These days, after a coach stays awhile at one place, he will alienate some; rub others the wrong way; make a statement that gets him trouble; lie or double cross someone.  Thus, when he gets the axe, those who are haters take joy and pleasure from their fall from the perch.  I’ve not talked to a single person that feels this way about Stan.  The majority of fans pulled for him, even till the end.

When you think about it, there’s not many coaches that you can think of that get fired, but everyone still likes and respects at the end.  Several words come to mind when I think of Coach Heath…but class and professional are the ones that resonate most.  As Tipster put it, he was the “Anti-Nolan” in more ways than one…good at the PR part, but lacking in the “instill your will into your players” department.  Time and time again, this resulted in a lack of consistency on the court, and the “Basketball Palace of Mid-America” being far less than full most of the time.

Stan was just not ready, and that wasn’t his fault.  After one season as a head coach, he needed more seasoning before he could really succeed anywhere.  The complete lack of talent left to him by his predecessor masked (for a while) his coaching shortcomings.  Nobody could have won with what Nolan left…not even Nolan himself.

Other than Brewer, Hill and Beverley, Coach Heath did not really gather up a bunch of future NBA guys.  But the ship has a lot fewer holes in it than when he first got here.  Give him all the credit for that.  But at Arkansas, you must make more progress than what has been shown in five years…bottom line.

Our good guy finished last, but represented himself and our university well.  Wins, championships, and deep runs into the NCAA Tourney should be — and are – expected at Arkansas.  And that’s what got him in the end.

Good luck, Stan, at your next stop.  As always, we’ll be rooting for you.

Hogwired.com: Heath Will Not Return As Arkansas Basketball Coach

Arkansas athletic director Frank Broyles announced on Monday that men’s basketball coach Stan Heath will not return to coach the Razorbacks in the 2007-08 season. Broyles informed Heath of his decision at a meeting on Monday.

Also:

Video

• 4029TV.com: Head Basketball Hog Is Out, Stan Heath Interview (Full)
• Razorback Nation: U of A Fires Stan Heath

The Morning News

• Ryan Malashock: Heath Fired In Monday Meeting With Broyles, Gillispie Is Prime Target For Vacancy
• Grant Hall: Heath Classy To The End
• The Morning News: Stan Heath Year by Year Record, Stan Heath Transcript

Democrat-Gazette

• Bob Holt: A new plan after Stan, Making Big Dance no security, UA’s Nutt wishes Heath ‘nothing but the best’
• Scott Cain: Broyles: UA took its time by design, Possible candidates, Gillispie runs past Arkansas questions
• Chris Bahn: Players jeer, cheer coach’s departure
• Wally Hall: Bad day for a nice guy could be seen coming

Northwest Arkansas Times

• Nate Allen: Making a change
• Terry Wood: New coach must finish what Heath started

Other Sites and Blogs

• ESPN.com: Despite 20 wins this season, Arkansas fires Heath, Richardson says ‘Broyles ought to take the job’
• FOXSports.com: Arkansas fires Heath, eyeing Gillispie
• Dallas Morning News: A&M’s Gillispie linked to Arkansas job
• Houston Chronicle: Aggies up ante to try to keep Gillispie, With Arkansas eyeing Gillispie, A&M talks raise, Aggies Blog
• San Antonio Express-News: Gillispie declines comment amid rumors
• ARSN Online: Schaeffer: Broyles Will Move Swiftly
• Chicago Tribune: Arkansas’ Beverley will consider his options, talk with AD Broyles
• Tampa Tribune: Former Arkansas Coach Heath Has Interest In USF Job

RazorBloggers Network Archive

• Walking on Sunshine: Nice Guy Finishes Last
• HogBaller: Right Back Where We Started
• TipsterHog: Not The Same Anymore, The Anti-Nolan
• HogBlogger: Last One In Is…The Razorbacks?

Updated 3/27/07 9:30 a.m.

