Some of this is repetitive but I thought I'd reset everything as of last night's Kentucky loss.
- I have no new information this morning. I have heard nothing definitively as to whether Vanderbilt will move on from Jerry Stackhouse or not. Vanderbilt lost at Kentucky last night by 16 points after leading late in the first half. I don't know that this changes the case one way or another to move on but it can't help.
- I still don't know the exact buyout but again, my guess based on the information I have is in the $14-15 million range. I have one source who believes it's closer to $8-10 million. Either way, it won't be cheap. The buyout cost would be offset by Stackhouse getting another job somewhere but the man has all kinds of money already and isn't in demand as a head coach anywhere as far as I know.
- Could Vanderbilt take care of the buyout? Yes, I know of ways it could easily but would prefer to keep that info to myself to protect a source.
- If Vanderbilt does move on, my guess is that it would make a move some time on Sunday.
- Part 1 of why I'm guessing a Sunday timeline: The buyout, combined with whatever it would cost to get an established, sitting head coach elsewhere and buy that guy out, would be expensive. I just don't see Vanderbilt paying Stack $15 mil (if that's the case) to go away, and then spending millions more to hire away Shaka Smart or whoever. That's a lot of money to pay before next year's coach has coached a game.
- Part 2 of why I'm guessing a move would be made Sunday: If that's true, the target would probably be lower level coach--a Josh Schertz, Pat Kelsey, Ritchie McKay, Bucky McMillan, whoever, a coach who could be playing in the NCAA Tournament in two weeks. Some of those coaches will have their conference tournaments by the weekend. That gives a school like Vanderbilt a chance to get in position to spend next week trying to potentially lock a guy down.
- If it is a lower-level coach, and that guy has a run in the NCAA tournament, I'd expect the name to leak out during that run so as to get the school some publicity as it's happening.
- If they don't move on Sunday, it could mean a bunch of things. It could mean the target is someone who is coaching an at-large-caliber team. It could be they're getting cute with an out-of-the-box candidate somewhere. It could mean they're taking a wait-and-see if Stack makes a run in the SEC tourney. It could mean they aren't firing him. It could mean general incompetence. Anyway, if they don't make a move on Sunday (and I have no info they will, but just war-gaming this) then I'm going to have a lot more questions than answers.
- If they do make a move, I'd expect the committee to be Candice, Ena Patel and Trace Wilgus (the current basketball administrator) at a minimum. I've heard Tracey George's name dropped as a possible candidate; she's a university vice-provost for faculty affairs. Of that list, the guy I far and away trust with making good decisions is Wilgus; his reputation is that he's a good dude and a sports guy. I could see them putting a "sports person" on the committee just to answer that criticism, but I would expect it to be Shan Foster or someone in Candice's inner circle. Daniel Diermeier would be a part of things but speculation is that he could be "in and out" of the process and maybe not at the middle. Or maybe he is more at the center of things, I don't know. John Ingram has typically been on these committees but I don't know if he would be or not. There could be others; I'd just about take Candice/Patel/Wilgus to the bank with some Diermeier and presume a committee along the lines of academic folks/someone close to Candice.
- Again, it looks like this will be a Renaissance-led search based on recent movement but I do wonder about the small possibility of Diermeier pulling an emergency brake and using Parker (as the school typically has) or even Korn-Ferry.
I'll pass along anything else relevant as I get it.
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