Fortunately, the university can't go poach last year's coach from that Long Island university only 45 minutes away. He's moved on to the midwest.

I had put up a few posts about this on another thread.

1.Mullins was on thin ice last season.
This season's collapse,especially with the talent he had,was "the straw that
broke the camel's back".

2.Mullins was always viewed as a "figure head".
The most common term used to describe him was that he "didn't like to get down in the weeds",particularly when it came to recruiting.

3.Mike Cragg,was brought in to try an restore Saint Johns to its former athletic prowess,especially in men's BB.
It doesn't sound like he was a Mullins fan.

4.Just about every sports writer and commentator out here was saying they coveted Hurley.
They also didn't think they had any chance of getting him from ASU,unless they were willing to spend a LOT more then they would consider.

5.According to WFAN,Saint John's has a big problem recruiting "local talent".
They said that most of New York City's top players are looking for more a change of scenery,then Queens.

6.Other then Hurley,no other coach's name has really been talked about.
Now that March Madness is over,sports talk is pretty much limited to Yankees and Mets.

7.I didn't know about the Iona coach,until I saw your post.
If he's not willing to jump to Saint Johns,that speaks volumes.

Mike Francessa is a Saint Johns Alum.

He is really tearing into them this afternoon for the coaching situation.

He's saying that,if they couldn't get Hurley,which he thinks they should have,Cluess was a "no brainer".

Cluess if from the area and a great recruiter.

Apparently Saint Johns didn't really want him.

Have to see what happens now.

Wonder if Saul likes NYC ? :-)

If both Cluess and Porter Moser turned them down in the same week, there's something amiss. Maybe they're simply trying to be cheap on the compensation and both guys said 'no thanks' I'll stay where I am. Maybe?

If worse came to worse, maybe they could persuade former Bobcat asst. coach and St John's Head Coach Fran Fraschilla to put away his headset and get back on the Red Storm bench. Though it was so long ago that he coached there, I believe they were still the Redmen back then. Wasn't Coach Fraschilla sort of ushered out of the door there because he kept secretly sending out feelers to other programs?

Sadly St. John's basketball like Tennessee football has too many people living in the 80s thinking of the good old days. Kinda reminds me of a guy I would occasionally see at a nearby parish fish fry, who was originally from New York. He was always clad in St. John's attire. He would tell you stories about meeting Jon Bonjovi, Chris Mullin, Big Paul Costellano and John Gotti. I was half expecting him so say he was going home to watch Hill Street Blues.

When your program doesn't win and seems somewhat irrelevant you are going to remember the good old days when it was relevant. Who knows St. John could unknowingly stumble on a diamond in the rough, they are going to need to because it seems the known precious gem coaches have been taken.

According to the people on WFAN,Saint John's is notoriously cheap.

They said they never "do what it takes" i.e. spend enough to get their first coaching choice in BB.

I'm gonna go with both.

That said, Mike Anderson.....not sure how to feel about this hire.

One of the reports I read about the St. John's situation (correction, its a comment to this deadspin story https://deadspin.com/another-coach-rejects-the-disaster-a... , so take it with a huge grain of salt) stated that the school's President and CFO were running the search behind the new AD's back, and that this is why Moser (and perhaps others) removed himself from consideration