March Through Madness: An NCAA Tourney Blog : Did Kansas Win a Title and Lose a Coach?

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March Through Madness

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Mark Coatney

Devin Gordon

Mark Starr

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March gets all the ink, and the fancy "Madness" nickname, but as a top-to-bottom sports fan, I'm finding myself much more partial to April. We get the Final Four and the national title game, then the Masters just a few days later. And wrapped all around...

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Did Kansas Win a Title and Lose a Coach?

Devin Gordon

I think its only fitting that we let Coatney have the last word, assuming he's come down from that cloud yet. He's waited a long time for this, and his Jayhawks took the title in the most electrifying way. There's no such thing as a crummy national championship, but no one wants to win one in a garbage game like, say, the Maryland-Indiana slopfest about five years ago. This was a skilled, thrilling game, with superb players all over the court, and the kind of finish you can't script. I'd like to second Starr's compliment of the referees and their wise decision to swallow their whistles. As I watched it, I thought often that the game was being called like an NBA game--and that it was much better for it. The players decided this one, loud and clear.

But now all the speculation will turn to the coaches--or one coach, at least. When I sent Coatney a congratulatory e-mail last night, I told him that I thought he'd won a title but probably lost a coach. As everyone reading this surely knows, Bill Self is being wooed by his alma mater, Oklahoma State, with buckets of money. Coatney thinks he'll resist the lure, but I seriously doubt it. At the risk of being a cynic, OSU is simply offering too much money to walk away from--a reported $4 million per year with a $6 million bonus. (He makes just over $1 million per with Kansas.) I'm sure KU will sweeten his deal, but not /that/ much. And here's why I'm so convinced Self will take the dough: it wouldn't be a betrayal. It would, in fact, be an act of loyalty to both sides. He can cry "mission accomplished" for Kansas--he got them their title--and he can return home without leaving any unfinished business and without having to explain why on Earth he would do it. And though it didn't stop Billy Donovan, the thought will surely cross Self's mind about what kind of KU team hed be returning to. Its also worth saying that $10 million is an insane amount of money, and I'm not sure any of us--as pure and noble as we are--could walk away from it. Especially if we were being offered that money to come home.

Coatney, I don't think anything can dim your day today. But do you really think Self will be your coach next year? Or is that just the champagne talking?

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