Stan Van Passes on the Pacers

by Tom Lewis on May 24, 2007 5:51 AM EDT in Indiana Pacers News

Yesterday evening I was hyped to read this Sun-Sentinel report, that Stan Van Gundy has removed his name from consideration to coach the Pacers. Since the DSL demon kept my words in a straight jacket last night, I'm working the Jones shift to set the words free.
So now, about Stan Van, apparently the lifestyle in South Florida is more suitable for his family than Indy.

"I really like Larry," Van Gundy said of his two meetings with Pacers President Larry Bird, which included an interview in Coral Springs. "It was a good fit from the standpoint in what they wanted in a coach. I was really comfortable with that."

But after spending more than a decade in South Florida and having to otherwise uproot his family in what he called a "total lifestyle change," Van Gundy decided to consider other options.

Hey, whatever it takes, but what is it with the Van Gundy boys playing the lifestyle/family card whenever they want to extract themselves from a situation. It's quite alright to say the Pacers situation is a shaky and I don't want to get stuck with a rebuilding job.

This is great news for both parties. The Pacers will avoid the Stan Van era and Van Gundy can continue getting paid by the Heat for another year. Win-win all around.

Of course, Kravitz used this news as a chance to bash the Pacers front office again. Just how many times can you rehash the current state of the team before any off-season moves are made? Since LJL didn't give Kravitz a plan for the future on the day Carlisle was fired then the Pacers have no direction now? Any plan at that time would've been useless without knowing what type of coach would be hired or how the draft lottery would shake out. Don't you have to let the off-season play out before judging its success? Things are just getting interesting. I'm certainly not going to fret over Van Gundy passing on the job. If Stan's not up for the job then by all means stay home.

This news should've pumped up Bulls' assitant Jim Boylan for his interview with the Pacers yesterday. The job appears wide open now, with Boylan, Brian Shaw, Chuck Person, and Johnny Davis as the sole survivors. I've said before that I'd rather the Pacers took a chance on a less heralded coach than go the mediocre retread route. I figure with a likely rebuild on the way, a less experienced coach couldn't do much worse than the retread. But, there's also a chance of unearthing a budding coaching superstar who just needed an opportunity. Either way, I think I'll let it play out and see what the team looks like at the end of August before I judge this off-season a success or failure.

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