Georgetown Will Hire Patrick Ewing As Its Next Head Coach
There’s no surprise here as the news started to circulate over the weekend with Ewing emerging as a serious candidate for Georgetown. Am I surprised? No, not when they struck out on some big names – and they did for sure offer Mike Brey and Shaka Smart who turned them down. So what’s to make of this? The Ewing name will absolutely win the press conference. That’s always step number 1 in a coaching hire, especially at a place like Georgetown. You want the boosters and alumni to feel like they have something special and any time you can bring someone back home to be a head coach, you accomplish that.
It also shows that John Thompson II is still running shit at Georgetown. There’s no doubt there was some sort of unwritten agreement that if they were going to fire JT3 he was going to play a major role in who they were going to hire. It’s still his team and really his university when it comes to this. It’s no surprise, but I had more than one person tell me the obvious – JT2 being there completely scared off some of those major names. Coaches don’t want to come to a situation like that. It eventually could cost them success, but when there’s a new practice facility thanks to JT2 it is what it is.
Finally, it’s sort of irrelevant to have a huge feeling on this hire. It all depends on what he does with his assistants and coaching staff. Yes, Ewing has experience coaching in the NBA. That doesn’t translate to the collegiate level though. We’re talking two totally different games and what’s important is who he gets on the bench with him. We likely won’t see who he has on his staff for the next week or two and until then you should hold judgment. One name for sure that will be on his staff is Patrick Ewing Jr., who has been the director of basketball operations for Georgetown the last two years. Look for him to hire a former college head coach, someone like a Mike Jarvis who has connections in recruiting. He’ll also look to likely hire someone with connections to the DMV’s high school and AAU teams.
Personally, I don’t love the hire just because it’s a JT2 guy and I’m very much in the boat of if you fire someone, you want to hire someone that’s at least somewhat different.
Like I’ve said though, I want to be wrong. I want Ewing to get the right assistants and be successful. Georgetown is one of the 25 best programs in college basketball and one that makes the sport better when they are good. Ewing did have four different coaching stops in the NBA and will be the 18th head coach in Georgetown’s history.