Members of “the family” will be quite pleased with Herb Sendek’s coaching announcement today.
Having been given a super opportunity to change some of the complexion and direction of his basketball program while quickly correcting some major shortcomings in his own resume, Herb Sendek did exactly what you might expect of old “Mr Excitement” — he did the easy thing; the path of significantly least resistance.
No reason to let anyone else into the circle and provide any kind of outside perspective, was there?
Today, Herb Sendek announced that Archie Miller would be promoted from Director of Basketball Operations to an Assistant Coaching position to fill the void left by Larry Hunter. Miller was one of Sendek’s first recruits in Raleigh, and is the brother of former Wolfpack assistant coach, Sean Miller. He has either played or coached for Herb Sendek in 7 of the last 8 years.
Caveat
One thing major item is unclear to me in this announcement.
The announcement states that “Mark Phelps, who has spent the last five years as an assistant coach for the Wolfpack, has been named Director of Scouting and Recruiting Coordinator. Phelps also came to NC State with Sendek in 1996, serving as the Director of Basketball Operations for four seasons before moving into the coaching position. A 1996 graduate of Old Dominion, Phelps was a successful high school coach in Virginia before joining Sendek. ”
So, I have to ask a question — does this move to Director of Scouting and Recruiting Coordinator mean that Phelps has been relieved of his Assistant Coaching position and therefore State still has an open coaching position available?
Does anyone know? This statement is fuzzy and open to a lot of interpretation.
Analysis – (assumes that no open assistant position currently exists)
There is not much to really analyze here. The only analyzing that can be done is on the failure to capitalize on the opportunity to do something different and greater with the program. Other than that, nothing has really changed here for us — Archie Miller was already on staff. He was here before…and he is here now (just with a different title).
Basically, State just lost an assistant coach with 25 years of head coaching experience and chose to replace him with a guy named Greg Morland who has spent the last three years as a camera man. (as the Video Coordinator for the Wolfpack program. A 1987 graduate of Muskingum College, Morland has served on the coaching staffs at his alma mater, as well as at Ohio Dominican University, Tiffin University and Cory-Rawson High School.)
IMHO, Sendek has failed miserably to fix many of the shortcomings of our program as discussed in my entry suggesting Sidney Lowe & Stormin’s entry from last week discussing the opening.
Archie Miller is inexperienced (he wasn’t even alive when Larry Hunter took his first Head Coaching job) and the weakness in his resume is compounded with the fact that he has basically played and worked for only one point of view over the greater part of the last decade – the point of view of Herb Sendek.
What is Miller supposed to bring to the table that wasn’t already on the staff before? Since Miller was on staff before…obviously nothing. I guess this Greg Morland guy can really edit some video that makes Jeff Gravely jealous…because we just replaced Larry Hunter with Greg Morland. Pure genius. (Oh…I’m probably not allowed to say that since I didn’t go to Carnegie Mellon?)
Are we supposed to think that this staff – which is the same as before except without Larry Hunter – can supposedly recruit in the ACC against:
* 3 coaches that have won national championships in the last 5 years,
* another coach that has made the National Title game and already coached 3 or 4 NBA players in the last 5 years
* and Skip Prosser who has beaten the pants off of the staff on the recruiting trail?
It will be interesting to see what the new impetus will be for NBA-type talent to suddenly start signing with State who will be recruiting them with the exact same staff that has failed to land this talent for the last decade.
