserve talk like this. I mean the guy isn't Sampson.

I chose Sean Miller, hope for Billy Donovan, but won't be surprised to see the headline in one week saying "Breaking: Indiana fires Crean, hires VT's Buzz Williams".

And even Zeller, who grew up not an hour or two from Bloomington, stated his main reason for choosing IU over UNC/Butler was because of the players and coaches. I vividly remember watching his interviews after he committed to IU, and the press would specifically ask him about how much IU's history and tradition played into his decision, to which he gave lip service saying "yeah it was a factor," but he would always say his relationship with Crean and the players on the team was his primary reason for choosing IU. The same reason Tyler Zeller DIDN'T choose IU, because the relationship with the players and coaches under Sampson was way different, yet the prestige and tradition of IU was no less esteemed historically.

Thank you. He's a good coach that a lot of programs would be lucky to have. However, after 9 years (really 6) of data, it's clear he can't maintain the consistency that IU should experience. Just time to move on.

Now this is certainly a good way to start a Saturday morning. I hope Donovan left Phoenix after OKC's loss last night and said, "Screw this, I'm going to Indiana."

Amidst all the posts and threads about rumors of upcoming coaching changes and all, I decided to take a look at the biggest recruiting misses of the Tom Crean era at IU. These are guys we missed out on, or ended up at IU whose career here never panned out. Hindsight is always 20/20 and this post is not meant to criticize any coach or player, but if things had turned out differently with these 5 players, I believe Crean would have had much, much different results here. 5. Kyrie Irving The first big name recruit Crean was in on and had a legit chance at landing, if I recall correctly. In the class of 2010, he would have signaled IU as being "back" a year before we got Cody Zeller. He wouldn't have led us to the success that Zeller did once he got here, but you can't help but wonder how that 2010-2011 team would have been with him as the PG. The team finished 12-20, so it could be argued we could have at least had a .500 season with him. We made his top 3 and he spoke very highly with us following his visit, but we all should know by now how that went down. 4. Hanner Perea To me, he was the biggest disappointment of all the players Crean signed at Indiana. I remember salivating watching his highlight videos dunking everything in sight, and ignoring several people's warnings that he was more raw than most of us thought. Once he got on campus, his career never seemed to take off due to his suspension (not his fault whatsoever) and lack of commitment to improve. He showed signs of improving as he got older, but his off-court issues derailed any chance at realizing his full potential. Crean invested 3 years into him, and never saw much payoff at all. Since he was a "big" on our team, he would have been instrumental in post-Zeller success, but that clearly was not the case. 3. Jeremy Hollowell Similar to Hanner, Jeremy's time here was a pretty big disappointment. I was excited to see him as part of our 2012 class, but he was a case-study on why "The Movement" largely failed. If he turned into a player that would have had better than 5.7 PPG his sophomore year, we would have gotten much more production out of our frontcourt his sophomore year. His freshman season he was usually the second guy off the bench, but he never seemed to develop while he had guys like Cody Zeller and Christian Watford to practice against. 2. Kellen Dunham A few years ago I remember Crean was on Dakich's show, and when asked one of his biggest regrets while at IU, it was not offering Kellen Dunham a scholarship. We all know why. He was a scoring machine at Pendleton Heights, leading the state with nearly 30 ppg. His freshman season he averaged 9.5 ppg, and was instrumental in beating UNC, Gonzaga, and #1 IU. If he had been included in our 2012 class, we would have had an extra shooter when Jordan Hulls got hurt in the tournament in 2013, and for the next few seasons when the 2013 and 2014 teams could have used an elite outside shooter outside Yogi. Speaking of that 2012 class, the #1 biggest miss during Crean's era in my opinion was: 1. Gary Harris No doubt in my mind he was the 1 player that could have been more instrumental in a deeper 2012-2013 NCAA tournament run. The potential of that 2012-2013 team with a starting lineup of Yogi Ferrell, Gary Harris, Oladipo, Watford, and Zeller with Jordy and Sheehey coming off the bench would have been sky high. At 6'5", he and Oladipo would have been a nightmare on the perimeter for opposing offenses. The B1G Freshman of the Year in 2012-2013 averaged 12.9 pts and 1.2 steals per game. As a sophomore, he was on the All B1G Defensive Team and averaged nearly 17 ppg. The thought of our 2012 class featuring Yogi Ferrell, Kellen Dunham, and Gary Harris still kind of stings to think about, especially considering how much time Crean put in to recruiting Harris. He and Dunham probably would have made us a tournament team in 2013-2014 as well with Noah Vonleh, Sheehey, and Yogi. Any thoughts to this list? Feel free to rip it apart, add to it, subtract from it, or point out any errors.

I had a feeling this was going to happen with Wisconsin. Once other B1G coaches had some more game tape available to scout against Greg Gard, he lost his element of surprise he enjoyed a bit last year. As soon as Bo Ryan's guys start to cycle out of there, he's going to have an even rougher time. They should have had an outright title this year.

I find it hard to believe any insider who calls himself "Crean my pants" or "BTownInsider"

He also broke the news that Sampson had been cheating before it was made public.

I can't get past the timing of Billy Donovan's Florida house going up for sale. Why do this now? Why do this 2 months before your offseason is going to start? If this had been done in October, that's one thing. But the end of February is entirely different.

They did found and open the very first Catholic high school in Gainesville, and I believe his kids went there. Not sure how old his kids are now though.

To be fair, Purdue was terrible during most of Davis' tenure. The Gene Keady days were winding down, and the past few years' Purdue teams have been much better than anything Davis had to deal with. And also, we do not measure success by beating Purdue. That's how Purdue measures their success (beating IU).

Now this is my favorite rumor I've heard yet, I don't even care if it's true or made up or whatever.

I feel like, at this point, pissing in the wind would be more productive than reaching out to Brad Stevens.

Swanigan, Dawson, Bluiett, and Lyles were never coming here. Great players from the state who everyone would love to have, but they were not coming to Indiana. It's tough to call them "misses".

So then Donovan simply isn't interested?

Pretty glad we missed out on Jaquan Lyle as well. Crean seemed to put in quite a bit of time with him too. Talented player, but I'm glad we missed.

Sounds like there's dissent among the insiders over there regarding our chances with Donovan. Hickory says dream on, 0708 says there's a real chance. I doubt he'll be our next coach ultimately, but I'll keep hope alive until he files a restraining order against Fred Glass.

I guess he has done well, averaging 11 ppg this year, 12 last year, and 11 the year before. I do know earlier in the year he wasn't even starting, and Marquette wasn't even very good, so I was basing it off that. He certainly would have helped us the past few years, that's for sure.