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Ohio State Coaching Hot Board: 4 Candidates To Replace Chris Holtmann · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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Welcome to Buckeyes Tomorrow Morning for Thursday, February fifteenth. I'm your host,
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Tom Or the Akron game in one hundred and ninety eight days, the game
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against Michigan in two hundred and eighty nine days. This show is going to
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be a little bit of an unusual one because we're gonna be talking Ohio State
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basketball, and we are talking Ohio State basketball because there are some pretty significant
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news on that front. Chris Holtman is no longer the head coach of the
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Ohio State basketball team. Ohio State let him go on Wednesday. Not the
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happiest Valentine's Day in the Holtlan household, but probably a time when a lot
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of Ohio State basketball fans are maybe breathing a little bit of a sigh of
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relief, because, listen, I'm not going to lie to you, it
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has not been a good time to be an Ohio State basketball fan in the
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last couple of years. Buck Guy's currently sitting at fourteen and eleven on the
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season, just four and ten in Big Ten play. They lost sixty two
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to fifty four on Tuesday night in Madison. That apparently was the last straw
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the sixteenth consecutive road loss for the Buckeyes against Big Ten opponents. Last time
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they won a game on the road against a Big Ten opponent with the day
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after the Peach Bowl January first, twenty twenty three against Northwestern. It has
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been a minute. It has also been a minute since we've had our good
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friend Tony Gernerman on the show Tony, Welcome back. This feels like,
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yeah, they could have waited until the end of the season, but yeah,
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they also could have done this like a month ago two and either one
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would have been kind of a defensible, defensible move. Yeah, I agree.
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I think the last time we were on this show talking about the basketball
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team is maybe a week or so ago, saying that probably not gonna make
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it to the end of the season, Chris Holtman is probably gonna something is
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going to happen, And that has finally happened. And I think it was
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a Florida Athletic director Jeremy Fowley one said if you're eventually going to do something,
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just do it now, and talking about stuff like this, and so
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this is something that felt inevitable and not just the way this year is going,
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but the way everything has been trending like his After the first season for
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Chris Holtman, he stopped out at twenty one wins and he hasn't even approached
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that in two years and going over a year without a road win in the
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Big Ten. Well, the Big Ten is a pretty good basketball conference,
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but that's completely unacceptable. And didn't you have a losing record and conference play?
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I mean, this is you should not be thirteenth place in back to
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back seasons or whatever. So I was okay with it not happening last year.
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I don't think you just overreact and to it after one year. And
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they start out really well this year, but it meant nothing to anybody who
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pays attention. You're like, well, let's just see what January looks like.
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And boom, you see what January looks like, and here we are
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in February looking for a new head coach for Ohio State. Yeah. I
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think the last three times we've been talking about the basketball team on this show
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were okay, football seasons over, let's do a little bit of just sort
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of like, well, just a little lay of the land state of the
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Union on Ohio State basketball. At that point, I think they were twelve
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and two give or take heading into conference play and okay, you know see
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where it goes from there. And then the one after that was, oh
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is it time for is this? This is just not happening right, And
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then the answer this time the third show we've gone on basketball this season is
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Nope, didn't happen and now he's gone. There was a line in the
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athletic reporting on this which Tony I was just gobsmacked by. Chris Halbin was
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quote blind decided unquote by the firing Tony I don't understand thirty and thirty the
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past two seasons nine and twenty five in Big Ten play, Tony I don't
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understand was what was what was shocking about this? First of all, Tom,
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I know you texted me about doing the show and then you said me
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a link, and then when I clicked on it link, I was blindsided
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to find out I was going to be on this show. I did not
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see that coming. Everything had been laid out there. I had seen the
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text, the numbers, the results. Yeah, if you didn't see this
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coming, then you know, maybe that's a coaching thing where I'm only focused.
