Top 10 Coaches You Want on Your Pickup Squad

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

http://espn.go.com/blog/collegebasketballnation/post/_/id/109586/top10thursday-coaching-staffs-youd-want-on-your-pickup-squad

It's a Myron Medcalf article, so apologies for that. We talk a lot about how our coaches could take any other coaching squad in a game of pickup. According to this, we would be seventh best (the article looks at all of them as if they were in their prime).

1. St. John's (Chris Mullin, Mitch Richmond)
2. Wake Forest (Danny Manning, Steve Woodbury, Randolph Childress)
3. Buffalo (Donyell Marshall, Julius Hodge)
4. Memphis (Damon Stoudamire, Josh Pastner, Julian Swartz)
5. North Carolina (Hubert Davis, Sean May)
6. Connectiuct (Kevin Ollie, Ricky Moore, Kevin Freeman, Karl Hobbs)
7. Marquette (Wojo, Chris Carawell, Travis Diener)
He didn't just slap the floor for Duke. Wojciechowski was the National Association of Basketball Coaches Defensive Player of the Year in 1998. Remember Carrawell, now Wojo's assistant? He was the ACC player of the year in 2000 and a first-team All-American that year too. Diener, Marquette's director of player personnel, played in the NBA and helped Marquette reach the 2003 Final Four with some guy named Dwyane Wade. So much balance with this staff leading your team.
8. Alabama (Avery Johnson, Antonie Pettway)
9. UCLA (Tyus Edney, Steve Alford)
10. Stanford (Johnny Dawksin, Tim O'Toole)

I know he probably left off people on all of these squads but I think Brett Nelson deserved a mention. All American, SEC Most Valuable Player, led the Gators to a National Championship appearance.

[CTWarrior]

Tim O'Toole for Stanford makes them part of the top 10?  "Starred" at Fairfield is quite a stretch.  When he played for the Stags they used to call him Timmy O'Turnover.  There has to be somebody with better than Dawkins and O'Toole.

[GooooMarquette]

Josh Pastner helps Memphis to #4???  lol

He played 42 games in 4 seasons at Arizona...and scored a grand total of 40 points.  That's just 2 more games and 19 more points than Rob Frozena.

[GooooMarquette]

Cal would be better at #10 than Stanford.  Cuonzo Martin and Tracy Webster.

[MU82]

Interesting idea for an article.

No. 1 vs No. 2 would have been a hell of a game, and I think NC is probably top-3 -- those guys were tremendous college players.

I agree that Brett Nelson was a bad omission. He was a better college player than Wojo was, for sure.

What about if these coaching staffs actually faced off today? I'd give Marquette a heck of a chance. No size, but we'd shoot, steal, drive, dish ... and kick Danny Manning in the ankles!

[barfolomew]

Thank you for pasting the results, TAMU, so that I didn't have to bump up Myron's click count. Good idea for an article; too bad it was given to Myron to execute.

[ChitownSpaceForRent]

Sean May...Hes probably the reason I still hate North Carolina to this day. The amount of non call offensive fouls in the national championship game...

[wadesworld]

Sean May...Hes probably the reason I still hate North Carolina to this day. The amount of non call offensive fouls in the national championship game...

Sean May's fault.

[MU82]

Sean May...Hes probably the reason I still hate North Carolina to this day. The amount of non call offensive fouls in the national championship game...

Eh ... Practically every pick James Augustine set in 4 years at Illinois was a moving screen. And I don't blame him for doing it. As wadesworld suggested, it's the ref's job to enforce the rules.

[keefe]

James Augustine

He came close to picking Marquette. Very close.

[Skitch]

There's a guy named Timmy O'Toole? Did he once get stuck down a well in Springfield?

[Mutaman]

There's a guy named Timmy O'Toole? Did he once get stuck down a well in Springfield?

Didn't he pitch for the Redlegs back in the 60s? A starter for the '61 National League champs with Joey Jay and Bob Purkey.

[brewcity77]

Josh Pastner helps Memphis to #4???  lol

He played 42 games in 4 seasons at Arizona...and scored a grand total of 40 points.  That's just 2 more games and 19 more points than Rob Frozena.

Not sure what's more laughable, Pastner or Swartz. Julian was a great Wisconsin HS player, but scored a total of 25 points in his one season at Wisconsin.

Also, leaving Brett Nelson off is clearly a big miss, but compared to some of these guys (Pastner, Swartz, etc.) Stan Johnson was an accomplished player. Averaged 2.8 ppg/1.2 rpg for Southern Utah with 140 total points and 61 rebounds over 3 seasons.