Tom Crean, the Georgia men’s basketball coach who previously worked at Indiana and Marquette, is having a rough tenure in Athens.
Crean has slightly improved his record through three seasons at Georgia, but just recently had the bottom fall out in recruiting.
Despite having former five-star and No. 1 overall draft pick Anthony Edwards on the roster last season and a more experienced lineup this year, Crean has failed to even sniff a postseason berth.
Now, the longtime head coach has lost the majority of his starting lineup from last season in Sahvir Wheeler, Toumani Camara and Tye Fagan.
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This leaves Crean with an empty roster headed into the final weeks of 2021 recruiting and the offseason.
To make matters worse, Crean was recruiting 13th out of 14 in the conference just last week.
Now, it appears there is legitimate traction to the rumors that Crean’s coaching style and attitude are affecting the program.
UGA Wire has discovered that Crean reportedly sent a disturbing text to former Louisville star Donovan Mitchell while at Indiana.
Mitchell, one of the key front-runners for MVP in the NBA this season, chose Louisville over Crean’s Hoosiers and a few other top-ranked programs during his recruitment.
UGA Wire has learned that Crean reportedly sent Mitchell a text multiple paragraphs long, telling the point-guard he just wasn’t good enough for the NBA, after the former Brewster Academy product committed to Louisville.
To Crean’s credit, Mitchell was slightly underrated by most scouts coming out of high school, but it’s still perplexing to think a former blue-blood coach would text a high school kid something like that.
I mean, really? Who does that?
This isn’t the first time Crean has been under fire for bashing players either …
Back in Crean’s first season, the coach had a meltdown following a home loss to Ole Miss, which left several members of the team upset in the locker room. Crean had to apologize for the language he used towards the team and already lost a lot of fans in year one.
What an interesting quote from Tom Crean after today’s game: pic.twitter.com/IFMBZr0FoP
— Seth Emerson (@SethWEmerson) February 9, 2019
Really!!!Tom Crean you want to blame the players!!What coach would say something like this to the media about his players😡 https://t.co/NSo4OfN8sO
— Shantell Crump (@shantell_crump) February 10, 2019
Since Crean’s texts to Mitchell, the point guard has gone on to drop 25 on Crean’s former team for Louisville and become the face of the Utah Jazz franchise.
Oh by the way, he is about to sign a $195 million contract extension too …
Utah Jazz All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell has agreed to a five-year, $195M designated rookie max extension, his agents Ty Sullivan and Austin Brown of @caa_sports tell ESPN. Story soon.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) November 22, 2020
Add this to the list of things Tom Crean has done to hurt his reputation and persona in the college basketball world.
I mean, my goodness. Who would want to play for this guy?
Just look at some of these Crean outbursts at former players over the years …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WGEtObvpgk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQW0epDCfhs
And there’s always this gem of an article:
It would be one thing if Crean was recruiting like expected and improving this program from the Mark Fox era at Georgia. However, he’s done the complete opposite.
What an embarrassment for the University of Georgia, the men’s basketball program, the players who have to put up with Crean and the long-suffering fans.
End this disaster …