Last Season's Highlights

Oh, hell yeah! I was starting to worry that I wouldn't have any material this summer and then the "Vermont Catamounts" Facebook fan site comes through with this video:


My favorite? Voekel's behind the back pass to Fjeld at the :34 second mark.

John Becker In As Coach

Coach Becker. I can get down with that.

The University of Vermont made John Becker the head coach of the men's basketball program on Friday. The hire was not as juicy as it could have been, but it was a safe and calculated hire. The team will face less of a transition period going into next season, assuming that Becker's style of coaching will not differ dramatically from that of former Coach Mike Lonergan. Also, returning players and recruits who committed to play at Vermont will be less likely to look into playing at another program, which is often a concern when you hire a coach from outside of your program.

Becker has previous head coaching experience at Division III Gallaudet University, a school for the deaf and hearing impaired. He then moved on to being an assistant coach at Catholic University (where Lonergan used to coach) before coming to Vermont to be an assistant under Lonergan. That type of experience had to be what set Becker apart from Lonergan's top assistant at Vermont, Hajj Turner, who will be going to GW with Lonergan.

Apparently, Becker had tears in his eyes while he was being announced as the head coach. Imagine how hard he will be bawling when Vermont wins an NCAA tournament game.

Coaching Search Continues

In the midst of Vermont's search for a new coach, I have been on a four day, 2,300 mile road trip back to Vermont (I took a bizarre route to make sure I saw some old friends). That is the my excuse for the lack of coverage detailing UVM's ongoing coaching search. Sporting Vermont recently ran a great piece covering this subject, and, as that article points out, John Fantino has also done a predictably good job keeping the Catamount faithful up to speed.

So here's what we know: former Lonergan assistant John Becker is the interim head coach -- a great choice because he helped keep recruits committed to UVM, and he has helped keep current players from transferring (so far). Keep in mind how many schools would love to have Brian Voelkel, Luke Apfeld, or Sandro Carissimo and their three years of remaining eligibility. We know that Middlebury coach Jeff Brown is not interested in the job. As our friend Oscar, who writes for America Least, pointed out, Brown has a really good situation at Middlebury. You have to respect coaches who know that good is good enough. Just ask Dan Munson. Or Billy Gillespie. Or Jeff Capel. It's a long list, and those are only a few high profile cases of coaches who sprung for "better" coaching jobs that turned out to be a whole lot worse. We also know that Hajj Turner, Lonergan's top assistant, will be headed down to GW with Lonergan.

Other than that, several names have been thrown around as possible candidates to take over at UVM. Don't count Becker out, but I would personally be surprised if he landed the head coaching job without the "interim" part attached to the title. He was not even Lonergan's top assistant, and though he has legitimate experience coaching at the Division III level, you would think UVM would look for a bigger name. It will be interesting to see how it unfolds.

Sure is nice to be back home in Vermont.

Lonergan Leaves For GW

The Vermont men's basketball team has no head coach. Mike Lonergan announced last night via text message that he will be coaching the George Washington Colonials next season.

During Lonergan's six years at Vermont, the Catamounts enjoyed a record of 126-68 and qualified for one NCAA tournament, a CBI, and two NIT appearances. They won the regular season crown twice during his tenure (and shared it a third time).

The national search for a new head coach to fill the gaping hole at Vermont will begin immediately. The front runner for this job will likely be somebody with no Division I head coaching experience -- remember, Lonergan did not have any when he first came to Burlington. Jeff Brown, who graduated from UVM in 1982, seems to be the people's choice (I know this because of twitter). Brown is considered a great tactician and recruiter at the Division III level, down the road at Middlebury, where he has coached for the past fourteen years. All the Panthers did this past season was go 28-2 en route to the NCAA semifinals.

Another possible candidate would have to be Hajj Turner, Lonergan's former top assistant. Turner was rumored to be going back to his alma mater, Louisville, to become an assistant under Rick Pitino. It seems like that has fallen through.

