I was a student when V was hired. Nobody knew who he was other than a Sports Illustred article about Jeff Ruland. We didn’t have Ken Pom, RPI, BPI, EFF FG%, relative timeout effectiveness, or the internets. We first tried to hire a HS coach and were rejected. People took a wait and see attitude. In year one V was severely overmatched on multiple occasions. We went 14-13 iirc. Year two looked a lot better but we lost to UT Chattanooga iirc in the NCAA tourney first round.
Just curious, with Jim Valvano coming from little known Iona, were fans exuberant of his hire?
