The biggest difference between Groce and guys like Stevens / Smart is that they reside at schools who seem to have much larger basketball budgets. Not only much larger budgets but a much higher level of overall athletics support from the university as a whole. 

Money could probably keep Groce here but Ohio lacks the funds (today) and the overall support to generate them (tomorrow). At least in the capacity that's needed. That just seems to be the unfortunate reality.

You can argue that this sweet 16 run should help but we're not talking about $5,000-$10,000 here. To retain a coach that is as hot as Groce, if Illinois wants him, it would take doubling his salary to even enter the discussion (and in the end, that might not even be enough).

It's not just the additional 300K this year to get him to come back, it's 300-400K a year for 4-5 years as well.  The AD is looking at 2 million plus incentives, over the course of 4-5 years, just to keep him around. Not sure how it is economically feasible without a private party providing a rather large sum of money via a donation.  

I know Ohio stands to receive a nice financial return from NCAA win shares but I don't know how realistic it is to expect the school to funnel ALL of that money in to only the Men's Basketball program. I personally would be all for it but the athletic department has other bills to pay. They may not be able to justify spending all the NCAA win shares on a single athletic team. The BBall team certainly earned it but at a smaller school, the overall economics play a much larger role in allocating money. 

With all that said, hopefully someone on the board can win Mega Millions tonight. That would solve the problem.