CRAWFORD | A look back at Louisville's circuitous search for a new basketball coach | Sports

NOTE: This column was written two hours before news of Louisville's basketball coaching decision broke. With changes happening rapidly, any needed amendments to this column were been made in bold, italics. - EC

UPDATE: College of Charleston's Pat Kelsey expected to be named next Louisville coach.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- The search now is apparently over, ending at one of the names it began with, Pat Kelsey, coach of College of Charleston, expected to be named soon. (Barring another wild curveball. But those never happen at Louisville, right?) But to get to this point, the University of Louisville proceeded through a sometimes confusing process.

When Bob Huggins is calling into sports talk radio in your town -- as he did Wednesday morning to Jerry Eaves -- and making his case to the public to be coach, all is not well. And, for the record, I like Huggins a lot and am glad to hear that he has dealt with his issues. And, from a purely reporter's perspective, Huggins would be good copy, and that's a lot of what I root for in these things. But I've already digressed.

You see? That's how easy it is to get distracted by the latest story, radio interview, social media rumor or whatever.

The Louisville coaching search took some turns.

There was the Scott Drew kickoff. A big swing that did not connect. Fine. He was the first call, and most would agree he should have been. He's staying in Waco, Texas, and that's as expected.

Dusty May, the next call and offer, had a last-minute change of heart. Let's just leave it at that.

But it turns out, May's friend, Indiana State coach Josh Schertz, who likely was next on Louisville's list (and perhaps higher had May not been the more recognized candidate), seems to have made an agreement with Saint Louis after May committed to Louisville, making him more expensive when Louisville turned its attention to him.

One thing I'm unclear on is why that agreement would be any real impediment to Louisville if it really wanted Schertz, but I don't know all the details. Heck, I may not know any of the details. Regardless, it looks at this point as if Schertz will be the coach at Saint Louis once Indiana State's NIT experience ends next week.

It's important to remember at this point that we're all seeing this through a glass darkly, to quote Scripture, and that, too, becomes more of a problem as these searches begin to go through their progressions, as football coaches would call it. Even what I am relating here is what I think. It is not what I know. And that's uncomfortable, but it's important for you to know, because I'm around people and talk to people but what I am writing here is not Scripture. It should be filed under commentary/opinion, and you should process it as such.

There was a conversation with Richard Pitino, after or in the midst of all this, and the name "Pitino" immediately set things on fire for a while, as it is wont to do in this state. Richard is a great person and a better coach than most people will give him credit for, given his record, and took New Mexico to the Mountain West Tournament championship and the NCAA Tournament this past season. He knows the game. You can't have his intellect and have spent as much time coaching with his Hall of Fame father and Billy Donovan and not know the game.

I don't know that Pitino has even been offered the job. I only think he's "in the mix" because Pat Forde of Sports Illustrated said he was, and I trust Pat. And people close to the Pitinos say that the family has had some discussions. I think Pitino and his family (extended) have gone through the process of talking about whether he wants to be in the mix, is how I would phrase it. And I don't know where that stands. I reached out to Richard and Rick, but neither has replied, and I didn't expect them to in the midst of this.

I have, from the start, thought there was no way Richard would want to come back here, given all that went on with his father and all the family history here. I'd be happy to have him, I just don't see it.

NOTE: Still have not heard directly from Richard Pitino. According to sources, after discussions he apparently was/is open to at least considering an offer, but in the end, no official offer was extended. Several websites have now reported he will remain at New Mexico.

Sitting in a stalking position, as we would say in horse racing, was Pat Kelsey at College of Charleston. He played for Skip Prosser at Xavier, was an assistant to Dino Gaudio at Wake Forest and was associate head coach to Chris Mack at Xavier before taking the job at Winthrop, and then going to College of Charleston. He's been to the NCAA Tournament four times, and three in the past five years. He's won a lot. His team this past season was in the neighborhood of top 50 in the country in tempo. Defensive efficiency is less so. He is a legitimate candidate who has been covered less than the rest because we know less about him than the rest.

He made headlines in 2012 with an impassioned speech about the Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting in Newtown, Mass., that moved one victim's family to the point where they reached out to him. He had them down for a basketball game and ran in a triathlon in memory of the victims. He also took the UMass job in 2017, then changed his mind before the press conference, for personal reasons, he said, and went back to Winthrop.