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I'm so super focused I can't even see the outside noise. But can
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you see nine to twenty five and Big ten play over the last two years
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and think that that's acceptable anywhere in the Big ten? I I guess being
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blindsided is if it's if it's not a lie, then maybe if you missed
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that part of what's going on, then does that mean you've maybe that explains
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why so much other, so many other things have been missed in the program
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and why things have been struggling, and why if you didn't see this coming,
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what else have you missed within the program that would have limited some of
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these things? So, you know, I don't think those that's a good
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terminology for him to use, or you know, I don't know if that
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was a quote or just he expressed this, but man, you had to
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know that things were not good, and no, at what point this season
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based on this? This is not just and this isn't even one season.
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This is two years in a row. There's been one long like double VHS
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tape of unacceptable but unacceptable play to be like, oh gosh, I you
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know, I thought we were going to turn it around and I could see
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the light at the end of the tunnel, and there's no reason to have
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any any hope unless you are the head coach. And really I don't even
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think it's hope that he would have anymore. It would be like, what
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is more desperate than hope? Because nothing has been improving, nothing has been
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getting better. It's only been getting worse or staying stagnant. And in a
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place like Ohio State, and if you're being stagnant, then things are not
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getting better, so he may as well be getting worse. So I don't
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understand how he could be blindsided by this when everybody has been expecting it or
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no, not just expecting it. But it would be acceptable if it happened
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now. Yeah, it would have been acceptable to happen now. It would
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have been acceptable to happen a month ago today. That was when they lost
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to Michigan up in ann Arbor on MLK Day. That was the one where
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I went, oh, okay, so this is just done. This is
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like done, done, overcooked, no chance of recovery. They that dropped
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them to one in three in the conference. They had lost to Indiana and
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Wisconsin immediately before that. Came back the next game they did beat Penn State
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and then lost to Nebraska, lost to Northwestern, and lost to Illinois lost
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to Iowa, lost to Indiana to overtime win over Maryland, and then they
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lost to Wisconsin, and that's it now for Chris Holtman, Jake Diebler will
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be taking over. He was the associate head coach of the basketball team.
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He's now the interim head coach. I'm a little surprised they didn't pull the
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plug a little earlier and give Jake the Deebler a chance to at least sort
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of show what he's got. Now, you've got six games left before the
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Big Ten Conference tournament, and you know what would he have to do to
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show that he deserves a job? Go five and one. I mean,
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they've got Purdue, Minnesota, Michigan State, Nebraska, Michigan, and Rutgers.
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There are some winnable games there, but you know, you got a
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one of the nation's best teams in Purdue coming in on Sunday. I guess.
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I mean we're both old enough to remember THEMDA beating number one Illinois way
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back when, and that was sort of a signature moment at the end of
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his first season. So sure, I guess. I just the timing's a
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little weird on this that you could have done it a month ago. You
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could have waited a month and done it. Then you know what has changed
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in the last month that has changed the trajectory on any of this. Well,
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and maybe a money thing where you finally the money people are finally like
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this, Just do this now the frustration, I think you also have to
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act in order to keep people from just being so they can tune completely out.
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This at least builds up some momentum for the for the program. And
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I'll go back to you. If you know you're gonna do it at the
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end of the season, why not do it now and just begin the process
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of getting ready for a new coach. Get that search committee going, and
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then they'll bring some names back to you know, Ross Byorg Jean Smith.
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But in terms of can Jake Diebler do anything to keep this job, I'm
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suggesting nothing short of Steve Fisher replacing Bill Frieder at Michigan back in nineteen eighty
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nine. You know you better go win it all because there is no reason
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at Ohio State this should be an internal job from a guy who got fired
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Like that's that's not the coaching tree that they need to be picking the fruit
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from. This is a this is the best job in the Big ten.
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They need to be looking nationally and it doesn't need to be a Butler head
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coach. It doesn't need to be somebody from Wichita State. It should be
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somebody from a level equal and you know to Ohio State where it's you should
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be able to go get a top twenty five programs head coach who is doing
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very well right now, a top ten program because it's Ohio State. And
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if you're not approaching it like that, then don't be surprised when the highers
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you make end up being five hundred over a four year span. And you
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know the timing of this. One other piece of the timing of this is
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that changeover in athletic director from Jean Smith to ros Ross Byork shows up officially
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on March first, doesn't take over and in the full athletic director position until
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July first, but he will start working at Ohio State on March first.
