Report on Coach Wardle

[Bradleyfan1]

[Go_Braves]

I really want Brian to stay and for his sake I am really not sure Nebraska is a great job. I’m sure it pays well but they have really never been successful in basketball and not at all convinced they really want to be. A job that pays well in the short term can be a poor landing spot in the long term. Please stay.

I totally agree with you HoustonBrave. Here's an interesting example: Keno Davis after turning Drake around and then left and Keno only lasted 3 years at Providence. Today Keno is the head coach of Central Michigan and has had his ups and downs - currently some ups these past 2 years and before some disturbing downs. Another example is Kevin Stallings of Illinois State - lasted 17 years at Vanderbilt and only 2 at Pittsburgh. My point - for coaches taking over a program that is not known for basketball - its a crap shoot and hopefully Wardle already knows this. Coaches such as Ben Jacobson I know has had many other offers and he realizes where he (and his family) are happiest. Ben has it nice at UNI. I wonder if Wardle also sees this aspect of coaching as Ben sees it. Nebraska was in the Big 8 but never in the Big 10 a basketball power. How does one attract top basketball athletes to spend their college days in the middle of a corn field and lucky to finish in the upper half of the Big 10 conference. The last 3 coaches at Nebraska lasted at least 6 years (Tim Miles 7 years) and Brian is currently 39. Coach Wardle it's a crap shoot. If you decide to leave - Thank you and Good Luck and if you decide to stay - Double Thank Yous. I realize its all part of the business.

[bigjimmy]

maybe they like Geno

You can take Geno's name out of the mix. He was promoted to head coach at Stoney Brook on Tuesday.

[Tommy]

Well, this is quicker than I was expecting. I would always hope the best for Wardle, but I sure hope he doesn't go! My hope would be that we'd pay him enough to stick around, but competing with Big 10 money would be difficult.

[Mikovio]

Why should anyone believe “Bracketgurus”? This guy has 91 tweets, 65 followers and went 11 months without tweeting anything.

[patrick_o'brian]

Well, this is not how I wanted to start my day. Everyone go buy a Powerball ticket tonight so we can ensure Coach doesn’t leave.

Seriously, this would be catastrophic. Everything we just experienced and all the hope we have for next year would be in certain jeopardy. Hopefully, they are just flirting and if need be, we pony up. I know Coach just signed an extension last year, but we need to figure out how to retain him.

[Tommy]

Why should anyone believe “Bracketgurus”? This guy has 91 tweets, 65 followers and went 11 months without tweeting anything.

Way to keep it real, Mikovio. I did a cursory search and couldn't find one single link to substantiate this tweet, so you ask a valid question. Certainly if Wardle had met with Nebraska, someone would have spotted it and reported on it besides this guy.

[tornado]

but then why would the guy guy make up such a thing, as well - that doesn't make sense...
Maybe he heard something - maybe not -
But I think we all knew this could come some day if we got good - but hopefully Nebraska is just using this to get Hoiberg to sign

Fred Hoiberg was signed by the Bulls thru 2020 at $5 million per year - so unless he negotiated or negotiates a full buyout -
he might just not want to work at Nebraska for $2 million until 2020.

[elmerb]

What does Wardle Make Now?

[tornado]

somewhere in the $450K range according to published sources
Tim Miles was making $2.375 million and was set to make $2.5 million this year (plus likely other salary from additional sources)

[Mikovio]

People will make up fake news for any reason or no reason at all. Some men just want to see the world burn. I just don't see a reason to believe this random guy in NY has "sources in Peoria" that inform him about backroom meetings between our coach and AD. And if there were people in Peoria privy to this, why would they reach out to this Bracketguru guy? If this guy was so well connected, why does he only have 65 followers?

[elmerb]

somewhere in the $450K range according to published sources
Tim Miles was making $2.375 million and was set to make $2.5 million this year (plus likely other salary from additional sources)

Money can't buy you happiness but that's a lot on $, Nebraska is a football school and never was and never be known for basketball. The best they'll be is mid pack Big Ten team. Nebraska has the unfortunate distinction of being the ONLY major conference program to Never win a game in the NCAA tournament. I think Bradley is on the verge of becoming the next Mid Major powerhouse. Hope he stays, it be good for the school and for the community.

[Go_Braves]

Here's a somewhat recent article - and read candidate # 6 - provided below ... and second shown below a March 26 article - Wardle is not even mentioned for Nebraska.


Seven Candidates for the Nebraska basketball job

http://www.kmaland.com/sports/seven-...f71591dec.html

Candidate 6: The mid-major coach

I’m going to make this real short and sweet. It’s time for Nebraska to NOT hire a mid-major coach. They’ve tried it with Barry Collier and Doc Sadler and Tim Miles, and they need to move on from that.

AND HERE IS A MARCH 26 ARTICLE - Wardle is not even mentioned...

https://watchstadium.com/news/search...ch-03-26-2019/

[Chibearsfan10125]

This reminds me of something Wardle said at the post season voice of the Braves. He said that half the stories about recruits Bradley has offered are players that coaching staff has never even looked at. This seems like a similar story. There is one source reporting it, with no verification. If this was from Dave Reynolds or the Nebraska beat writer, I’d take it more seriously (despite all that happened with the PJ Star in the last month), but it’s a random post on Twitter from a source that is nowhere near Nebraska or Peoria.

And quite frankly, while I do think Wardle is a very good coach and we’ve got good things ahead, if I’m a Nebraska fan and I see we’re trying to lure a guy who has finished 9th, 7th, 5th and 5th in four years in the MVC and has had one NCAA bid in 8 years as a head coach overall, I wouldn’t be too excited. I think Wardle is a great coach, and unless we get lucky and he loves Peoria the same way Jacobson enjoys coaching at UNI and Marshall enjoyed coaching at Wichita, he’ll probably end up at Power conference team someday. I just don’t think he’s there yet and leaving for Nebraska just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense at this time.

[BUSongwriter]

One other thing in the "let's keep it real" department. While Coach Wardle is building something great here, and I hope he stays for years to come, the fact is his team has not finished higher than fifth place in the MVC during his four years here. And this year's team, as good as it was at the end, lost to some pretty awful teams during the regular season, even at home. Coach does things the right way and it wouldn't surprise me if he's getting looked at by bigger budget programs, but his resume -- at this point, anyway -- would seem to me to be a hard sell to the fan bases of Big 10 schools.