You guys know how the coaching carousel goes. You hear one thing one day, and another thing another day, and you never know quite what to believe.
When Buzz Williams was hired by Virginia Tech in 2014, I put him on my initial list of candidates, but I didn’t think they had a legit chance to hire him. It wasn’t until the morning of the day he got hired, March 21, 2014, that we began to hear rumblings that he was a legit candidate.
Whit Babcock tossed out this warning when he fired James Johnson and began the coaching search that culminated with the hiring of Williams…
“I would caution our fan base, however, not to put too much merit in 'leaks' or sources. I’ve done this enough to know, and I want to warn them or at least let them know, any time you have a leak, it’s done with a motive. Sometimes it’s a blogger or reporter throwing names up on the wall to see what sticks, and I guess the motive will be entertainment, or seeing if they get lucky on that.
Other times, I’ve seen agents on purpose who will leak the name of their candidate, and associate it with your job for a variety of reasons. Sometimes they’re trying to leverage us here, and a lot of other times they’re simply trying to leverage the school their coach is currently at, or they’re also trying to leverage a school that is also open in the marketplace. So leaks always have a motive.