I’ll be honest…I didn’t follow the Kent State run through the 2002 NCAA Tourney that closely.  After all that had transpired here on the Hill that spring, I was soured on college basketball by the time ‘March Madness’ rolled around.  I guess I just wasn’t as trained to follow another ‘horse’ in the race like I am now.

But when it became apparent that Flashes’ head coach Stan Heath would be introduced as the new head Hog Baller, my interest was piqued enough to take a ‘long lunch’ and watch his introductory press conference.

A couple of things stood out immediately.  The man was articulate and charming.  He was excited and enthusiastic about the chance to coach the Hogs.  He even talked about the importance of rebounding.  REBOUNDING!  Sure…he really didn’t know what the heck was going on when ‘Big Daddy’ Frank led the room in calling the hogs.  But that was okay.  He was at least trying to get it.

In other words, Heath was nothing like Nolan Richardson.  He was the Anti-Nolan.  And for the past five years, he hasn’t been Nolan…in all the ways that are both good and bad.

The Good Example:  Now that it looks like the handwriting is on the wall, Heath seems to be handling the pressure with class and a hopeful attitude.  A respectful “no comment” when asked about “published reports.”  A continued urging to his players and the fans to not give up.

By contrast, Nolan would have completely lost it by now.  Called for the “tanks” and demanded that they “pay me my money.”  And told that “turd” down in Little Rock to go flush himself after writing a column like the one he penned on Sunday.

The Bad Example:  But if Nolan were coaching this year’s team, when it started looking like things were heading south several weeks ago, he would’ve circled the wagons.  Shut off all media access.  Created an “us against the world” mentality.  Convinced them…scared them…willed them into the best team that he could possibly make out of them.

Stan, however, has just wanted everyone to stay calm.  Don’t panic.  Sure…they’re getting beat by lesser opponents.  Absolutely…they’re getting out rebounded by smaller teams.  Yes…they had a player leave for the locker room during a game.  But don’t worry about it.  “Sometimes that’s ‘D’,” you see.  “He’s an emotional guy.”

Now, of course, it’s too late for either Stan or Nolan to do anything differently.  In fact, that might be the primary regret shared by each coach.

Both the former one…and the one who’s soon to be.

Unfortunately, for me that statement was made back in March of 2005, as I sat at the SEC Tournament in the Georgia Dome and watched the Hogs play the most pathetic basketball game that I have ever seen in person.

Against a much less talented Tennessee team, who had a losing record and eventually fired their coach after the season, the Hogs were beaten by 19 points.  While shooting 39 percent and being outrebounded 42-23, they scored a paltry 46 points.  For most of the game, the Hogs played lazy, sulked and felt sorry for themselves.

During and after the game, I looked around the Arkansas “cheering” section and saw Frank Broyles, John White, and several of the “money people” just figuratively shaking their heads.  The lack of effort that they also had to witness that night is probably why the NIT was told a few days later that Arkansas wasn’t interested in playing in their tournament that year.

At any rate, if you’ve ever been to the SEC tournament, you know that the arena section occupied by the losing team is always inundated after their game by numerous Kentucky fans.  They feverishly want to buy your tickets, of course, so that they can call their friends back home and tell them to head to Atlanta for the party.  (And maybe make a few bucks in the process, too.)

Unfortunately, after your team gets humiliated and you get asked about 500 times if your tickets are for sale, you’re really not in the mood to talk to any of them.  Which is why I was surprised when I had a quick exchange with a middle-aged man wearing his “Big Blue” Wildcats jacket.

I guess he could tell I was there to watch four days of basketball and wasn’t interested in selling my seats.  Instead, he just looked me in the eye and very graciously said, “Tough game.”  I nodded and agreed.

Then he made a statement that I’ve remembered many times over the last two years of watching Arkansas basketball.  I thought about it again after the game on Saturday.

“Let me tell you…we need you guys to be good again,” he said.  “It’s just not the same anymore in the SEC as it was back when you guys were good.”

And with that, he summed up the feelings that I (and I believe many others) still have today about the state of Razorback basketball.

