After simply 4 seasons on the job, Johnnie Harris is out at Auburn, marking the second head coach opening within the Southeastern Convention as March Insanity approaches.
A number of sources instructed SB Nation that the writing was on the wall for Harris when John Cohen was employed because the athletic director just a few years in the past and didn’t reward her with a contract extension for making the NCAA Match final season, the Tigers’ first journey to the large dance since 2019. Regardless of working at Mississippi State as an assistant coach for eight years and wanting the top job when Vic Schaefer left for Texas in 2020, Cohen didn’t promote Harris to when he was beforehand the AD in Starkville.
The outcomes on the court docket made the choice simpler for Cohen to dump Harris. Regardless of a First 4 look for Auburn final season, Harris by no means had a successful document in SEC play throughout her 4 seasons there. General, she was 58-63.
To rent a coach higher than Harris although, Auburn will possible need to open its pockets a bit wider. In accordance to USA In the present day, Harris was the second-lowest paid coach within the SEC final yr (a knowledge pool that excludes Vanderbilt’s Shea Ralph, since her non-public faculty wage isn’t public).
Auburn has had some huge moments of success in ladies’s basketball, none increased than the late Nineteen Eighties and early Nineteen Nineties when it appeared in three consecutive nationwide title video games, dropping every one. Auburn groups coached by Joe Ciampi went to 6 Elite Eights and gained 4 SEC Match titles. Nell Fortner had success there within the 2000s too, successful a daily season SEC title with DeWanna Bonner main the way in which. Terri Williams-Flournoy went to a few NCAA Tournaments in 9 seasons within the 2010s.
However now, Auburn must be rebuilt.
Right here’s just a few folks that Cohen would possibly name for the job.
Sam Purcell
The final time Cohen needed to rent a ladies’s basketball coach — at Mississippi State in 2022 — he known as Purcell, who had beforehand been considered one of Jeff Walz’s high lieutenants at Louisville and helped the Cardinals make two journeys to the Closing 4. Purcell has completed properly at Mississippi State, at the moment having fun with his third straight season of a minimum of 20 wins and eyeing his second NCAA Match berth. We’ve seen SEC coaches bounce from one faculty to a different inside the league earlier than in lots of sports activities, together with ladies’s school basketball. Most lately, Joni Taylor went from Georgia to Texas A&M in 2022. Apart from Purcell beforehand having a working relationship with Cohen, it’s value noting that he’s a graduate of Auburn and received his begin in teaching there as a video coordinator. Purcell’s buyout at Mississippi State is slightly below $1 million.
Carly Thibault-DuDonis
It’s a close to assure that Cohen will name Thibault-DuDonis sooner or later this month, and he gained’t be the one Energy 4 athletic director doing so. One of many quickest rising stars in teaching circles within the sport, the 33-year-old has shortly established Fairfield as a mid-major energy, going 70-20 there in three seasons. Along with making the NCAA Match final yr, she’s led the Stags to victories over main packages in Arkansas, Wake Forest, Villanova, Rutgers and St. John’s. The daughter of three-time WNBA Coach of the 12 months Mike Thibault, she was additionally an assistant below Schaefer at Mississippi State whereas Cohen was the AD there. The Bulldogs appeared within the nationwide title sport in each of her seasons on Schaefer’s workers.
This may be fairly the step up for Roussell, who has been voted as Coach of the 12 months within the Atlantic 10 in back-to-back seasons now and has Richmond able to land a uncommon at-large berth within the NCAA Match, ought to the Spiders falter within the convention tourney. Rousell has been a winner in all places he’s been, from the Division III ranks in Chicago, to Bucknell and now Richmond. 11 of his groups — quickly to be 12 — have performed in postseason tournaments since he first turned a head coach 20 seasons in the past. Auburn may do a lot worse than hiring Roussell.
