Wednesday afternoon, Ball State University athletic director Tom Collins announced what most people connected to the Cardinals program already suspected: Basketball coach Tim Buckley had coached his final game for the men's basketball team.
Technically, Buckley will be reassigned to some position in the Office of University Development, but it is likely that Buckley will instead seek other employment - possibly as an assistant coach back at his previous employer, Marquette University, due to his friendship with the university's coach, Tom Crean.
Although Buckley was an asset to the Muncie community and ran a clean and ethical program, in a purely basketball sense it made sense to fire him. A simple glance at the banners hanging in Worthen Arena explains why.
The Cardinals were once a Mid-American Conference dynasty, and NCAA or National Invitational Tournament banners hang for almost every year between 1988 and 2000 to represent that status. Since Buckley was hired to begin the 2000-01 season, just one solitary NIT banner hangs in the arena. Clearly, a change was needed.
Buckley almost appeared to be campaigning for his job when he made comments after the first-round MAC tournament loss to Buffalo, when he spoke about the Cardinals' close losses and how the team was better than its record indicated. However, this has been the case in many of Buckley's seasons as coach, and especially in the last two seasons, when Ball State has lost an inordinate number of close games. Teams should never be better than their records indicate, because if they are, that means either they've had a large amount of bad luck, or - more likely - something is wrong with their coaching.
In this case, the Cardinals never seemed to know what they were doing at the end of close games, even last season when the team had strong senior leadership. One prime example is the controversial home game against Miami (Ohio) during the 2004-05 season when instead of holding the ball for the last shot, guard Dennis Trammell took a shot with seven seconds left. Most of us know the controversial events after that, involving the shot that should not have counted to give the RedHawks the win, but it would never have happened if Buckley demanded that no one shoot until there are four or fewer seconds on the clock, as most coaches try to do.
No one ever wants to be in a position where they have to fire a coach. Athletic Director Tom Collins addressed that truth at the press conference when he said, according to a Thursday story in the Muncie Star Press, "You're dealing with people's livelihoods; they have families, and I have empathy for that. [...] It was a very difficult decision."
However, in this case, Ball State University did the right thing for itself and for Buckley, who is free to seek new employment or continue in his position in the Office of University Development if he so chooses.
The future remains bright for the Cardinals, who already run one of the best programs in the country - academically speaking. With the right coach, this talented team - led by Peyton Stovall, Skip Mills, Maurice Acker and many others - can also be one of the best teams in its conference on the court.
Collins had a job to do in this matter, and he did it. He handled it tastefully and in a classy manner.
Some fresh blood in chair of the Ball State men's basketball will no doubt lead to great success for the Cardinals in the future.
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