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I’m not sure Tim Miles had even finished unpacking his suitcase after Nebraska’s season-ending trip to TCU before the critics of Bill Moos were chiming in.
Nebraska AD Bill Moos is disgracing himself by letting Tim Miles twist in the wind so long. He can relieve Miles, let him coach the NITif he wants and still pursue Hoiberg or whomever he wants. Miles deserves so much better than this. Embarrassing.
— Seth Davis (@SethDavisHoops) March 26, 2019
Things move quickly (at the speed of Twitter) today, so perhaps that why it seemed like the uncertainty lasted an eternity. Except it really didn’t. Bill Moos has said multiple times that he let’s his coaches coach their seasons and then acts after the season was done. That’s how he did it with Mike Riley in 2017.
And that’s mostly what he did with Tim Miles in 2019. Complicating the timeline was that Miles and his team didn’t return to Lincoln from Dallas until Monday afternoon. I suppose that Moos’ critics wanted a Lane Kiffin-like tarmac firing. SB Nation called Kiffin’s dismissal by Southern Cal “cold-blooded” at that time.
I dare say that’s probably doesn’t fit the “Nebraska Way”.
So Bill Moos waited about 24 hours after Miles’ return to make the move. Lots of extenuating circumstances came into play here, including the sudden resignation of University of Nebraska president Hank Bounds.
Enough of the drama! One infamous local commentator even suggested that Miles would still be in his office when his replacement shows up. We have enough Llama Dramas in society today; must we overreact to everything?
Moos acted in what would be timely fashion just about everywhere else. Arkansas fired Mike Anderson nearly three days after a season-ending loss to Indiana in the NIT. Where’s the outrage there?
No, Moos is showing why he’s the athletic director at Nebraska, and he’s handling this task better than most of his colleagues would. He handled it gracefully (complementing Tim Miles in the process), and made sure that the team’s season finished undisturbed by him. He can’t help the external noise; but he let the team finish it’s season. And frankly, they finished the season with strong, gutty performance despite multiple injuries that decimated the roster.
There is no need to turn a Nebraska basketball coaching decision into a humiliating spectacle for everyone involved. Bill Moos is in over his head. https://t.co/pKgYWigT5R
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) March 26, 2019
It may surprise Wolken that Moos is WAY ahead of him in the process. He says he has three candidates in mind, and at least one of them is probably still coaching in either the NCAA tournament or NIT. Or maybe Fred Hoiberg wants to enjoy his son’s run through the Sweet Sixteen with Michigan State. So once again, people are going to have to be a bit patient while the process works it’s way out. Doesn’t matter.
There wasn’t any need to rush to fire Tim Miles. Likewise, no need to rush to hire a replacement. When Moos talks about hiring a coach with credentials like Hoiberg, I feel pretty strongly that Bill Moos knows what the hell he’s doing here.
Unlike some critics.