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You wonder a little bit is this Jean Smith saying, you know, raising
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his hand or being asked raise his hand and say, this is your mess,
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clean it up before the new guy gets here. Because Jean Smith did
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give Ross did give Chris Holtman a three year contract extension before the twenty twenty
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two twenty twenty three season, that is right when the nine to twenty five
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and Big ten play started. Ian Smith has had some great moments at Ohio
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State as an athletic director. That is not going to be at the top
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of that list that contract extension. So you know, now Chris Holtman's in
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the review mirror as ross Byorke comes in. Ross Byorke is going to be
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the one leading this search. That was part of the Ohio State release on
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this and you know, you were talking about the types of coaches that you
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might see in, you know, as potential candidates moving forward. Greg Greg
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McDermott from Creyton. He was one of the leading candidates during the search where
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they ended up hiring Holtman. The other person we were talking about right before
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we hit record here, Lamont Paris from South Carolina. He is an Ohio
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guy from Finley, went to college in Wooster. Currently has South Caro align
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it in the top fifteen with a former Ohio State player as one of his
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best players there. I mean, I would have him towards the top of
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my list. I don't know about you. Yeah, somebody would experience building
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something and experience keeping it at a level. But also that has now shown
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that they can produce a you know, top ten program, because again,
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to me, this is what Ohio State should be. It should never be
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a losing program in the Big ten over two years. And when it's been
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that way in the past, you've had to make big changes and you know,
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going from Jim O'Brien to Thad Mada, that worked. But you know,
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this is a different day and age with the way college sports are,
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so I I don't know how easy it is to find that right guy,
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but you should have plenty of options and you should have plenty of time to
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parse things out into people. Just I remember going back and watching and listening
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when we were there with Ross Byorke and Ted Carter and Ross Buorke talking about
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the coaching process, about the search committee. Though the search committee will go
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out and they'll bring me like two or three names, and it's like,
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I hope you really trust the search committee because for somebody to go out and
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just pair things down like that and then that's all you're choosing from. I
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just I don't necessarily trust that process implicitly. So I think you it's a
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national search, and to be honest, the correspondent should be headed towards Ohio
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State as much as it is Ohio State going out because it is a coveted
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job that does allow you to fly under the radar if you want, but
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you definitely don't have to at all. You can be front and center with
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this program. And and I don't think that Modern necessarily necessarily took a backseat
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to Jim Trestled during their days, and this was a very, very prominent
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program in a amount of time. He took it to a level that Fred
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Taylor really never had it, even though Fred Taylor has the lone national title.
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And I'm not saying where I Thadmota had it for a four or five
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year stretches where Ohio State should always be because I don't think you can do
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that, but it should be attainable. The Final four is attainable for half
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of the teams. Basically in college basketball, you know a quarter of them
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just all you have to do is get hot for five games. And we've
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seen eight seeds, twelve seeds or whatever make that run. So it is
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possible. I don't think you should ever expect it, And that's my thing
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with college basketball. You should never expect to make the Final four, you
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should never expect to win a national title, but you should threaten it,
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threaten for it, and you should make a run. And Chris Holtman never
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getting past the second round became essentially a meme after a few years. And
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so that is the that's not even a baseline. That's the basement of what
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should be expected at Ohio State. Is I think that's the sorry to say,
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that's the legacy that Chris Haltman leaves behind. Is it's like the low
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water mark, and it's like you better be above here because I don't know
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how patient the next guy is going to be. Yeah, I think compete
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for the Big ten at least every couple of years. You don't have to
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win it, but compete for the Big ten every couple of years, make
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it to the Sweet sixteen every couple of years, three years, something like
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that. That seems all like very reasonable. And you know, I mentioned
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Greg McDermott earlier. Greg McDermott was a sixth seed with Creighton last year and
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got them to I think it was one second or something like that. They
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were playing San Diego State, in Louisville for the right to go to the
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Final four, and it ended up being I think a one point game settled
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in the final seconds. I was there. It was a very random thing.
