Today’s column for CBS Chicago …
(CBS) With no games scheduled until Monday, the Northwestern basketball team is taking a break this week. But here in the meantime, what I’m wondering is if the Northwestern basketball program will ever decide to break away from coach Bill Carmody.
Or if the school will just let it remain perpetually broken.
Now in his 13th season with the Wildcats, Carmody has been in the Big Ten since Y2K was a thing and around the league longer than any coach not named Tom Izzo. So long, in fact, that first-year Illini coach John Groce was still in his 20s when Carmody made his debut.
Probably had hair, too.
Yet, in all those years, Carmody has compiled just a 186-192 record (.492), lost two out of every three conference games he’s coached (he’s 66-136), and still never made an NCAA Tournament (not even in this era of an expanded 68-team field).
Last season, Carmody & The Cats thought they might finally get their first invite to the Big Dance in school history. But then they went and lost their Big Ten Tourney opener, and found themselves relegated to the NIT – for the fourth straight year.
Back in March, I thought that Northwestern’s 19-14 record, which included an 8-10 conference mark, would likely spell the end of Carmody’s lengthy tenure in Evanston. But clearly, I thought wrong.
Continue reading at CBSChicago.com …