Sources: Roberts will be out at St. John’s
Last Updated: 9:44 AM, March 11, 2010
Posted: 3:42 AM, March 11, 2010
Comments: 10
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Norm Roberts is one of the lucky guys, and given enough time, the pain of professional disappointment will subside and he’ll remember that most people never achieve their dream job.
Roberts did. For six years he lived his dream, coaching in the footprints of Lapchick and Carnesecca.
Now the dream is over.
It ended yesterday when St. John’s was eliminated from the Big East Conference Tournament in nightmare fashion, dropping a 57-55 gut-buster to Marquette that tagged Roberts with his 100th career loss.
Multiple highly placed sources — in the athletic department, on the board of trustees and in the booster sector — told The Post that Roberts will not be retained for a seventh season.
“He has as much as integrity as anyone I’ve known,” said one source. “He is as classy as anyone I’ve ever known. That’s what makes this so hard.”
When the university announced two years ago that it was rolling over Roberts’ revolving five-year deal, the emphasis shifted from rebuilding the basketball program’s image to improving success on the court. Translation: postseason play.
Although the Red Storm (17-15) posted the most wins in Roberts’ tenure, an NIT berth is highly unlikely said sources well-versed with the NIT’s selection process, which now falls under the auspices of the NCAA. St. John’s is likely the fifth Big East candidate on the NIT selection committee’s board.
“That’s all fair,” said Roberts, when asked if wins and losses should be considered in evaluating a coach. “We’re paid to win games. But we’re also paid for the process of running a program that St. John’s can be proud of and nobody can say we haven’t done that.”
The fall for Roberts (81-100), whose annual package pays him about $650,000 will be lessened by a buyout of $700,000-$800,000, sources said. Roberts’ agent, Dennis Coleman, interrupted a telephone conversation with The Post to say he had to field a call from one of his college basketball coaching clients. He subsequently did not return calls and texts.
When St. John’s hired Roberts, his only previous college head-coaching experience was at Queens College. Now the university will turn its attention to finding a proven winner that can galvanize the program.
Highly placed sources said that Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg, a Long Island native with ties to St. John’s, tops their list of realistic candidates. Greenberg is a two-time ACC Coach of the Year.
Several sources at St. John’s said the university was prepared to offer a long-term (six years), lucrative ($1.5 million annually) deal to the right candidate.
Hofstra coach Tom Pecora, who is highly respected by high school and AAU coaches in the metropolitan area, also is on the Red Storm’s wish list as is Siena coach Fran McCaffery, Iona coach Kevin Willard and Harvard coach Tommy Amaker, the former Seton Hall and Michigan coach.
Sources told The Post that former St. John’s and Knicks star Mark Jackson has reached out through third parties to gauge if there is interest on the university’s behalf. Although he has name recognition, he has no head-coaching experience.
lenn.robbins@nypost.com
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Comments (10)
Post Your Commentjeml
03/11/2010 12:16 PM
Mike Jarvis killed St. John's. Norm restored some pride and dignity to the program. Father Harrington should retire or shut his mouth about this one, this whole mess is on Harrington. The ALUMNI is all but gone from all the games.
Good Luck Father, listen to the sound of silence. Keep Norm. GO REDMEN !!!!!!!!!!!
b.e.v.
03/11/2010 11:56 AM
You know what's weird about the big picture here? The Big East as we know it, has to go away very soon. Football must become the driving force.
Rutgers, Pitt, Cuse, UConn, Cinncinati, Louisville, USF and West Virginia have GOT TO get away from b-ball-only programs and soon. No choice. If The Big East allows any of them to jump to the Big 10, then the other football programs are dead meat and out of the BCS. Tranghese was asleep when BC, etc., blew them off before. They can't screw up again.
Gohard
03/11/2010 11:43 AM
Jbarks is absolutely right. Although, St. John doesn't necessarily need a big name coach and its fitting because I don't think they are willing to pay the money to hire a big name guy. What we do need is an effective recruiter who knows the area or at least has someone on his staff who knows it, has a relationship with guys on the AAU citcuit,and a staff that will be able to develop talent. It seems like none of these guys have gotten any better with the exception of DJ Kennedy and the spike in his all around stat line, year after year, are a will & testament to that. This is NOT a young team, its made up of mostly juniors which means they have a considerable amount of experience in this league. Now is the perfect time to bring in a new coach. Next season we'll be working with 9 scholarships, possibly 10. These next 9 or 10 recruits will determine where we stand as a program for the next 5-6 yrs, their either gonna make or break us. He'll be with the team for a year & also be able to bring in his OWN recruits while he's there for a full season as opposed to scrambling around for a month from mar.2011- apr. 2011 trying to lure recruits or being stuck with Norm's. Imagine if Norm were to stay on for another year & screw up those 9 scholarships & ruin the program for another 5-6 yrs?
agedone
03/11/2010 11:14 AM
To coach a team like St. Johns which WAS a great basketball school for seven years and have a record like he has is a tribute to prefer\red treatment. With a record like this he would have been gone long ago at Kentucky, N.C. s
St or many other schools. To come from Queens college where I could make the team to St Johns was a mistake from the beginning. Mark Jackson is a no fooling around guy who knows more basketball than the whole St. Johns team and coaching staff combined. Briarcliff
Jbarks
03/11/2010 10:54 AM
**my mistake we didn't lose to depaul. We won in triple overtime and i will give them credit for that. Made up for a terrible first half. Bottom line, get a coach that people want to play and bring some excitment back to college basketball in NY.
favrest
03/11/2010 10:16 AM
"This is a young team that will be good next year."
No offense my friend, but we've seen this movie before.
AND, this is not a young team. They just play young.
Marquette is a young team.
favrest
03/11/2010 10:15 AM
"The best thing about sophomores is they become juniors"
Sophomores - 7 BE wins, 13 losses
Juniors - 7 BE wins, 13 losses
Progress?
Jbarks
03/11/2010 10:04 AM
I must say you guys do not watch enough St. Johns basketball. We have 6 juniors who have been been getting a lot of playing time for the last 3 years. Go to the st. johns homepage and look at how each of them has fallen off with the exception of kennedy. Horne, Burrell, Evans, Thomas, and Boothe have all performed at below expectations this year(all have drops in ppg and other stats). The are juniors. This is the real year to shine and it never happened! How many games this year we were leading at halftime only to get crushed in the second half. It happened against Cornell(36-31), Prov(33-32), lville(32-28), Nova(38-37..and we gave up 5 pts in the last 10 seconds of the half), Pitt(28-24), WV(33-22). We lost to depaul giving them their only big east win of the year. If we would have won 3 of these games we would be the bubble of the tourney instead of sitting on the sideline for the 6th consecutive year(or is it more)? Coach gets his team to play for 20 minutes a game. Then, we give up 10pts within the first 3 mins of the second half and the game is over. Wouldn't you make an adjustment. Watch the tapes. Do something!!! As an alum, I'm tired of watching these kids who have a full scholarship to play lacklucter ball and only give effort when they feel like it(l'ville game). I'm sure we can find other who have heart.. How is a team like Butler so good? They play 40 mins with heart. Why can't we go out there and get the high profile coach who can keep some talent from the tri state area in NY? Someone that can make his team play for 40 minutes and get us back to the tourney? Also, If we keep Norm for this year and the team does ok that means they feel obligated to keep him longer. Then the whole team is gone(8 ttl juniors i think) and we start over like we did 4 years ago. We need a new Coach, plain and simple!