Trent. Come on dude.

On the way home from the bar tonight, and I happened to catch Trent Tucker drop this little nugget of wisdom about the sweet 16 matchup between Stanford and Texas.

"The key here is Tempo. Texas really wants to get out and run, whereas Stanford wants to slow the game down."

I've actually heard this same thing from some other analyst, but here is a classic example of perception not matching reality.

In terms of tempo, from the basketball stat jesus, Texas ranks 258th out of 341. Not anywhere near a team that wants to speed the game up. Stanford is actually a slow it down kind of team, but their tempo ranks 249th, so they are actually slightly faster than Texas.

The Longhorns score a lot of points, third in the Big 12 at 74.5 per game, but it's not because they play an up tempo style, it's because they're efficient. They rank third in offensive efficiency in the country, behind only Kansas and North Carolina.

So, the point is, people like to make things up based on their perception without bothering to even make a cursory glance at the stats which could either back up or refute their subjective opinion, and that's what's wrong with a lot of columnists and commentators these days. But I still love Trent Tucker anyway.

Trent Tucker needs a Job

Tubby Smith has hired many of his assistants already, and it's good for him to get the people he wants and that he is comfortable with. I've since heard that he's still looking for an assistant with Minnesota ties. Apparently the number one candidate is Jimmy Williams, a former Gopher assistant coach under Bill Musselman and Jim Dutcher.

Williams was with the Gophers from 1971 - 1986, and was even head coach for the final 11 games of the 1986 season after Dutcher resigned. He has since been as assistant at Tulsa, San Diego St, Nebraska, Louisiana-Monroe, Oklahoma State, and with the NBA's Timberwolves and Warriors. He resigned recently from Oklahoma State, presumably to put himself into contention for the Gopher job.

The issue is that the administration is still terrified to hire someone who might break the rules. Williams was here with Musselman, whose staff was found guilty of numerous violations. Since the Clem incident, everyone is terrified of anything remotely associated with any issues, shown by the hiring of a terrible, terrible coach who was a terrible, terrible recruiter, just because they knew he was clean.

Nevermind the fact that none of the schools Williams has been at since Minnesota have had any sanctions against them, or even rumors of impropriety. But, whatever. If they want to be scared little girls and not hire a very qualified coach, fine. Then hire Trent Tucker.

Sure, he has no experience, but that's not what you need. Tubby already hired his first choices for assistants, so I'm guessing that means he has his lead recruiter and lead X's-and-O's guy. Trent obviously wants to coach, since he went back to school to get a degree, specifically so he'd be qualified. His name still resonates in this community, and would go a long way towards repairing the damage done by The Great Dan Monson.