UND92,96

This quote was briefly discussed earlier today, but I'm surprised it hasn't drawn more discussion: Unbelievable.

Conducting a national search--good; Offering job and then retracting said offer to Herbst--bad; Strictly interpreting one of the "preferred" criteria so as to all but eliminate any candidate with strong local ties--bad; Choosing to interview a candidate who was apparently unable to find a collegiate coaching job last year, and who has a history of being a part of losing programs--bad; Choosing to interview a candidate who was recently demoted--bad. My expectations were to hire somebody who has either proven to be a successful college head coach (at any level), OR somebody who was an assistant at a highly successful program (preferably dI but can accept Brown because of Winona's recent success).

That's been attempted. Hence, the statement in today's Herald article by Wayne Nelson about the controversy of the process. I'm sure you read Buning's response.

Weemer's credentials consist of seven years as an assistant at Eastern Illinois, during which time they had a losing record for five of those seasons. Last year he was the head coach of a 13-15 high school team. I find it outrageous that somebody with those credentials could possibly be our next head coach.

If Buning meant exactly what he said, that's an insult to the vast majority of fans and alums who clearly disapprove of the candidates who were selected for an interview. What an embarrassment this process has been. I do want to give credit to Wayne Nelson for continually bringing up the support Craig Smith has in his articles. link. By essentially labeling Smith's backers as "not looking at the best interests of the university, the players and the future players we want here," Buning is coming across as either very arrogant, or very ignorant (or both).

With nearly 300 votes so far, 65% have chosen "someone else."

I agree 100%. If I were Buning, I'd politely tell Betty Ralston that her services are no longer required on this committee, and replace her with Steve Brekke and Dale Lennon. I trust those guys to not steer us wrong.

Here's a new poll at the Herald web page. Probably not surprisingly, "someone else" is the current leader by far.

This was in the Forum today, and although it doesn't tell the whole story, it at least gives some indication of what happened:

Herbst pulls himself out of the running. link. Hopefully, this could open the door for Smith or one of the other local candidates to get an interview.

Nothing, really. But if I feel like the a.d. has made a grievous error, and I know Kupchella isn't overly concerned about athletics, who am I supposed to contact? Harmeson played a major role in hiring Buning, and acted as the interim a.d. It seems to me that it makes a certain abount of sense that he be the one to field the complaints. And I'm quite sure I'm not the only one who is concerned enough to have contacted him and/or Kupchella regarding this matter.

As expected, my e-mail to Mr. Harmeson was probably a complete waste of time. His response: He forwarded my e-mail to Kupchella, who likely won't ever read it, and to Buning and Ralston, who likely won't appreciate what I had to say about the performance of the search committee. Oh well.

In case anybody is curious as to how Weemer's high school team did this past year, their record was 13-15. I have to think that even the Herald was shocked when he was named a "finalist", as they had pretty thoroughly reported any application they considered notable. They never included Weemer's name in any of the practically daily reports of new applications.

You just knew this was coming. [url="http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=126814

I have written an e-mail to Harmeson about my concerns about the hiring process and the list of interviewees/finalists. I doubt it will do anything, but I think it's important that he know how many people are upset about how things have been handled up until now. Even if we are remaining in division II, I think we could have done much better, and the omission of Smith is appalling considering the current state of the careers of Weemer (couldn't find a college job last year), Jones (recently demoted) and Herbst (mediocre recruiting and associate head coach of a struggling program).

Just for the record, Johnson, Jaskulski, Gillespie and Fuller all have Masters, in addition to having more than five years NCAA experience. I noticed there is no mention of Herbst having a Masters in his bio on the official UND athletic web page. Whether he actually has one, I don't know.

I believe what happened is that longtime Eastern Illinois coach Rick Samuels was fired after the 2004-05 season, meaning all of his assistants were also let go. Weemer was unable to find another college job, so he took what he could get--a high school job. Eastern had one pretty good season while Weemer was there (21-10 and an NCAA appearance). Other than that, the records ranged from 6-21 to 17-12. I believe his inclusion as a finalist is difficult to justify, to say the least. But for Ralston, I'd say the odds of Weemer getting an interview would have been somewhere between slim and none.

It could have been a factor with some of them, but as for Johnson, for example, I can't imagine Fort Hays State pays better than UND. And this five-year NCAA experience thing was stupid, to say the least. Sleeping on this hasn't made me any less upset, unfortunately.

Glas is actually associate head coach at UNI. link. Of the four finalists, IMO Brown is the one most likely to be a future star as a head coach. I would prefer him over the other three finalists. I'm just still trying to figure out how Smith, Johnson, Fuller, Jaskowski, etc. didn't warrant interviews over Jones and Weemer, in particular. It makes absolutely no sense to me.

There's probably only one of us on this board in a position to know much about Jones, and this doesn't exactly fill me with confidence:

Based on what I can tell, Weemer was a high school coach in Illinois last year. Either something like 50 of the 56 applicants withdrew at the last minute, or this was perhaps the worst job ever done by a search committee at UND.

Alright people, this should disappoint nearly everyone. link. I'm speechless.

I agree with Jeff Kolpack, and typically I do not.

Forum [url="http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=126428

I brought up the fact that I doubt Ralston has any experience hiring a basketball coach, or knows much about basketball, because while those factors would not necessarily preclude a person from being on the committee, they do call into question why she's on the committee instead of a highly-respected coach like Dale Lennon, who could also offer the viewpoint of a coach from a different sport, and who also is somebody I trust to do the right thing for UND. Can anybody honestly say that they know enough about Ralston to say they have more faith in her than Lennon (or another longtime UND coach)? I don't recall Ralston's predecessor Kathy McCann being prominently involved in hiring coaches, at least in high profile sports, but perhaps I just never heard about it.