So heres what I know about UCLA thats not necessarily new

Ben has been a dead man walking since early in the season. Boosters and Alum were just done with him. He even lost the support of Dan Guerrero who always (at ties inexplicably had his back) to soem extent.

So essentially the search has been on all season. They couldnt hire anyone away midseason so theyve been putting out feelers.

For those of you who dont know. Of course UCLA isnt contacting coaches directly. That would be illegal. All coaches do have agents though and UCLA basically has had a headhunting firm that does the outreach for them via the agents.

Their main targets who have shown mutual interest per Tracy Pierson (for those of you who dont know he's a writer for Bruin Report Online. I really respect his info cause he's one of those guys thats really tight lipped about shit unless he knows theres some truth to it. Even though he's an insider he rarely just leaks information recklessly)

are

Pitino
Brad Stephens
Jay Wright (lol)
Shaka Smart and
Billy Donovan

I think Stephens and Shaka are on everyones radar but Pitino (to some extent) and Billy D are the shockers. No secret UCLA pursued Pitino last time around.

But a lot of people wonder why Billy D would leave. He has a lot of reasons to stay but I think there is still a huge allure with being the coach who can bring UCLA back to the promised land. He'd have very little competition recruiting west of the Mississippi, and can still pull in some florida kids.

Because UCLA is a state school the school alone cnat match the 3.5 million salary but the boosters are supposedly ready to pony up and for the right coach will help pay the salary up to 4 million--making whoever is hired one of the highest paid coaches in college basketbal...

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"though time has passed, im still the future" (c) black thought