With the stunning news that Brad Stevens is now the head coach of the Boston Celtics with a six-year-deal worth $22 million, Butler must now find a new coach just a few days after officially joining the Big East Conference on Monday.
Keep in mind that the July live period is about to start and coaches will be heading out on the road next week for recruiting.
“Understanding the situation, I would expect someone from the Butler family and someone who understands the Butler way to get the job,” ESPN college basketball analyst Seth Greenberg told SNY.tv. “They have great pride in the culture that they established and I would expect them to keep it within the family and keep this system consistent.”
Former Butler associate head coach Matthew Graves would have been the logical candidate but he recently took the South Alabama job and confirmed to SNY.tv that he was not a candidate.
“I am staying at South Alabama,” he said by text.
He also told AL.com of Butler: “It is home and it’s certainly a tough decision (not to express interest in the job), but at the same time, there’s a lot of things to consider besides your own personal feelings. You’ve got families that have come down here with me on our coaching staff and you’ve got friends of mine who are on the coaching staff there currently at Butler.
“There’s just a lot of different pieces for people to sort through. But at the end of the day I’m really excited about being here and seeing where we can go with this program.”
Barry Collier, the school’s AD and former basketball coach from 1989-2000, is also not a candidate, sources told SNY.tv.
The top two candidates appear to be Michigan assistant LaVall Jordan, who is a former Butler assistant under Todd Lickliter and who was on the bench for the NCAA championship game this season; and Brandon Miller, a Matta assistant at Xavier and Ohio State and a Butler assistant under Stevens.
“I would be really upset if it were someone outside of those two,” Joel Cornette, a former Bulldog center and assistant coach, told the Indy Star of Jordan and Miller. “When Brad took the job, he’d been doing things the Butler Way. He’d been there for years. These guys are the same way.”
Butler — which reached back-to-back NCAA title games in 2010 and ’11 — needs to act quickly given that college coaches will head out on the road on July 10 and Butler needs to make a statement on the recruiting trail as it heads into the new Big East.
“Brad is leaving a great legacy and an excellent foundation for us to build on” Collier said. “Our athletics program has an extremely bright future, and we are confident that Butler’s first year in the Big East will be an outstanding one.”
