Todd Graham is down in Florida with Pitt’s contingent for Big East meetings. Not much for him to do other than talk to the media. He’s doing that.
Maybe it’s bravado. Maybe a touch of irrationality. I don’t know and I don’t care. Coach Todd Graham is not trying to lower expectations in his first year.
Pitt’s Todd Graham: “Our expectation is to win the Big East. Anything less than that & we’ll be disappointed.”
I choose to believe first that it is simply in his personality that he expects to win. To succeed at Pitt. The other part is that he does get that there are expectations. That the fans don’t want to have them tamped down. Especially not even before the first preview guides hit the newsstands. He knows what is expected, and he’s not going to pretend that it is unachievable.
It’s also got just a touch of wiggle room. Winning the Big East this year. Not going to the BCS Championship. Not running the table in the non-con. Winning the Big East.
I usually leave that school located in the middle of Pennsylvania out of my posts. The news, though, that Ed DeChellis left for Navy at the end of May… Wow. Keep in mind Navy lost its head coach because the guy who was there found the job so tough he went back to being an assistant at Villanova. Ed DeChellis not only left a Big 10 program for a service academy in the Colonial Patriot. He took a big paycut. He also left his alma mater. Dana O’Neill (who is a PSU alum) really lays into Penn St.
There’s a good argument that despite taking a pay cut from $650-700 K to $450 K is misleading. He got no extension and was heading to the last year of the contract, probably saved his job this past season, and likely would be out of work after yet another go-round of rebuilding. So jumping now probably gives him more long-term stability and money than just going one more year in Happy Valley and having to go back to being an assistant somewhere else for $100-200 K/year. Still, there’s no good way for Penn State to spin this as a positive reflection on their basketball program.
