Columnist endorses Pearl for Indiana job

Tennessee men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl has the No. 1 vote from Indianapolis Star columnist Bob Kravitz to become the next coach at troubled Indiana.

"These are my shoot-for-the-moon candidates," Kravitz said in his column in Friday's edition.

"If IU has to settle for a smaller name down the road, fine. But let's see it make a play for some of the established big dogs of college basketball.

"My first call (and second and third) would be to Bruce Pearl of Tennessee. He's a terrific coach, he's a charismatic personality and he would make those IU-Illinois games even more heated. Anybody who is willing to paint his body orange for a women's game gets my vote. It doesn't hurt that he has Midwest ties, having been an assistant at Iowa and head coach at Southern Indiana."

Kravitz said his other candidates would be Louisville's Rick Pitino, Michigan State's Tom Izzo, Memphis' John Calipari and Texas' Rick Barnes. After that it's Vanderbilt's Kevin Stallings, Georgia Tech's Paul Hewitt and Gonzaga's Mark Few.

Kelvin Sampson resigned from Indiana last week amid a phone-call scandal.

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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