As Kentucky comes calling, Will Wade has survived and thrived at LSU
At the end of March 2019 you could have made a speculator’s ransom had you bet that on Feb. 18, 2020, Frank Williams Wade would still be the head basketball coach of the LSU Tigers.
And yet when 10th-ranked Kentucky visits the Pete Maravich Assembly Center in Baton Rouge for a key SEC game, Wade will be on the home team sideline directing the Tigers.
Who’d have thunk it?
A review of 2019 events: On March 7, Yahoo Sports reported that Wade was on an FBI wiretap saying that he had made a “strong-ass” offer to Louisiana prep prospect Javonte Smart, a current member of the Tigers who at the time of the wiretap was being recruited by Wade. A day after the report, LSU suspended both Wade and Smart. The player was reinstated after one game. But Wade remained suspended after refusing to meet with school officials.
The coach missed LSU’s final five games as the Tigers wrapped up the SEC regular-season title before reaching the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. Once the season was completed, it was expected that Wade would be relieved of his duties. That didn’t happen, however. After hiring a new attorney, Wade met with the LSU administration and was reinstated on April 14 by the school, which cited absence of “actual evidence of misconduct.”
Three days later, news broke that LSU Athletic Director Joe Alleva would be leaving the program. Former Texas A&M AD Scott Woodward replaced Alleva.
Meanwhile, back on the job, Wade has picked up where he left off, building a successful program in Baton Rouge. He signed top-20 prospect Trendon Watford, brother of former Indiana star Christian Watford. After going 18-15 his first season at LSU, Wade was 25-5 last year (before the suspension). After an 8-0 start, the Tigers are currently 9-3 in the SEC and 18-7 overall. Saturday’s 88-82 loss at Alabama knocked the Tigers out of the Top 25.
In fact, LSU has lost three of its last four. A terrific offensive team, the Tigers have had problems on defense, staring with a surprise 99-90 loss at Vanderbilt on Feb. 5. Wade has said the Commodores exposed his team defensively. “Pretty much any good guard can get loose against us,” Wade has said.
And yet the Tigers are still in the thick of the SEC title race, especially if they can knock off Kentucky on Tuesday (9 p.m. tip on ESPN). And Wade has three top-135 prospects signed for next year, led by No. 24-ranked Cameron Tatum, a shooting guard for Oak Hill Academy.
There have been some slings and arrows along the way. Back in November, when LSU played at VCU, the school Wade left to come to Baton Rouge, VCU students dressed up as FBI agents and tossed fake $100 bills into the air. After an 84-82 loss to the Rams, Wade admitted he appreciated “the atmosphere and the fans.”
Meanwhile, Alleva gave an interview to The Advocate in Baton Rouge in which he referred to the Wade hire as his biggest regret at LSU. “I got some bad recommendations on that guy,” Alleva said.
So why is Wade still around? I go back to last March at the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament in Jacksonville, Fla. Kentucky was there. So, too, was LSU. One morning I happened to be riding the elevator down to the lobby with a gentleman wearing an LSU logo on his shirt.
“What’s going to happen with your coach?” I asked.
The man offered up that he wasn’t saying that everybody was doing it, i.e. cheating, but everybody was doing it. He then said he didn’t know what was going to happen, but he didn’t think the school wanted to lose Wade for one simple reason.
“Will can coach,” he said.
Other stories of note:
▪ Kentucky’s Vince Marrow could be the highest-paid football non-coordinator in the SEC next season. After turning down an offer to join his friend at Michigan State last week, Marrow received a new UK contract in which he’ll make $900,000 annually through June 30, 2023.
▪ Louisville basketball is at a crossroads, writes Mike Rutherford of Card Chronicle. He writes: “Forget the ACC title race, forget NCAA Tournament seeding, forget all the other minutiae we typically obsess over at this point in the season; Chris Mack’s team suddenly has an existential crisis on its hands. How it handles that in the days to come will determine whether or not any of the other stuff even matters.”
▪ Silver Prospector, winner of the Kentucky Jockey Club last year at Churchill Downs but fourth in his 2020 debut, took the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn on Monday to put himself back on the Kentucky Derby trail. Trained by Steve Asmussen, Silver Prospector earned 10 points for his first-place finish.
SEC basketball schedule this week
Tuesday, Feb. 18
- 6:30 - Vanderbilt at Tennessee (SEC)
- 7:00 - Arkansas at Florida (ESPNU)
- 8:30 - Ole Miss at Missouri (SEC)
- 9:00 - Kentucky at LSU (ESPN)
Wednesday, Feb. 19
- 7:00 - Auburn at Georgia (ESPN2)
- 7:00 - Texas A&M at Alabama (SEC)
- 9:00 - South Carolina at Mississippi State (SEC)
Saturday, Feb. 22
- 12:00 - Tennessee at Auburn (CBS)
- 1:00 - Missouri at Arkansas (SEC)
- 3:30 - Mississippi State at Texas A&M (SEC)
- 6:00 - Florida at Kentucky (ESPN)
- 6:00 - Georgia at Vanderbilt (SEC)
- 8:00 - LSU at South Carolina (ESPN2/ESPNU)
- 8:00 - Alabama at Ole Miss (SEC)
This story was originally published February 18, 2020 at 6:00 AM.
