Coach Jamie Dixon is in New Jersey today for St. Benedict’s Dan Hurley’s coaching clinic. Dixon is one of the headline/name speakers at the clinic. I’m sure he’ll get congratulations from some of the other coaches for the raise — though, when you’re hanging out with Bill Self and Rick Barnes you are still on the low end of the pay scale.
Legends Classic Championship Round Tickets go on sale this morning. The games at the Prudential Center in Newark on November 28 and 29 will include Pitt, Mississippi St., Washington St., and Texas Tech. Dick Weiss included Sam Young and DeJuan Blair on his list of players that the Wooden Award Committee should stick on the watchlist.
Levance Field’s ankle is now officially a source of anxiety. I’m not putting it at major anxiety, but it is a concern. The latest setback is an infection that has put the kibosh on rehab and conditioning while it heals.
It isn’t expected that he will miss the season or anything, but it will slow him down when practice starts in October. The only upside is that it will give the other guards opportunities to compete to run the offense initially.
On the subject of Dixon’s extension, the terms weren’t disclosed but it is expected that he will be making around $1.5 million per year. Dixon has a great comfort level with the PItt powers.
Pederson offered Dixon more money and three more years on his existing contract, and Dixon had only one question: how long the administration of Pederson, Vice Chancellor Jerry Cochran and Chancellor Mark Nordenberg would remain intact.
“My only concern, and I raised this to Steve, was this contract runs for eight years,” Dixon said. “I wanted to know how long they will be here, what the direction of the university is and where they will be.
“They couldn’t give me guarantees, but that’s a big part of our success. Jerry, Steve and the chancellor are a big part of it. They’ve done an unbelievable job running this place.”
AD Pederson says it’s not just an extension by a few years.
“Essentially, we reworked the whole deal,” Pederson said. “We didn’t just add three years. The terms changed for the whole seven-year period.”
Pederson declined to reveal financial terms of the contract, which paid Dixon a salary of $1.3 million last season, but he said it includes a raise that places Dixon among the upper-echelon of Big East Conference coaches.
“There’s really is something special about Jamie,” Pederson said. “The reasons he loves it here and the reasons he’s so loyal are real sincere reasons. From my standpoint, this wasn’t a contract extension done for recruiting reasons or public-relations reasons. It was done because we want him to be the coach here a long time, and he wants to be the coach here a long time.”
Well, maybe upper-middle of the BE coaches. We are talking pay for coaches like Calhoun, Pitino, Boeheim, Huggins and Wright. To say nothing of the fact that Brey got a raise from ND. Marquette actually helped lower the upper-end with Crean moving to Indiana.
With Dixon’s 132 wins, he’s a virtual lock to pass Paul Evans’ 147 wins to move to 3d on Pitt’s all-time coaching wins list. Behind only Robert Timmons (174 wins) and H.C. (Doc) Carlson (367).
Joe Starkey feels his cynicism over coaching declarations of loyalty beaten back in the case of Coach Dixon.
Call me a sucker, but I think so, too. I think Dixon really is going to be here for the next seven years — and quite possibly longer.
Several reasons for that.
For one, Dixon seems deeply connected to Pitt’s administration — he’s much tighter with Pederson than he was with former athletic director Jeff Long, for example — and truly seems to appreciate the city and that Pitt took a chance on him.
I believe Dixon when he says he wants to become synonymous with this program the way Mike Krzyzewski is with Duke.
Coach “J,” anyone?
“I don’t want to be the guy looking for the next job,” said Dixon, who owns the best winning percentage (.680) in Big East history. “I don’t want to be the guy who gets fired, (either).”
I’m still a cynic. Don’t get me wrong. I love that Dixon is Pitt’s coach. He wins, there is absolutely no whiff of impropriety. He has been the best fit for Pitt. While Dixon is highly successful, his success has been less overtly spectacular. This has aided the school in keeping him.
Administrators and ADs at other programs are aware of him and keep putting him on the short list. His maintenance and slow growth of Pitt’s program, though, has kept him from becoming a splashy name. He doesn’t excite the big money boosters at other programs. That means less pressure on the AD to pursue and money thrown at Dixon. A lot less than a coach at a mid-major or another school who engineers a quick turnaround or makes a big splash by getting to the Sweet 16 very abruptly.
Given the history of Pitt in keeping coaches and paying the money, I think this has been a big help in keeping Dixon and building his trust and desire to stay at Pitt over time. There was only after his 3d year, the serious threat to him leaving.
Now having said that, never assume “forever.” There are a couple places on the West Coast that could come calling in the next 3-5 years that can’t be taken lightly. Oregon may have extended Ernie Kent, but if he flounders they will cut him loose. They have lots of money going into new facilities and they have Phil Knight of Nike ready to give them more for anything they need. I also don’t think I will breathe easier until Lute Olson retires and is actually replaced at Arizona. That is an attractive job and they will have the money to throw as well.
With basketball practice starting in less than 3 weeks, Josh (Merlin) Verlin over at the Oakland Zoo is getting geared up. He’s happy about the Dixon extension and notes that Pitt’s Media Day will be on October 16, the day before the first official day teams can practice.
Finally, for the hoops deprived, the tip-off for college basketball junkies will be on Tuesday November 18.
A marathon of 14 college basketball games on Nov. 18 — spread over 23 consecutive hours — will help kick off the 2008-09 college basketball season on ESPN.
The games open at midnight ET with national championship game runner-up Memphis hosting Massachusetts, where Tigers head coach John Calipari once coached. It wraps up with the two winningest programs in college hoops history — Kentucky and North Carolina — meeting in Chapel Hill at 9 p.m. ET.
Wheee.
