Report: Details emerge on Tom Crean's buyout at Georgia

It wasn’t an unexpected move, but Georgia is officially moving on from Tom Crean, the school announced Thursday night. One of those reports shed light on his buyout situation at the school.

ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported Georgia owes Crean $3.2 million after parting ways with him. Crean just wrapped up his fourth season in Athens, which culminated with an 86-51 loss to Vanderbilt in the SEC Tournament.

During his time with the Bulldogs, Crean amassed a 47-75 record and never finished higher than 10th in the SEC. This season, Georgia went 6-26 overall and just 1-17 in conference play — with the lone victory coming against Alabama in January.

Crean took over for Mark Fox, who was fired in 2018 after totaling a 163-133 record in nine years with Georgia. Now, after four years, he’s on his way out.

The Bulldogs announced a national search is starting right away to find Crean’s replacement.

Georgia makes final decision on Tom Crean

Following a report that head coach Tom Crean was “likely” to be fired by Georgia, the university made that decision Thursday. Georgia confirmed Crean won’t return as the Bulldogs’ coach next year.

Reports surfaced earlier this week that Crean’s future was in doubt, and they came before Georgia’s SEC Tournament game. In Crean’s final game in the head chair, the Bulldogs were blown out by Vanderbilt 86-51. Georgia shot 29.8 percent from the field (14-for-47) in Crean’s last game, while making just 11.8 percent of its three-point shot attempts (2-for-17).

Formerly the head coach at Indiana and Marquette, Crean had the worst win percentage of his career while in Athens — despite recruiting and developing a No. 1 overall NBA Draft pick in Anthony Edwards. Crean went 47-74 in four years at Georgia, amassing a .388 win percentage, along with a 15-57 record in SEC play. Georgia finished no better than 10th in the SEC in Crean’s tenure, and the Bulldogs never made an NCAA Tournament. The Bulldogs finished with a 6-25 record this year, not including an additional SEC loss in the league tournament.

Georgia’s 6-26 record, including the postseason loss, is good for the third-worst winning percentage in program history (.188). Crean’s win percentage only beat two Georgia teams from the 1950’s.

Hired ahead of the 2018-19 season to replace Mark Fox, Crean still has a winning record in his 22-year career. Crean has 403-305 record in his career (.569 win percentage), including a .551 win percentage in nine seasons at Indiana and a .664 win percentage in nine seasons at Marquette.