LIKE IT IS : Domino effect could see Pelphrey in Kentucky

WALLY HALL

Posted on Thursday, April 3, 2008

URL: http://www.wholehogsports.com/adg/221649/

It could, possibly, be a deadly domino.

When Sean Sudden was forced to resign at Oklahoma State, it left many people wondering if a replacement wasn’t already in place.

LSU and Indiana both terminated their coaches before the end of the season, John Brady for having too many injuries on his team and Kelvin Sampson for violating personal NCAA restrictions.

LSU has yet to name a head coach, and several weeks after Sampson left Indiana announced Tom Crean would leave Marquette and become the head Hoosier.

There is just not a deep talent pool of coaches right now.

Which has made Tony Bennett, the head coach at Washington State, one of the hottest names in coaching.

He’s being linked to openings at LSU (his wife is a native of Baton Rouge ), California and now Marquette (he is a Wisconsin native ).

So it would make sense that OK State AD Mike Holder already had secured a new head coach, otherwise why would you get rid of a guy who has only two years on the job ?

Yes, there is the T. Boone Pickens factor. Apparently the ultrarich Pickens wanted to clean the Cowboys basketball barn when Eddie Sutton had his bout with drinking and driving.

More and more in college athletics, money rules over wisdom.

Bill Self, an alumnus of Oklahoma State and a former assistant there, is the sexiest name the Cowboys could possibly attract.

He and his wife are both Okies, and she was a Cowboys cheerleader and he was a player.

Yet, Self is focused only on the Final Four and getting Kansas the championship most of the state is starving for, and the icing on the cake would be to beat North Carolina’s Roy Williams in the semifinals because Williams dared leave the Jayhawks after 15 years as the head coach for his alma mater.

Self said he advised OSU to look elsewhere, he’s happy.

Keep in mind, if Pickens decides the check he signs is blank, all bets are off and Self could listen next week.

There is another possible scenario, and one that would not make any Razorbacks fans happy.

Self might recommend his best friend Billy Clyde Gillispie, who has spent one year enduring a fishbowl existence in Lexington, Ky., where he has found he has about 50, 000 assistant coaches.

Gillispie has not signed his contract.

He is being paid, and very well, off a simple work agreement.

Gillispie, a native Texan, was not Kentucky’s first choice a year ago, but he quickly moved up on the wish list when Billy Donovan and Rick Barnes said no thanks to the big blue.

If — and that is still a big if because no one ever knows what Gillispie is doing but him — Gillispie jumped back to the Big 12 Conference, what would Kentucky do ?

Two former players are now head coaches.

Travis Ford, whose UMass team plays for the NIT championship tonight, and John Leslie Pelphrey, who is still so popular in the Bluegrass State they had special medallions made welcoming him back on for the Hogs game against the Wildcats.

Pelphrey would most likely be their first choice.

That’s logical because of his family values, popularity and basketball knowledge, plus he beat Indiana in the NCAA Tournament and that counts for a whole lot in Kentucky.

Granted, Kentucky would have to open the vault because Pelphrey has a $ 2 million buyout with Arkansas right now.

Plus, Pelphrey knows it is hard to go home.

He and his family live a very private life so that it can be as normal for their two welladjusted children as possible.

The Pelphrey family has fit Arkansas like a new glove and vice versa.

No one knows right now what is going to happen at Oklahoma State, but surely it had someone ready to come aboard before forcing a good person like Sutton out.

One thing is certain, though: This could be a domino that affects the SEC.