The dark horse, the crazy-hire, the are-you-out-of-your-mind-candidate is your boy, T.J. Sorrentine, who has been a top assistant at Brown the last two seasons. Lord knows, Sorrentine would be welcomed back to Patrick with arms wide open. If you foolishly clicked that link, I apologize.

So today we say goodbye to Mike Lonergan and wish him the best of luck in the future. I can already picture the odd frequency with which I will find myself on the GW athletics page, quietly hoping that Lonergan can make us proud, and the strange warm feeling that I will get when a GW game is on television and the ESPN announcers are obliged to say, "Lonergan had great success at his previous job, coaching up in Burlington. (Second announcer): He coached at UVM, where he replaced our buddy, Tom Brennan." And UVM basketball will get a little more well-deserved respect. And for that, Coach Lonergan, we thank you.

Hewitt In At George Mason

Former Georgia Tech head coach Paul Hewitt has been hired at George Mason to the same title. Hewitt seemed like he was on the proverbial hot seat for the last three decades in Atlanta, but it was probably more like the last three years. He was finally fired at the end of this season sometime during March (dates in that month don't actually exist due to the NCAA tournament). After reaching the NCAA title game in 2004 (and losing to UConn), Hewitt and the Yellow Jackets were never able to achieve the same level of success: they reached the second round twice in those seven years and missed the tournament four times.

This means that Coach Lonergan remains an obvious candidate at only one school, George Washington. This may have already been established considering that Lonergan never even interviewed at George Mason (to my knowledge), while his interview at George Washington was openly publicized.

It took Mason about a week to hire a coach. Monday will mark a week since George Washington fired Karl Hobbs, so you might anticipate hearing about who will be the new coach at GW early this week.

Buckle up -- the coaching carousel is awhirl.

GW To Interview Lonergan

According to the Burlington Free Press, UVM head coach Mike Lonergan will interview for the open George Washington coaching job.

Lonergan has rarely shown any interest in interviewing for other jobs, so it would appear that he is definitively attracted to this job. I guess you can take the coach out of Washington D.C., but you can't keep him in Vermont unless you pay him more money. That's the saying, right?

Hobbs Out at GW -- Lonergan a Candidate There, Too?

The plot thickens. George Washington University announced on Monday that head coach Karl Hobbs has been fired. The highlight of Hobbs' ten year run in Washington D.C. was a 27-3 record in 2005-2006. The Colonels made the tournament again the next year before slipping into Atlantic 10 mediocrity the last few seasons.

Why is this significant in terms of UVM Basketball? For two reasons. It means two intriguing coaching jobs have opened up in the Washington D.C. area in the last few days. Coach Lonergan is from there, and has various coaching experience in the area, as my previous post takes note of. Perhaps more importantly, the man who fired Hobbs, Patrick Nero, had just been hired as the new athletic director at GW. His previous position? Commissioner of the America East conference. Nero will lead the search for a new coach to head the Colonels, and you have to believe Mike Lonergan is somewhere on that list.

The Nero connection is what UVM fans who hope to see Lonergan stay should be worried about; the GW job is not quite as alluring as the George Mason job. George Mason is coming off a solid season in which they were ranked in the top five of the mid-major poll for upwards of a month. They made it to the second round of the NCAA tournament only to suffer a brutal loss at the hands of Ohio State's shooting display that can only be described as hot fuego (my own words). Mason returns four out of five of their leading scorers from last season. Meanwhile, George Washington showed some signs of life last season, finishing fourth in the Atlantic ten, but they are not nearly as polished a product as the Patriots. That is to say, stepping into the George Mason job would seem to be much more desirable. Also, George Mason's iconic status as a mid-major juggernaut seems to have had some pull in the recruiting world over the last five seasons, something any coach must be attracted to.

With potential options springing up for Lonergan, Catamount country remains on high alert.