NCAA Basketball: Best/worst head coaching jobs among key questions

After discussing NCAA Basketball teams in the past couple of roundtable articles, this week’s group will talk about the head coaching; including the ones that have done a great job and which of those have struggled this season.

Chris Thedinga – @CTheDinga

Jacob Zinkula – @1Perfectbracket

Andrew Tineo – @D_Tineo4

Karl Heiser – @karlheiser17

Anthony Brown – @ABrownSports 

Benjamin Zacher – @beezacher

1. More impressive coaching job this season; Nate Oats or Juwan Howard?

Brown

This one is a toss-up because both teams and conferences are robust. You have a strong Alabama team who upset a top-10 Tennessee squad, beat Auburn, Ole Miss, and had some excellent non-conference wins.

I would argue that if they beat LSU and Oklahoma in the upcoming weeks, they deserve to be ranked or at least have a high number of AP Poll votes.

Herb Jones and John Petty Jr. coming back this season were returning additions for Nate Oats and company because of how well the Crimson Tide are playing. Javon Quinerly has been a substantial addition from the transfer market, and Jaden Shackelford is doing a great job in his sophomore campaign.

Oats will continue to attract top talent in recruiting and the transfer market if he keeps this up.

As for the No. 7 Michigan Wolverines, I felt that when Juwan Howard came back to Anne Arbor to be the head coach, he was going to do great things. In his second season, he has been masterful and has the Wolverines primed for a Final Four.

Hunter Dickinson has put on a show this season as a freshman. The only team that managed to make him look like one was Minnesota, who held him under 10 points and rebounds.

Isaiah Livers returning was big for them also, and he has been playing well. Howard has done a better coaching job by a small margin because the Big 10 is a better conference than the SEC. It has been the best conference in college basketball the last two seasons.

Zinkula

Juwan Howard’s performance has been undeniably impressive, but he took over a program that was already in great shape under John Beilein (earned 2-seed in 2018-19). In comparison, Alabama missed the tournament the year prior to Nate Oats stepping in.

Not only does Oats have the Crimson Tide rolling — seven straight wins — he’s implemented significant tweaks to the team’s style of play over the last two seasons. Alabama has upped both its offensive pace and 3-point attempt rate — ranking 3rd and 22nd respectively – and these changes certainly seem to be working.

Tineo

I’m going to go with Nate Oats at Alabama. Michigan over the past five years has performed better than its pre-season expectations. Oats is in just his sixth season as a CBB head coach, after coming from Buffalo. After a rather lackluster first season, Alabama is leading the SEC.

The Crimson Tide are not known as a basketball school, as they’ve had double-digit losing seasons every year since 2005. The Crimson Tide has also won double-digit conference games just four times since that 2005 season. However, Alabama is already at six.

Both coaches have done a fantastic job this year, being two of the biggest surprises of the CBB season. However, I have been slightly more impressed with the job Oats has done at Alabama.

Thedinga

The job Nate Oats has done at Alabama cannot be understated. The Crimson Tide was picked fifth in the SEC Preseason Poll but now find themselves in the thick of conference championship talks. He has blended this group of newcomers and veterans and concocted an absolutely splendid mix. No disrespect to Juwan Howard, but Nate Oats has done as good of a job as anyone in the country.

Zacher

Nate Oats deserves heaps of credit for the job he has done with the Tide this year, and Alabama’s win at Tennessee might be one of the best wins on any resume.  But I have to give the edge to Juwan Howard, whose Wolverines have – like last season – surpassed expectations, but unlike last season, have continued their hot start to the season.

The Wolverines have come a long way since their overtime win against Oakland, where one of the most infamous scenes of the young season still lives on in my head, in the verbal altercation between Howard and Isaiah Livers.  Their 11-0 start to the season, which includes seven wins over KenPom top 100 squads, was stellar, and Michigan’s offense and defense both rank in the top 15 in efficiency nationally.

Michigan’s lone loss at Minnesota is a much better loss than two of Alabama’s three losses (Stanford and Western Kentucky) – that is not a knock against the Tide, considering they’re in prime position to win the SEC – but the Wolverines have performed exceptionally well in one of the best conferences in America, and much of that can be traced to Juwan Howard.

Keiser

Juwan Howard’s coaching at Michigan so far has been phenomenal. While Oats has also done a great job, I think Alabama is about as good as most people expected them to be, maybe a little bit better. However, there wasn’t a Preseason Top 25 in existence that had Michigan anywhere close to where we see them now.

Busting Brackets’ preseason power ranking had the Wolverines at number 30. Howard has gotten the very most out of Michigan and they are firmly within the country’s ten best teams right now.