WHAT DO WE DO WITH THE CU BASKETBALL PROGRAM AND TAD BOYLE?

Quick disclaimer:  Tad Boyle was my basketball coach at Longmont High School my sophomore year (when I played more junior varsity minutes than varsity minutes).  He was very intense at that point in his coaching journey and has subsequently offered to pay my therapy bills.  I have followed his coaching career with interest since my high school days and am a Tad Boyle fan.  

The basketball team is on track to have its worst record in nearly 20 years and currently sits at 9-16 overall.  More troubling, however, is that the Buffs have a conference record of 0-13 in the Big 12.  CU has not had a winless conference season since the 1985-86 season under coach Tom Apke, when the CU Band would play brand new smash-hits “Crazy Train” and “Carry on Wayward Son” through the CU Events Center, unknowingly setting a precedent that would last for the next 400 years.

The team isn’t particularly fun to watch. CU plays slow (ranking 190^th in tempo per KenPom), doesn’t like to pressure the ball full-court, and turns the ball over too much.  Fans have noticed — attendance at the CU Events Center is lagging this year and is down about 1,000 fans per game on average.  

This year’s team isn’t a young team taking lumps before hypothetically turning the corner in the future.  5 of the 6 players that have played the most minutes this year for the Buffs are seniors.  There are some talented younger players like Bangot Dak, RJ Smith and Sebastian Rancik, but it’s not clear that any of these younger players have All Big 12 potential.  This is a tough season and the future doesn’t look particularly bright.

So we should fire Tad Boyle, right?

…..let’s slow down and take a look at 3 separate factors that might shed some light on whether CU should retain Boyle, and then we’ll look at why  Rick George should keep a coaching hot board regardless (!) of whether or not Boyle is on the hot seat.

Basketball Success at CU

Just last year – how quickly we forget! —  CU went 26-11, won a first round NCAA tournament game, and had 3 players drafted to the NBA.  Of course this season was going to be a rebuilding season when 3 of the best players in program history all walk out the door.  [counter-point:  essentially the same thing happened to the women’s program and JR Payne has found a way to be very competitive this season…but that’s another post]  

CU has had a total of 14 20-win seasons in the program’s history.  10 of these 20-win seasons have come under Boyle!  CU has been to the NCAA tournament 16 times — 6 have come under Boyle, and a seventh would have come in 2020 if there had been an NCAA tournament when the team was ranked 16^th nationally.  CU has the 15^th most active NBA players out of any college in the country, yet ranks outside the top 50 in spending on the basketball program.  

Frankly, Boyle has been the best coach in CU history by almost every metric.  

Program Support at CU

The CU athletic department has underfunded the CU basketball program for many, many years.  CU’s basketball program has operating expenses of about $9m (with revenue of about $9.3m), of which only $393k is direct institutional financial support from the university.  Compare this to basketball bluebloods – Duke spends about $28m annually on its basketball program, UConn spends about $24m annually, and Kentucky about $22m annually.   While CU will never be a basketball blue blood, its reasonable for fans to expect CU to spend money along the lines of other successful Big 12 basketball programs.  For CU to match the budget of Big 12 teams like Houston, Arizona, and TCU, CU will need to spend about $11m+ annually on its program – which may require additional university financial support in the neighborhood of about $2m.

More tellingly, however, is the lack of movement on facilities.  How long has Rick George talked about the need for renovations to the CU Events Center?  None of the work has started.  Moreover, most of the NIL collective money went to football, not basketball, and this makes it very difficult for Tad Boyle to compete for the best players in the transfer portal.  

Contract Buyout

Tad Boyle has a rolling 5-year contract, with automatic 1-year extensions (pending Board of Regent approval).  As a result of the contract, CU would owe Boyle $10.2m if he were fired this year, per USA Today and other sources.  That’s a lot of money for a basketball program that is consistently underfunded relative to peer institutions, and to an athletic department that is pinching pennies to keep Deion Sanders at Colorado.

If CU has $10m for a buyout, then it’s reasonable to concldue that this money should get invested into the program to allow the team to compete on an even playing field in recruiting and facilities, which will in turn draw more fans and additional revenue, as opposed to using the money to fire a basketball coach.

So That’s It — There’s No Issues with Boyle?!

Tad Boyle has earned the benefit of at least one more year to figure things out.  Boyle is the most historically successful coach in CU history and has overachieved relative to institutional support.  

Note, however, that this doesn’t mean he should get a pass for this year.  This year’s team is painful to watch, and the defense-first style of play at CU isn’t particularly appealing to top prospects.  It’s become clear that the program has reached a ceiling under Boyle, and if fans want a program that is a perennial top 25 program, then Tad Boyle is probably not the right coach for the job.  However, there is a concern that if CU fires Boyle and pays the full $10.2m buyout without simultaneously and preemptive investing “extra” dollars into the program on top of the current budgeted expense + buyout number, that the bottom could fall out of the program.  And this author doesn’t see CU ponying up this extra money. A better path might be to give Boyle another year to see if he can lobby donors (and the university) for a larger NIL / revenue sharing budget, improved facilities, and a larger operating budget.  It’s clear that the basketball program needs these things and that without them, this job will be difficult for any coach to have the same kind of sustained success that Boyle has had at Colorado.

To hold Boyle’s feet to the fire, however, and potentially minimize the buyout payment, it’s reasonable for the Board of Regents not to approve the 1-year extension on his contract after this season….

So We’re Done, Right?

In the words of Lee Corso — not so fast my friend.  

Tad Boyle is old school.  He was old school 30 years ago when he was coaching me and was sporting Pat Riley’s hairstyle.  He loves basketball.  He loves being around young people.  But I can tell you with absolute certainty that he doesn’t love the current world of college basketball, with NIL and open transfers and marked player control.  

Tad Boyle has made more money at CU than he probably has ever dreamed of.  He’s a former stockbroker and money manager, so he knows how to manage money.  He doesn’t need the money.  Frankly, he doesn’t need college basketball in 2025.  And for this reason, it wouldn’t shock me if he decided to step down in the next year or two.  Listen – I have no sources on this.  This is just a hunch.  But knowing Coach Boyle a little bit, I think the increased recruiting grind and the agents and the NIL drives him crazy —- now, in addition to coaching basketball, he needs to recruit his own players ever year due to the transfer portal, he needs to continue to recruit high school players every year, he needs to recruit transfer players every year —  and he even needs to recruit donors.  And then he needs to have financial discussions with each of these players and donors.   For an old school coach, it’s enough to make you think about retiring.

So if I were Rick George, I’d be keeping a coaching hot board close.  In fact, look for Part 2 coming in the next few days for a hypothetical head coaching hot board (apparently we absolutely love hot boards over here at BuffsBlog.)