[Husker] Shaka Smart turns down Illinois

[Mike Jaixen]

The World-Herald is reporting that Wichita State's Gregg Marshall turned down a $2 million offer from Nebraska.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20120321/NEWS01/303229996

Tom Osborne denied that anybody has been offered the job, though Lee Barfknecht explains that away as semantics.  If you remember the whole Steve Pederson coaching fiasco, what constitutes a job offer is somewhat nebulous.  So these offers are nuanced in such a way that the coaching candidate knows what he's being offered and what he's agreeing to...yet the athletic director (Pederson or Tom Osborne) can deny that anybody has been offered at this point.

While I'd like to think that Shaka Smart is a candidate at Nebraska, I think that's highly unlikely.  I've heard that Illinois has offered anywhere from $2.5 to $3 million a year to Smart.  Would Nebraska pay a basketball coach more than what Bo Pelini makes?  Highly unlikely.  So I don't see Smart coming to Lincoln.  I'd love to be wrong, of course.


And with uncertainty about what Smart was going to do, I don't see Marshall or John Groce being at all interested in any overtures from Nebraska.  Not with the Illini job still open.  Marshall is also apparently waiting for South Carolina to contact him as well.


Once those other jobs clear up, I think that Tom Osborne probably stands a better job with Marshall or Groce.  The money that Osborne is apparently offering should be a sign that Nebraska is committed to breaking out of it's rut.
 

Mike Jaixen
http://huskermike.blogspot.com
http://www.cornnation.com


________________________________
 From: Steve Cornelius <sscornelius at gmail.com>
To: Husker List <husker at tssi.com> 
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2012 1:28 PM
Subject: [Husker] Shaka Smart turns down Illinois
 
Shaka Smart has reportedly turned down the University of Illinois' offer to
be their next basketball coach and will stay at VCU. Smart was Illinois'
number one candidate and he has also been on Nebraska's wish list too -- or
at least among fans. The Illinois position is considered the top available
coaching position, but the athletic director is under pressure to hire a
minority candidate.

http://goo.gl/K4pvG

--
Steve Cornelius
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