NOTE: Kelsey has now accepted the job.

And there's Shaheen Holloway, whose Seton Hall team is still playing in the NIT. He has few real connections to this area, that I know of, save for his agent, but he's a pretty impressive young coach. Everyone knows he beat Kentucky while at Saint Peters and parlayed that into the job at his alma mater. His team is 22-12 this year, but has a 15-point win over Connecticut, and also beat Marquette and St. John's (twice).

The important thing on both of those candidates is that they've been in "the mix" from pretty much the start. Or close to it. So they wouldn't be last-second hires if either was picked.

And, I think I should throw in WKU coach Steve Lutz, who did a great job at WKU this past season, is good friends with Louisville football coach Jeff Brohm and his family and, though he hasn't had the experience you'd want, probably, at Louisville, has at least been mentioned at another ACC school (SMU).

NOTE: Lutz was not the choice. The school, sources say, balked at a $2 million buyout for a candidate with just three years' experience (though he has been to the NCAA Tournament in all three years).

At some point, and I'm dead serious about this, was it crazy to call Scott Davenport, let him finish out his career at Louisville, and put this thing back on as solid a footing as you can get until you find someone you're sure of long term? Didn't happen. But his DII resume is better than Schertz's was, and he qualified for the NCAA Tournament in his second DI season. (In some ways, the fact that they were considering Schertz this year just tells me they should've hired him six years ago.) Just saying. I'll move on.

The longer this search went on, the more all of us groused. It was a stressful thing if you're in the media. Everywhere you go people asked you about it – and that's good. It's that interest that keeps us in business. But you also don't know what to say. I mean, I've wrote three FULL stories on guys I thought could take the Louisville job, just to have them ready (May, Pitino, Kelsey.)

It's hard on fans, because I feel as if you're jerked around a lot on this kind of thing. Every day there's a new hot thing on talk radio or social media that may or may not be something worth really getting riled up about, but in the absence of hard news, that's what you go with. It's not always different in TV or if you're writing for the newspaper. People want news, even if there isn't always news.

So you get Bob Huggins throwing his hat into the ring. It was part of the story. He wasn't part of the search, but now he was part of the story. Certainly, Will Wade out at McNeese, was part of the story. He was not part of the search, but he has some loyal fans around here. And with all of the "nos" Louisville got, you wondered if it would crack open the door to him a little bit? I mean, they could always have said, "Hey, we tried just about everybody else."

Everybody always asks, "But what about _________?" Fill in your coach's name in the blank.

Eric Musselman of Arkansas? I don't know.

Shaka Smart? Don't think he's interested.

Greg McDermott, Chris Beard, Tommy Lloyd, Nate Oats? All signed extensions at their schools.

Mick Cronin? Likely too expensive, with his buyout, in the end.

Bruce Pearl? See reason for Cronin.

Chis Collins? Steve Forbes? Jerome Tang? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.

Others? I don't really know.

I wish there hadn't been so many, "I don't knows." That, I do know.

I can tell you that Louisville athletic director Josh Heird doing now what a lot of people wanted done two years ago when Kenny Payne was hired. He talked to a lot of people. Heck, he may have talked to everybody by the time this was over.

There were, I know, a great many considerations. Consider that some boosters were more likely to respond financially, shall we say, to a coach who is more recognized, who brings more buzz. And money is important, especially when other large donors are still not so happy with Kenny Payne being let go, and dollars aren't flowing quite as freely as they always have been. It is always worth following the money. Especially when you've taken a bath on basketball tickets for two years.

Was this search been large and unwieldy and unnerving? Yes. It was.

I guess I would only say, the important thing is who wound up being hired. The process to get there is not as important. This process was probably not what anyone had in mind at the start. But no one had going 12-52 over two seasons in mind, either.

And now I'm going to post this, and expect the search to wrap up five minutes later, thus rendering all 1,400 words obsolete, but rendering everyone's long wait at an end.

Let's see if it works.

NOTE: It did work. Pitino was out of the running moments after the column posted, and Kelsey was reported the choice maybe an hour later.

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