I expect UK to go after a marquee name like Donovan, Calipari or maybe even Pitino, I’d personally love to see John Pelphrey in the role. He may not be ready for such a big-time spot but I don’t think anyone in that state would complain too loudly.
And no way on Travis Ford. I spent enough time around him at Eastern Kentucky University to know what a d-bag he is.
Count me in the camp which thinks that Tubby’s biggest problem is a fan base that is not possible to satisfy, no matter what the team’s record is. That’s not to say that Tubby has been flawless, either in coaching or recruiting, just to say that I don’t think anyone could sastifsy Kentucky fans over the long run. I don’t see his race as being an issue.
I wish him and Minnesota only the best.
I don’t envy whoever tries to coach at UK next.
It’s going to take some long green to get anybody to take the Kentucky job. Who would want to deal with those kinds of expectations?
And Kentucky fans are delusional if they think Donovan would leave Florida. He’s made Florida into the better job.
He’ll also never be the king as long as he is in Gainesville either. He’ll always be the #2 guy.
I don’t know what he will do if UK makes a ridiculously high salary offer…I’m not sure how loyal he is to UF.
Eh, the title of Kentucky Mr. Basketball doesn’t mean nearly as much as it used to. Since Dwayne Morton won it in 1990, I would say that only three subsequent winners have turned out to be especially desirable players – Jason Osborne in 1993, J.R. VanHoose in 1998 and, of course, Lofton in 2004. Lotta no-names mixed in with those guys. It got bad enough that the 2006 winner wound up going D-II.
Interesting philosophical question: is a coach better off making, say, $3 million a year at a school like Texas or Florida (where the pressure is less, where fans are ecstatic if you make the Final Four now and then, where another sport will always be #1, and where a 23 win season doesn’t seem like a horrible disappointment) or will a storied program (Kansas, Kentucky, Duke, North Carolina, UCLA) that’s fallen on hard times always be an irresistible attraction?
I mean, if Kentucky offered Texas coach Rick Barnes (this is hypothetical- I’m NOT suggesting Kentucky wants him, just asking “what if?”) an outlandish contract, would he be nuts to take it, or would he be nuts to turn it down? I could make a strong argument both ways!
I mean, the money is phenomenal at Kentucky, but it’s pretty dang good at Texas, too. Most coaches are such workaholics, they’d never get to spend the extra money, anyway!
It’s the mirror image of the decision that faced Mack Brown a few years back. He’d done very, very good job at a basketball oriented school (North Carolina), but felt he HAD to take an elite football job (Texas) when it became available. As good as his position is now, would a Rick Barnes just HAVE to take a job from a school like Kentucky if it were offered?
King of what? #2 to whom? He has one NCAA championship and is working on another. He is out-recruiting everybody. He has back-to-back SEC titles. From where I sit, Donovan is not #2 to anybody at this point.
Like I said, Kentucky fans are delusional.
I believe he means #2 to the Florida football program.
:smack: See, football doesn’t even cross my mind this time of year.
But to address that point, I know quite a few Florida fans. While it’s true that historically they were focused on football, I’ve seen them get quite fanatical about roundball lately.
I don’t think Donovan is lacking adoration among the Gator nation.
My take: I think it’s a good move for both everyone involved.
Kentucky Basketball: KY is a storied program. It’s one of the few schools where basketball trumps football. That’s pretty rare ESPECIALLY in the SEC. To the athletic department, it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with Tubby’s race. If he had consistently won or challenged for National Championships, then there would be no problem keeping him around. Instead, KY doesn’t make the Final Four in ten straight years. Forget about it. Move on and look for someone who can get it done.
**Kentucky Fans: ** Certainly there was/is a small group of rabid, racist fans who were never going to accept Tubby (despite his National Championship), and they won’t accept anyone who’s black. But overall, it’s just a fact that KY fans demand more. And it was pretty apparent that most KY fans had given up on Tubby. Look at the vitriol in this thread from diehard Wildcats. And I don’t have any problem with it - he was their coach, they gave him years and years, and he couldn’t get it done. Once a coach loses the respect of his fans, it’s tough as hell to get it back. The fans will be happier seeing someone else take a crack at it.
Tubby Smith: I like Tubby, and I think he made a good move. He’s a good coach. I think his biggest problem was that he wasn’t a great (or even good) recruiter at KY. At Minnesota, he will have a few advantages. He can lockdown Minnesota, and sneak over into Michigan and steal a few players. Plus, he won’t have Pitino sitting across the state from him. I think he’ll make them a decent program - not a year-in-year-out competitor, but certainly much much better.
Minnesota: Definite upgrade, despite Tubby’s flaws. The Big 10 is going to get 4-5 teams into the tournament every year. With a little coaching, Minnesota can start competing right away for that bottom spot.
So, I’m happy with it for everyone. And truly excited to see who KY picks up. My money is on Calipari, but today on Sportscenter, they were hyping Mark Few from Gonzaga. I’d be seriously interested to see how he would do at a program like KY.
What expectations are those, exactly? Not failing to take the winningest program in NCAA history to zero Final 4s with your own players?
Of course you meant to say, “Commonwealth rejoices,” right, brianjedi? 
Mark Bradley (a UK alum) describes the phenomenon nicely in this column:
And as Bradley also points out, Smith never missed the tournament, never failed to win 20 games, and won 5 SEC titles in his ten-year tenure. Do you really expect to find a coach who will do better?
The SEC is a helluva lot more balanced than it was in Rupp’s day, and that’s not about to change. If you think you’re going to find a coach who averages an SEC title at a better clip than every other year, your expectations are unrealistic.
My concern for Tubby is that if he can’t recruit at a school like UK that practically recruits itself, how is he going to do it at Minnesota, a school with nowhere near the tradition and appeal?
Whoever the Wildcats pick is going to need to rustle up a center right quick. ESPN.com is reporting that Randolph Morris has flown the coop (again) to sign with the Knicks.
He recruited and coached just fine at Georgia before going to Kentucky. I think Minnesota will be very happy with Tubby.
All-everything-and-still-at-large recruit Patrick Patterson doesn’t sound too happy about Tubby’s departure:
If Patrick Patterson has this to say:
“‘It has somewhat of an affect for me going to Kentucky,’ he told the station. ‘If I went to Kentucky, Tubby Smith is the guy I would want to mentor me in the game of basketball. He’d be one of the main focuses on me going to Kentucky.’”
Then I have this to say:
“If you wanted to play for Tubby Smith at Kentucky so bad, Patrick, maybe you should have committed back on Signing Day instead of jerking a half-dozen schools around. You’d have saved his job.”
And God help me, I agree with Gregg Doyel for once.
http://www.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/story/10080776
Doyel’s right. Make all the excuses about parity and “it’s not the same game” as you want, but at the end of the day, 25 losses in two years is not the performance the winningest program in college basketball deserves.
Pretty loyal, as it turns out.
I gotta say … this is the only message board I’ve seen where so many more people thought Donovan was staying rather than going. I guess people are used to Internet rumors panning out these days.
Speaks for our intelligence, I think. 
And good for Donovan for being smart instead of greedy. The guy who took over for him at Florida would have had been walking into a better job than Donovan would have at Kentucky.
Agreed. There’s maybe 20 or so sports fans nationwide that agree.
UK basketball and its fans shouldn’t take their tradition for granted (cf. Notre Dame football in the 80s, Alabama football today).