When writers use a phrase like “coaching carousel” it can be dismissed as a generic term meant to imply that some coaching positions are so important that any changes to those will impact several other job around the country.
Well, as Luke Winn writes, it’s not a phrase that can be dismissed. Take John Pelphrey.
When Arkansas parted ways with Pelphrey back on March 13, it did more than simply send Mike Anderson from Missouri to Arkansas, Frank Haith from Miami to Missouri, Jim Larranaga from George Mason to Miami and Paul Hewitt from unemployed to George Mason.
It also affected 25 teams – with perhaps more to come – and could help N.C. State land prize 2012 recruit Rodney Purvis.
How? Over a series of weeks after Pelphrey’s firing (and eventual re-hiring as a Florida assistant) different coaches jumped from job to job, recruits decided to attend other schools and several assistant coaches changed schools as well, leaving some – like Louisville – with an entirely new coaching staff.
That’s why Purvis, originally a Cardinals commit, is thinking twice given that the guy who mainly recruited him, new Missouri assistant Tim Fuller, is gone. Now Purvis is thinking about playing for Gottfried, the new coach at N.C. State.
But really, it’s all much more complicated than those two graphs. In this article, Winn details the 16 steps it took to get from Pelphrey to Purvis and everything in-between.
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