We should start saying "we wish you well in your future endeavors..."

We can't compete with Illinois and that offer. I love OU and our season and what the future holds, but I would tell him to take that job in a second. Why?

5 or 6 years of guaranteed big money, being able to offer assistants $150,000+, premier conference, resources...you can't pass up that chance. He could never get this chance again...even with a great year next year, you still need a lot of luck to hit it big in the MAC tournament, not just the NCAA.

You secure your family's future with that deal and you get to do something you love.

Thank him for the great run and the memories, and hope that he leaves a program on strong footing that can continue into the future.

I think we're overly romanticizing the situation if we think that the reason this deal isn't done is because Groce is doing some serious soul searching. He isn't praying for guidance, he's praying for more $$$$.

Let's get this over with so we can get the new coach in here and he can begin the daunting task of finding the replacements for the class of 2013.

This is just shoddy work. I said before the work you guys are turning in is not well done and would have been done by a bobcatattacker in 2 pages what took your board over a hundred to get done... like the double spaced every other line skipped stuff you handed in to the freshman English teacher in High School getting the rolled eyes treatment and admonishment that you need to go back and do a better job...fix it.

Throwing out those numbers tells me you did not do the work. You did not look at who he recruited to Butler, X , Ohio State as the lead recruiter and that you have no idea how this all works. YOu know very littel of the MAC and have not paid attention to everyone from Vitale and Knight to most of the major talking heads  talking about the parity in the league and the difficulty in winning out at this level. Then you top it off assuming he would bring MAC players to Illinois when he brought Oden and COnley out of Indiana to that football school in Columbus ahead of Purdue and Indiana then threw in Cook, Deibler, Thomas and Craft just for good measure along with a ton of other supporting role players.

Weak work my friend. Sorry. YOu are one of the sane Illini guys but you misjudged this one ....but hey ... I have long been saying there are no good stops on this year's coaching carousel to anyone who wold listen and you guys are making me look pretty good at this point.

Says who. Look at his recruits coming in. We were stocked for years. Larranaga stayed, never had the same success and still moved on years later. Salaries aren't trending down.

Bobcat Love/Mike---and that's what "might" crash this deal.  If his pride gets in the way of the big picture, assuming he really wants the UI job, he might tell them to stick it if they don't budge just for the sake of the principle of the matter.
But in the 12th hour, I think he backs down if necessary and takes the $$$.

The only thread of hope, and it's a long shot at very best (seems like about 0.5% right now), is that he really does want to build "a Duke at OHIO" and this is his one big poker play to budge the powers at OHIO to pony up money.  He gets a lot of promises for salaries/facilities, etc... that this current position provides him so that he can move the boat at a faster pace from this point forward.  Once again, that would be the mindset of a entrepreneurial type coach who's working the system now that he has some power to get the resources he needs for future growth.  That's the "path less traveled" and right now I'm thinking he's taking the status quo path of a successful MAC coach.

(if true) 

but (again, if true) I hope JG is successful enough that he can ditch Illinois for a GOOD high-major program in 2-3 years.

edit: again, if all of this is true. Hopefully this is another case of Illinois reporters being illinois reporters.

And the bad part is that if he jumps at this he very well could find himself following the path of his mentor, Lickliter in the Big Ten experiement.....used up and sitting next chair while he collects and lives off of buy out money....courtesy of a fanbase and a few coaches who don't like him from day one.

I would love to see him build the program. I have coached and been around basketball my entire life. Maybe it's just me but I'm always the guy who wants to go to the underdog school and make it big. Even as a player I loved going into a game being the underdog. Groce and the entire MAC are in a place where they can get two seeds in the tournament if Ohio does well next year and the MAC is as to schedule a few good games in the beginning of the season. And the other thing ( and I know this sounds stupid). Money isn't everything. Family plays a big part in your decision. And where you live and the community. I would without a doubt take a job for less money to stay In a place I am happy and to build a program. He is a hero here.

Most of the details are very different, but UM hiring RichRod from WVU, does have one potential similarity to the feel of this.  UM fans/alumni didn't want him from day one and he wasn't one of them.  Consequently, they didn't give him a chance and was eventually run out of town.  And like JG, RichRod was great with the media, charismatic, well spoken and had won everywhere he'd been.  No doubt had they embraced him, he would've won at UM.  They didn't, he didn't,  he's in Arizona and he wishes he was back at WVU.

It wouldn't surprise me if those numbers are low, or if this ends with Groce getting what we was quoted as asking. 

This is only the 68 NCAA tournament teams, but 28 guys made 1.3MM or more.  Factor in the guys like Weber who didn't make the tournament, and maybe we can say there are about 35 jobs out there that pay that money or will pay that money.  Is this the right fit?  Is it worth it? 

I think he'll take it because of proximity, but he doesn't have to wilt to Illinois.  Groce doesn't have to even match what he did this year, he'll be in the mix for the same level of jobs.  And perhaps one without an outgoing president or jilted BOT.

(Larranaga as mentioned struck while the iron was cold, and still doubled his salary to a cool mill).

If he takes it, I'll thank him, root for him when it doesn't impede Ohio, and cherish the memories... 







(but he can as well next year in finding a suitor).

I'm interested more in the number Illinois is offering than anything else. 

If their ceiling is 5-6 years at 1.2 million, there's certainly a window of opportunity here for Ohio. 

Does something like 8 years, $650,000 per get it done?

Illinois: 5 years, 1.2 mil = 6 millon + incentives. 
Ohio: 8 years, $650,000 = 5.2 million + incentives. 

He's really not leaving a ton of guaranteed money on the table in such a scenario. It would simply come down to whether or not he aspires to coach at one of the elite programs (Duke, UNC, Kansas, etc.) one day. 

Again, I'd venture to guess that money may not be there for the AD but if you can get in that 50-55% range (of whatever the bigger school is offering) you certainly have a chance. 

illinois' offer is MUCH lower than I expected it to be......he may still end up there but I would have guessed the per year salary would have been at a minimum 1.5 million (low end) and was not going to be shocked if it was nearly 2. 

I've been in on this thread for quite a while, and these Ohio fans are a classy bunch indeed. Know a lot about basketball, too. There will always be someone who dosen't like us, you know that.