Coaches, Like Players, Leave Too Soon

As we approach the final weekend of the college basketball season, numerous players have already declared for the NBA Draft, the majority of whom are forgoing the rest of their collegiate careers. In the anticipation that surrounds the Final Four there is also the looming question of which young players from Kentucky will play their final college games this weekend. John Calipari has established a culture where graduating does not matter and neither does a player's ability to play at the next level. Kentucky is one of the main perpetrators in having kids leave early and as basketball fans we have had to adjust to that. Yet while it's an expectation nowadays to see players leave college early, what seems to be lost in all of the drama with the players is the drama with the coaches. To put it bluntly, some coaches are just as guilty of "leaving early" as some of the players.

Manning will be the head coach of Wake Forest next season

After bringing a little life to the Tulsa program these past two years, former head coach Danny Manning has packed his bags and is headed to take the job at Wake Forest. Obviously, Wake Forest and the ACC are a bit more prestigious than Tulsa and Conference USA. The issue is this, Manning led the Golden Hurricanes to 21 wins and 13 losses this year and hung tough with fourth seeded UCLA for most of their second round match up. Now understand that Manning was not bringing Tulsa into the national spotlight nor were they the country's "darlings" of this year's tournament, but there were obvious and noticeable improvements in the Tulsa program since Manning's arrival in 2012. He had established himself as a qualified coach and clearly had the background and knowledge to be able to lead a program, no matter how small it was. He had coached the Golden Hurricanes to a share of the conference title and had Tulsa headed in a good direction. Yet bigger, but not necessarily better, schools came calling, and now the progress Manning brought Tulsa is essentially ruined.

Enfield left FGCU after a miracle run to the Sweet 16

While Manning had the chance to make a program into something special, he's not the only coach to bolt from a school at the first chance. Anyone who pays even the slightest attention to college basketball knows all about Florida Gulf Coast University last year when they shocked the world with a Sweet 16 appearance. Their coach, Andy Enfield, was the leader of "Dunk City" and had brought that school the attention it once only dreamed about. But when the Eagles fell to the Florida Gators, it was a matter of weeks before Enfield left FGCU in the dust on his way to accepting the job at USC. Seriously? USC? Granted, the Trojans are a member of a Power Six conference and an occasional tournament team, but there's not exactly a line of people banging on the door of the USC Athletic Director's office begging for that head coaching job. The point is that Enfield saw the dollar signs and the prestige of coaching at a bigger school and took the job without batting an eye. Why? Florida Gulf Coast just provided the nation with excitement that few teams have ever been able to do. They were a 15 seed that took down the number 2 seeded Hoyas of Georgetown, one of the nation's most traditional programs. The Eagles had a nice roster full of athleticism and talent that could have easily brought them back to the tournament this year (they lost to Mercer in their conference championship). Much like Manning, Enfield could have made his own mark on college basketball by turning Florida Gulf Coast into a perennial tournament team. Instead, Enfield is now at USC sitting at home with an 11-21 record and a last place finish in the Pac-12 to his name.

Stevens made two runs to the Final Four at Butler

Enfield and Manning made a choice that is frustrating to say the least. However, the one coach that made a decision that is forever upsetting is Brad Stevens, the former head coach at Butler University. If you were to look up "darlings" in the dictionary, the Butler Bulldogs from 2010 and 2011 would have their picture right underneath the word. Butler took the NCAA tournament by storm in both years by making back-to-back trips to the championship game. Stevens was in his low 30's at the time and was a fresh new face in a tournament full of renowned veteran coaches. He had the chance to make Butler into the best basketball school in the state of Indiana, currently anyway. Unlike Manning and Enfield who had the potential to make their programs into something special, Stevens had already done that and then some. Butler was established. Butler was a threat. Butler was good. It was at the point where nobody wanted to play the Bulldogs in March. Stevens had successfully brought them into the national spotlight and had done so before he was even sniffing the age of 40. And as quickly as Butler's success under Stevens came, it went away even quicker. The NBA came calling and Stevens took the head coaching job for the Boston Celtics, leaving Butler under the direction of Brandon Miller. Yet Stevens can't be blamed too much for this move as he's not the first great college coach to test the NBA waters. Larry Brown, Rick Pitino, and John Calipari all coached in the NBA before opting to come back to the college game. With any luck, Stevens will soon do the same.

Smart has already put VCU on the map

But not all coaches have left for supposedly greener pastures when given the chance. The one coach in college basketball that I have the utmost respect for is VCU's Shaka Smart. Smart's Rams made a Butler-like run through the tournament in 2011 and even had to win one more game to get to the Final Four than the other three teams (VCU was one of the play-in games). He is the coach of one of the toughest defensive programs in the country and has the up-tempo playing style that would fit right in with the bigger conferences. Yet Smart has opted to stay at VCU and has helped build the Rams into a tournament threat each and every year. It can't be easy to stay put when you know that bigger schools are begging for you to come, but Smart has stayed loyal to VCU in a time when most coaches struggle to do so. Now, Smart can honestly say that he is building a program that will fit his mold and that looks to be under his direction for many years to come. He is the perfect model of dedication and trust because of what he has turned down to remain at VCU.

Now just because a coach leaves or stays does not have any impact on his ability to coach and maybe this has made it seem like the decision to leave is something that should be taken personally by the schools that get left behind. It's not against the law or frowned upon to upgrade to a bigger school, but the excitement of building a smaller program into a national threat is something enticing in my opinion. Obviously the dollar signs are different the larger or smaller you get in terms of the size of the school you coach at, and finances/supporting a family are surely to be one of the top priorities. But seeing these small schools take down the big schools in March is what college basketball is all about so when a small school has a solid, qualified coach and makes a nice tournament run, we as fans get to watch that program develop until it is a part of the 68-team field on a regular basis. Players leaving early definitely has an effect on the game, but coaches that move on from the schools they put on the map is just as frustrating to see.