The Morning Dish – Tuesday, June 24th
Carlesimo Passes On: Former NIT executive director Pete Carlesimo passed away Sunday night after an illness. He was 87. Carlesimo is the father of P.J. Carlesimo, who took Seton Hall to the NCAA Finals in 1989, and has since coached in the NBA, and is currently an assistant on the NBA Champion San Antonio Spurs. The elder Carlesimo was the first full-time executive director of the NIT, and is widely credited with saving the tournament by instituting early round campus sites in 1977, and later created the Preseason NIT in 1985. He had also coached college football and basketball at Scranton, and was AD at Scranton and later at Fordham.
JvBK in NO: Ousted St. Bonaventure coach Jan van Breda Kolff has been named an assistant for the New Orleans Hornets, joining the staff of Tim Floyd. It’s all in the Crescent City, as JvBK is the son of Butch van Breda Kolff, a former coach of the University of New Orleans and the New Orleans Jazz. Floyd is also a New Orleans man, and most NBA pundits are opening questioning his hiring with his inexperience and track record, especially in light of the non-renewal of the franchises’ winningest coach, Paul Silas, last month.
More ACC Stuff: Here’s the latest. The Attorney General of Connecticut, Richard Blumenthal, sent a letter to the ACC (as well as BC and Miami) accusing them of delaying the Big East Five lawsuit. Blumenthal accused the conference and schools of attempting to change the judge, requests to depose university officials, and delays in discovery.
Rocket Upgrade: The University of Toledo has promoted assistant Bob Simon to associate head coach to head coach Stan Joplin. Simon, a graduate of Eastern Michigan University, and has been on the Rocket staff since 2000. Previously he spent nine seasons as an assistant at Wayne State University in Detroit, winning three conference championship and a trip to the D-II Final Four.