It’s why no one notices anymore the number of empty seats at “sold out” Bud Walton Arena.  Or that they don’t remember anymore the large numbers who used to fill the student section.  Or that they aren’t surprised anymore when games are frittered away.  And why it seems no one even gets upset anymore after the losses.

Just not the same anymore, indeed.

I’d love to say things have changed over the past two years.  Certainly returning to the NCAA tournament and defeating a few quality opponents has been a positive.  But there’s been just as many inexplicably negative losses as well.

Ultimately, a basketball program is like a business.  And it’s just too hard to build the support of your “customers” when they don’t trust what the quality of your product will be when they go to buy it.  When inconsistency is the only consistent result that your company produces.

And right now there are many people who just aren’t interested in buying into the roller coaster product of the Stan Heath era anymore.

As for me, well…I tore my ride ticket up a couple of years ago.

Laden with eight upperclassmen, Coach Heath and the Hogs appear to be middle of the pack, at best, in the SEC again.  And a program that was once a national power continues to swim in a sea of mediocrity.

Stan pulled us out of the ditch after Nolan left…no doubt about it.  You have to give him credit for the rebuilding job he has done given the mess he inherited.  He put us back on the road.  But now some are asking, “the road to where?”

Assistant Dan Hipsher has helped Heath somewhat since joining the staff last year.  And new assistant Glynn Cyprien, who has a good resume and comes highly recommended, should as well.  But entering his fifth season at Arkansas, Heath is still learning the ropes, and there’s nothing like “on-the-job training” for a college head coach.  Mike Anderson and his Missouri Tigers took us to school in the thumping they put on us in Columbia last month.  And Bobby Knight and Texas Tech did the same last Saturday.

As much as I pull for our team and for Stan, this team will not be competitive for a SEC title, a Western Division title, or for that matter, a NCAA tournament birth.  Is this acceptable for Arkansas basketball?

I hate to use the University of Texas as an example, but watching how they have reloaded after graduating their entire Elite Eight team (starting four talented freshmen and beating LSU last week), it makes you wonder what in the world we are doing.

After watching first-hand how Junction City’s James Anderson tore up the Holiday Hoops Tournament, the loss of him signing with Oklahoma State last month was critical.  It was unnerving, to say the least, to watch him on the same floor as our two recruits from Springdale Har-Ber High.  The Har-Ber players (one signed) are good.  Anderson is great.  The takeaway: we should not be settling for signing good players in a year where we only have one or two scholarships to offer.

The success of Nutt, Van Horn and their teams this season will mask it for a while, but eventually fans will demand excellence in Razorback basketball again.  Until then, we’ll have to enjoy our relegated spot as third or fourth in the West, eighth or ninth in the SEC, and home court advantage for all the NIT games we can eat.

“Obviously, I’m real happy, and my family and I are appreciative for the extension,” Heath said. “I’m thankful to Coach [Broyles] and the University of Arkansas for the commitment to the program. It hasn’t been a major thing on my mind. I’ve been more concerned with making improvements and adjustments for the upcoming season.”

One interesting note was stated very clearly in the article. After last season’s disappointing end, Frank Broyles was going to fire someone.

Broyles said that in the spring he suggested that Heath make staff changes so a more experienced coach could be hired. Heath didn’t end up firing anybody because one assistant, Rob Flaska, left to take the head coaching job at Centenary, and Heath eventually hired Dan Hipsher, a former head coach at Akron. “We were going to make some changes, so I guess [Flaska’s leaving] is a break in that you’d have had to pay somebody,” Broyles said, referring to severance pay. “He gave us an opportunity without terminating anybody.

“Adding a more experienced assistant coach fulfilled the main objective Broyles said he had given Heath in the off-season. That allowed Broyles to extend Heath’s contract, albeit several months later than usual.

I’m sure the only thing that made Frank feel better when he couldn’t fire someone was the fact that he didn’t have to pay them severence pay after they left on their own.

Always remember…don’t mess with the Big Daddy.