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We've talked about that on the Buckeye Weekly podcast. I was driving through
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Louisville and just was like, well, we could go stop and watch the
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last ten minutes of this game for ten dollars, So we did. So.
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Yeah, there's some first person scouting for you, you know. The
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Lamont Mont Paris just his contract, Just an update on that from the state
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newspaper out of South Carolina heading into the season. Sorry, Lamont Paris was
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the lowest paid coach in the SEC two point three million annually, with one
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hundred thousand dollars raises each of the next three years. The state newspaper reports
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that he has a relatively low buyout as well. So you know that is
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that is someone that Ohio State could go get, you know, financially without
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any kind of trouble. And just to give you his resume, he was
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an assistant at Akron and Wisconsin for quite a while and then his first head
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coach and job was at Chattanooga UTUE. Chatanooga the moxo. You will see
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in the tournament every once in a while, the moccasins ten and twenty three,
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twelve and twenty and then twenty and thirteen, eighteen and eight, twenty
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seven and eight. I mean that is a very steady climb. That is
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not I inherited a great program. That is a very steady climb. This
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is his second year at South Carolina. First year eleven and twenty one,
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second year twenty one and three, Tony, I would say that represents both
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of those represent some tangible signs of progress with an Ohio guy. It feels
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like someone that we're probably going to be at least talking about for the next
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couple of weeks. Well, it's always interesting to watch the NCAA Tournament and
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see which coach ascends to being the next hot guy when when it was what
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Andy Kennedy at the Florida Gulf Coast a decade ago, takes the USC job
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or whatever. But this is this is going to be an opportunity for somebody
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to elevate themselves and showcase themselves. It is every year. It's like a
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coaching Coaches convention type of thing, but it's the NCAA Tournament. And some
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group of five school or whatever goes ahead and leads somebody to to Elite EID
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or Final four. They capture the Hearts and the net coach goes on to
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cash in. So were just a couple other names that I've at least been
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looking at. Anthony Grant from Dayton. The catch with him is he is
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a Dayton grad who is coaching at Dayton, so he might be tough to
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pry out of the flyers position. But fourteen and seventeen to twenty one and
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twelve to twenty nine and two, and then a lit'tle step back to thirteen
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and ten, but then right back up twenty four and eleven, twenty two
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and twelve and nineteen and four this year, and then finally Tony we mentioned
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sort of going the mid right major route if they wanted to do that.
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Josh Shurtz from Indiana State eleven and twenty to twenty three and thirteen to twenty
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two and four. He just three seasons there. They did just lose to
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Illinois State literally last night, so he has made Indiana State relevant for the
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first time since Larry Bird left, which has been a hot minute. But
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just another name there. But yeah, I'm if I'm ross byorke I'm looking
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at Lamont Paris and thinking that might not be a bad might not be a
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bad move, But well, where will they go? Well, we'll all
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find out together. There's gonna be a little time probably before the before that
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hiring is finished, because you can there's still another month or so of basketball
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season left before you can probably hire anyone away. So we'll keep an eye
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on that for you. But we're also, of course keeping an eye on
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football as well. There's a whole lot going on there with the football program
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and winter workouts kind of wrapping up pretty soon and heading into spring football in
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just what three weeks something like that. We are getting close already, lots
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of stuff to talk about and hoping to have some interviews with some players and
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coaches in the coming weeks as well. So there's to be a lot of
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stuff to talk about in the coming days, coming weeks, and you can
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talk about it all at bucke huddle dot com. That's where Tony, Kevin
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and I cover the team, Mark covers recruiting, plenty of x's no's talk
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as well from our schematic gurus like Ross Fulton and Devin and Justin and Mickey
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all on the Huddle Board presented by Jeff Ruby Steakhouse. That's where we were
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making you smarter football fans, giving you some inside inside information on the team,
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recruiting, all that good stuff all at Buckey huddle dot com. That
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will do today. Thank you guys all for joining us. Have a great
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day. We will talk to you tomorrow.