Ron Hunter loves Georgia State. Georgia State loves him back. By all that’s holy, this relationship of four years’ standing should last another decade. Sometimes, however, circumstances intervene.
In leading the Panthers to the NCAA tournament and falling off his chair after his son hit the darnedest shot since U.S. Reed, Hunter became the biggest name of the Big Dance’s first week. When a mid-major wins in March, those majors with coaching needs come a-sniffing. Sure enough …
Not 24 hours after Xavier eliminated his team, Hunter admitted he’d been getting “feelers” from other schools. “They’ve called my agent,” he said Sunday, and at the moment he didn’t seem disposed to listen.
“I am 50,” Hunter said. “Quality of life means more to me. That’s not to say if there’s a job for me — a no-brainer — that I’d say no to looking at that, but there aren’t many of those. I don’t have to chase money. My happiness means a lot more to me. I love where I’m at. I love what I’m doing.”
It's not as if Hunter doesn't have other pressing concerns. He and his son have to decide if R.J. Hunter will enter the NBA draft. (It'll be a surprise if he doesn't.) There's also the issue of Ron Hunter's left leg, the one with the torn Achilles that led to his adoption and famously abrupt abdication of that rolling sideline throne.
That said, this is the hiring season, and money and opportunity can be powerful lures. Mississippi State just hired Ben Howland, who once worked in Los Angeles, to ply his trade in Starkville. There are openings at George Mason, which fired Paul Hewitt, and at Alabama and DePaul. There might be vacancies at Texas and Indiana.
Any school would be advised to look hard at Hunter. There’s a performance element about him, but giving world-class press conferences would mean little if the man couldn’t coach. This man can coach. Xavier had to play what Chris Mack afterward told Hunter was “our best game of the year” to subdue the Panthers, who’d already toppled Baylor.
This isn’t a coach who lucked out by having a gifted child: Hunter was winning at IUPUI before R.J. was college-eligible, and he’ll be winning after his son is gone. His teams play exactly the way he wants, meaning fast and furious, but there’s a design to everything. You don’t see wild shots or lax defense from Georgia State. You see good basketball.
“It’s a great fit,” Georgia State athletic director Charlie Cobb said, speaking of Hunter. “He’s built a program.”
Difference, program-builders like Gregg Marshall of Wichita State and Shaka Smart of VCU make at least $1.5 million. Hunter made $425,000 this season; due to the Panthers’ NCAA tournament appearance, his salary will rise to $500,000. That’s less than half what Brian Gregory makes for coaching Georgia Tech, which just went 12-19.
Seeing that its coach has become a desired commodity, is Georgia State be willing to pay more to keep him? Wrote president Mark Becker in an email: “Our best days are ahead of us. What Ron is building here does indeed have the potential to achieve the levels of recognition and success now enjoyed by universities such as Wichita State and VCU. We look forward to Ron Hunter being the coach of the Georgia State Panthers for the long term.”
Then this: “I believe that if you research the contract histories for both Gregg Marshall and Shaka Smart, you will see that each received significant increases after taking their respective teams to the Final Four.”
Cobb said Monday that he and Hunter will meet “talk about long-term success and trying to make this program like the other (top mid-majors).” Still, you wonder how much a downtown school with a walkup gym can do, and what it might take to lure Hunter away.
“Me just taking a job for the money, I’m not going to do that,” Hunter said. “My really good friend Homer Drew (father of Baylor coach Scott) stayed and built something at Valparaiso, and that appeals to me more. I want to stay at Georgia State and make it a national name.”
Then: “My wife and I love this city. It would have to be absolutely perfect situation for us to leave. Whenever my son does go to the NBA, I can fly anywhere direct and see him play.”
That would seem to mean that Hunter isn’t casting a hungry eye toward, say, Tuscaloosa. (During the NCAA tournament, he took great pride in saying, “We’re representing Atlanta.”) But there’s another Division I school in this city, and it very nearly fired its coach last week. If Tech should part with Gregory, who’s facing a win-or-walk season, there’s only one call for AD Mike Bobinski to make.
You ask: Could Ron Hunter win in the ACC? The answer: Ron Hunter could win anywhere.
