Arkansas Business

This story is from the archives of ArkansasSports360.com.

Don’t laugh, Arkansas fan. It could have been you.

In fact, it has been you and not too long ago. You sat and watched the college basketball program you love publicly turned down by one top-notch coach on your wish list after another, the college coaching carousel spinning and spinning without stopping and dropping off the coaches you wanted. 

It has been you defending a head-scratching hire with a sales job you tried to believe, but deep down knew was hog slop. You know what it’s like.

So don’t laugh. Don’t take joy in the misery felt by Missouri fans. Or Georgia Tech and North Carolina State.

Just be thankful and confident that the Razorbacks wound up with — watch the word choice here — inarguably the best possible candidate for this job. Hiring season appears to be winding down in major conferences with basketball job openings. TV analyst (and former Alabama coach) Mark Gottfried was hired by the North Carolina State, leaving only Miami with a vacancy. Gottfried’s hiring press conference was hijacked by an athletic director who claimed her coaching search was sabotaged by a coach at a school where she once worked.

Yikes.

But don’t laugh. Just smile confidently, knowing that a quality coach — one with a track record for academic and athletic success — now runs basketball at Arkansas.

It’s not unreasonable to think Mike Anderson will have the Razorbacks back in the NCAA Tournament in a reasonable amount of time.

Can you say the same for Georgia Tech? That school spent $7 million to buy out its old coach. That left the Yellow jackets scraping for coin under couch cushions to hire new coach Brian Gregory. Thanks to that insane buyout Georgia Tech, according to a report, had only $1.2 million to spend for its head coach and staff.

I see you snickering. Stop it.

Be thankful for the approach that Jeff Long took in seeking out a new coach. Long knew before the process began the amount of money he could spend to land a quality coach. He didn’t throw out ridiculous figures in the press and he didn’t appear to allow himself to get used for money by a parade of candidates.

As has been noted before in this space, $2.2 million seems like a lot of money. It will take a high-level of success and a jump in ticket sales to justify making Anderson one of the Top 10 highest-paid coaches in college basketball.