Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

We've discussed this a bit in the Holtmann Thread and in the current B1G Basketball thread.  I also considered just starting next year's B1G Basketball Thread early and putting this there and if mods think that is the right option then just go ahead and change this to the 2024-2025 B1G Basketball Thread.  

I think we should perhaps start with the elephant in the room.  Ohio State is 4-1 so far under Interim Coach Jake Diebler.  I personally don't think that is enough *YET* but I think most of us would agree that there is a line somewhere and if Jake Diebler crosses that line (wherever it is), he should be retained.  Where exactly that line is could be debated all day long.  

Pros and Cons for Jake Diebler:
The biggest con is the lack of head coaching experience.  Does it really make sense for Ohio State to spend a ton of money to make Chris Holtmann go away just to hand the keys to a guy who has literally never been a head coach before?  

IMHO, there are three major pros for this.  First is dependent upon performance but so far so good.  Second is continuity.  This is a bit of a double-edged sword as it raises the thorny question of whether or not you actually WANT continuity with a prior coach who you just paid MILLIONS to get rid of but OTOH, Diebler recruited a lot of the existing players and potential commits and is probably in the best possible position to keep them.  The third thing is money.  With Diebler there is obviously no buyout since he is already an employee and you can probably safely pay him bottom-half of B1G money as essentially a "probationary" salary.  

Speaking of, B1G BB Coach salaries according to an IU site prior to this season:

• $6.2M, Tom Izzo, MSU
• $4.6M, Brad Underwood, IL
• $4.2M, Mike Woodson, IU
• $3.9M, Kevin Willard, UMD
• $3.55M, Matt Painter, PU
• $3.55M, Greg Gard, UW
• $3.5M, Chris Holtmann, tOSU
• $3.5M, Fred Hoiberg, UNL
• $3.4M, Mike Rhoades, PSU
• $3.25M, Juwan Howard, M
• $3.25M, Steve Pikiell, RU
• $3.2M, Fran McCaffery, IA
• $2.89M, Chris Collins, NU
• $1.95M, Ben Johnson, Minnesota

If you are competing with everybody to lure a big name you are probably looking at paying $4M/yr or more.  If you sign your own guy you can probably come in significantly under that and also with a lower percentage guaranteed in case he doesn't work out.  

Xavier Coach Sean Miller has been a name a lot of people have tossed out.  He is in his second stint at Xavier having previously been the head coach there from 2004-2009 before leaving for Arizona (2009-2021).  He got fired by Arizona more for NCAA troubles than performance issues but, IMHO that is worse.  I don't want to become Michigan.  My view is that cheating is and should be a firing offense at Ohio State, not a cause for celebration like it is up North.  I'd rather not go this route.  

Pros and cons of Sean Miller:
The pro is that he is a proven winner with 8 S16's and 4 E8's.  The con is the ethical issues.  

Dusty May is another name out there.  The current FAU coach took the Owls to the F4 last year and has them 2nd in the American and probably looking at a return to the NCAA Tournament this year.  The pro is the F4, the con is that was his only ever trip to the NCAA Tournament.  In his defense, FAU has literally zero prior NCAA success.  They have four total NCAA Tournament wins all time, and all four of those were last year.  Prior to that they only had one NCAA appearance and lost in the first round.  Last year was his fifth at FAU and it was a F4 but prior to that his first four FAU teams finished 9th, 9th, 4th, and 2nd in CUSA and never even made the NCAA Tournament.  It is a gamble because you really don't know if last year was a sign of how good he really is or just a random magical year that he'll never be able to duplicate.  Another problem with May is that he absolutely loves Indiana and who knows how long Woodson will stay employed there.  So you either have to accept that you may lose him to his alma mater or make the buyout so high that even IU will not pay it but buyouts are typically symmetrical so if you do that and he doesn't work out you'll have to pay a fortune to get rid of him.  

Lamont Paris has USCe in the SEC hunt and is a name that will be kicked around for all the openings this season.  He is a native Ohioan with deep ties to the state and also with close ties to the Wisconsin program.  He was born in Findlay, Ohio and after graduating from Findlay High School he played college ball at Wooster (Ohio).  After college he made short assistant coaching stops at Wooster, DePauw (IN), Indiana U of PA (PA), and Akron (OH) before a seven year stint at UW from 2010-2017.  Then he coached Chattanooga for five years with the team improving most years and reaching the NCAA Tournament in his final year there before heading to USCe.  

On Lamont Paris, his team's record this year is odd.  They are currently 24-5/12-4, tied with Bama and one game behind Tennessee for the SEC lead.  They host Tennessee on Wednesday and already won in Knoxville so they currently control their own destiny to at least a share of the SEC title.  What is strange about his record is that he has some great wins (beating a then top-10 Kentucky and winning on the road against top-5 Tennessee) but he also has some dreadful losses.  The five losses are:

• At Clemson by 5
• At Bama by 27
• Vs UGA by 5
• At Auburn by 40
• Vs LSU by 1

The close losses to Clemson and LSU are fine but UGA is a terrible team and losing by 30-40 points is bad no matter who you are playing so the losses to Bama and Auburn are troubling.  Even the LSU loss is a little questionable since they are a .500 SEC team and USCe lost to them at home.  I'm just not sure what to make of this.  

Greg McDermott has had a lot of success at Creighton and could be a candidate for the job.  He will turn 60 this fall so if the Buckeyes hire him he'll be in his 60's by the time he coaches his first game at Ohio State.  From my perspective he "feels" like less of a gamble than Diebler/May/Paris with a less likely downside but also less upside potential because if one of the others succeeds he could coach here for the next 20 years where McDermott's horizon is probably no more than a decade.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWI4Fhq0x00

TLDR

Jeff Goodman thinks it will be Dusty May. Says May is represented by Klutch Sports (aka the Lebron and Rich Paul agency). There was a weird report that Lebron wanted Dusty May, but this makes a lot more sense in that context. Also says he doesn't think Dusty May wants the Indiana job and would prefer the Ohio State job where no one pays as much attention to him. Said he didn't think they would go after Sean Miller, but didn't really give a reason. Also says Jake Diebler won't get it.

My fear is that they'll hire another big name bust, while Jake Diebler goes onto be a rock star HC somewhere else. 

Forget about this one.

I wasn't expecting Holtmann to land in the Big East.