What kind of Tulsa Man will Danny Manning Be?

What can the Tulsa Golden Hurricane do for you? That is the question that Wake Forest fans should be asking as they enter their first season with head coach Danny Manning. Tulsa, the small private school in Oklahoma, has a pretty good track record of producing head coaches. This where Nolan Richardson refined his ideas from 1980-85. This is where Tubby Smith was from 1991-1995. This is where Bill Self was from 1997-2000. Using 1980, we are going to look at the coaches who used Tulsa as their springboard and what they did thereafter to see if that tells anything about Coach Manning.

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Nolan Richardson, 1980-5
Tulsa Record: 119-37
After Tulsa: 389-169 (Arkansas)

Richardson won an NIT title with Tulsa in 1981, but he built his legacy with his pressure defense at Arkansas, reaching the final four three times and taking the 1994 National Championship in Charlotte, NC. His biography on Wikapedia argues that Richardson is the coach that made Tulsa a destination for other coaches looking to burnish their credentials.

Part of what makes Tulsa coaches in demand is their ability to win games at a school that ranks as one of the smallest FBS schools. Bigger schools may believe that if you can at Tulsa, you can win anywhere.

J.D. Barrett, 1985-91
Tulsa Record: 106-75
After Tulsa: 55-79 (Northwestern State)
Barrett could not keep Richardson’s success going at quite that pace, and he left Tulsa in 1991. Barrettt does not really tell us anything about Manning, because Barrett was not promoted to his next job. NW State is a step down from Tulsa.

Oct 15, 2014; Kansas City, MO, USA; Texas Tech coach Tubby Smith answers questions from media during the Big 12 Media Day at Sprint Center. Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports

Tubby Smith, 1991-95
Tulsa Record: 79-43
After Tulsa: 446-199 (Georgia, Kentucky, Minnesota, Texas Tech)

Tubby’s record at Tulsa was not all that different from Barrett, but Tubby’s teams were bad at the start and then good at the end of his tenure. Tubby went on to win the 1998 National Championship with the Kentucky Wildcats in what remains as his only Final Four trip. So Tubby is another example of how Tulsa has done well in building head coaches.

Steve Robinson, 1995-97
Tulsa Record: 46-18
After Tulsa: 64-86 (Florida State)

Kansas assistant Robinson took Tulsa back to the NCAA tournament two years in a row, and that was enough to get him the opportunity to replace Pat Kennedy at Florida State. Robinson was at FSU for five years, but the team was getting progressively worse. Robinson left in 2002 to join Roy Williams at Kansas and follow him to Chapel Hill where he currently is.

Oct 15, 2014; Kansas City, MO, USA; Kansas Jayhawks coach Bill Self answers questions from media during the Big 12 Media Day at Sprint Center. Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports

Bill Self, 1997-2000
Tulsa Record: 74-27
After Tulsa: 403-93 (Illinois, Kansas)

Oral Roberts coach Bill Self stepped in and continued the good run that Tulsa was on in the 1990s. Self turned that opportunity into the Illinois job where he was equally successful. He is most famous for being the current head coach at Kansas, with a National Championship in 2008 and two trips to the Final Four.

Buzz Peterson, 2000-1
Tulsa Record: 26-11
Post Tulsa Record: 162-177 (Tennessee, Coastal Carolina, Appalachian State, UNCW)

Appalachian State coach Buzz Peterson came in on a wave of success and cashed in immediately, going to Tennessee. Peterson and Robinson have been the cautionary tales so far. Both spent the smallest amount of time at Tulsa and therefore had the weakest resumes of the other coaches on this list. Neither saw a recruiting class graduate. Therefore neither had to consistently develop the players that were there.

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John Phillips, 2001-5
Tulsa Record: 61-42
Phillips also does not much to tell us. Things took a down turn in his last two years and he quit.

Doug Wojcik, 2005-12
Tulsa Record: 140-92
After Tulsa Record: 38-29 (College of Charleston)
Wojcik also does not fit our main idea, because he was fired because he was not winning enough even though he only turned in one losing season.

So finally we look at the last entry and the most important one:

Oct 25, 2014; Winston-Salem, NC, USA; Wake Forest Demon Deacons men

Danny Manning, 2012-4
Tulsa Record: 38-29

Why Manning will be more like Richardson, Smith, and Self-

Manning’s short two year resume was immediately impacted by his ability to recruit. He had two players on the CUSA all-freshman team and that talent influx was the primary reason for the increase in the win total in year 1, which looked like another season under Wojcik.

Manning also a name and presence that any coach would like to have. He was a national champion at Kansas and spent his pre-Tulsa years under Self with the Kansas coaching staff. If there was anyone who understood how to convert Tulsa success into future success, it was Self.

Why Manning could be Peterson or Robinson-
Manning moved up the chain very quickly with only two years coaching at Tulsa. The last guys who replicated that both found difficulty at the next level. Like Robinson, Manning was an assistant and not a head coach before coming to Tulsa (so was Tubby). The ACC is not really the place to learn the coaching craft. Wake Forest is a place with aspirations not dissimilar from Tennessee or Florida State when the other two went to those places.

Oct 29, 2014; Charlotte, NC, USA; Codi Miller-McIntyre of the Wake Forest Demon Deacons during ACC basketball media day at The Westin. Mandatory Credit: Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports

The Wild-Card

The other problem that could be lurking for Wake Forest is that Manning might not be done climbing the ladder. Tubby Smith and Bill Self both jumped from the jobs that they took out of Tulsa to an even bigger job. Wake Forest folks like to see themselves as a destination job, but in the current ACC it is not as desirable as it once was. Manning, if immediately successful, might go to a big name job if one should happen to open. I don’t want to see that happen, and I’d like to think that Manning’s Guilford County ties mean something. However one never knows.

Historically, hiring the Tulsa head coach has been either a real good idea or meh. There really isn’t a middle ground. Wake fans are tired of meh. They really want to see Danny Manning be a home run hire in the mold of Nolan Richardson, Tubby Smith, and Bill Self.