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Daily briefing: On radio announcers, the coaching carousel and David Cutcliffe

Ivan Maiselby:Ivan Maisel•11/19/21•

Ivan_Maisel

DavidCutcliffe
Duke coach David Cutcliffe (Ryan M. Kelly/Getty Images)

Ivan Maisel’s “Daily Briefing” for On3:

Going over the line

After I covered Baylor’s upset of Oklahoma on Saturday, I was driving to a restaurant in Waco (Trujillo’s, really good old-school Tex-Mex) and listening to the Texas Tech Radio Network. I couldn’t believe how far over the line announcers Brian Jensen and John Harris stepped in criticizing the officiating. They said over and over that the Big 12 office must want Iowa State to win the game. They read off the names of the officials. I’m listening on radio – I have no idea as to the quality of the officiating. But you can’t do what they did. Forget “conference policy.” You can’t have school representatives making comments that could incite fans. They’re close enough to going over the top as it is.

Mel Tucker reiterated that Michigan State is a “destination job” on former Spartan Draymond Green’s podcast. James Franklin told a Penn State booster group “I’m not going anywhere,” the always reliable Neil Rudel of the Altoona (Pa.) Mirror reported. It is the third week in November, and the coaching carousel is whirling as if it were after Thanksgiving. Has the early signing period compelled deals to be made more quickly? I don’t see how. How is hiring a new coach two weeks before the early signing period going to undo the weeks and months of work that other programs have done? Maybe it’s just that everything moves faster these days.

Tough times at Duke

Duke extended its ACC losing streak to 12 games Thursday and looked bad doing it at home against Louisville. David Cutcliffe, in 14 seasons with the Blue Devils, has won 77 games, four more than the six coaches before him won over 25 seasons. Here comes the “but.” But Duke is struggling. The Blue Devils are 10-24 from 2019-present. Coaches coach because they love winning and they love working with young people. Cutcliffe, at age 67, has put himself in a tough position to continue doing the latter.