The end of Fred Hill’s tenure at Rutgers was surely not the ending many had in mind when it all started. While the storybook ending that some foresaw never came, and it was never really in sight, the ending is still something of a head-scratcher.
When Hill became the head coach at Rutgers, there was a lot of anticipation. Some of that was because it was the worst-kept secret in college basketball, as Hill had left Villanova to become the associate head coach at Rutgers a year earlier. It was an odd move, a step down in the minds of most as Villanova had become a consistent NCAA Tournament team while Rutgers was still trying to get to the NCAA Tournament. Gary Waters, the head coach at the time, was on the hot seat, so everyone figured Hill went to Rutgers to then succeed Waters once his contract ran out a year later.
But a lot of that anticipation came from other things. For one, Hill is a New Jersey guy. He was born there, went to college there, and did a lot of his coaching in or around the state save for stops at Marquette and Maine from 1988-94. There aren’t many people who are associated with college basketball in New Jersey as readily as Fred Hill. Also, his father is the long-time head baseball coach at the Rutgers, so there was a family angle to it as well – one that would come into play at the end, oddly enough. And this was Hill’s first head coaching job, sort of a hometown-kid-comes-home-for-his-first-job kind of story.
Hill has also been known for his recruiting, as he’s had a big hand in top players going to all of his stops, and that was a key because Rutgers had for years struggled to get the best New Jersey kids. There has been plenty of talent in the state, but Rutgers was always getting the second-tier players, the ones who were borderline Big East talents or better off in the Atlantic 10 if they wanted to be all-conference players. The thinking was that with Hill and a staff with plenty of roots and connections in the Garden State, more of the top-tier players would start coming to Rutgers.
Of course, there was a question about whether or not Hill could then coach those players. The jury is still out on that one, much like whether or not he could get the top players consistently. Sure, Hill landed Mike Rosario and Greg Echenique, but the Scarlet Knight roster this past season still had several borderline high-major players like Mike Coburn, Jonathan Mitchell and Hamady Ndiaye. Next year’s class wasn’t looking like a breakthrough group, as they didn’t land players like Kyrie Irving, Devon Collier, Ashton Pankey, Fuquan Edwin or Ronald Roberts. Chances are, neither Gil Biruta nor Austin Carroll, if they still go there (Carroll said recently he is still going to Rutgers), will make anyone forget Echenique or Rosario, let alone Phil Sellers or Eddie Jordan.
In four years at Rutgers, Hill had a 47-77 record, including a 13-57 Big East mark. With a new athletic director since he was hired, the thought was that Hill might not have much time before some results needed to be seen. But athletic director Tim Pernetti said Hill was going to get another year to try to turn the corner, and then the month of April came about.
On April 1, Hill was involved in an incident at a Rutgers baseball game. According to reports, he yelled at the Pittsburgh baseball coaches after the game and was told by Pernetti not to attend any more games between the two schools that week. Hill showed up again, however, and that led to the end. It was only a question of when, not if, he would be out as the head coach, as well as how much money he would get going out the door.
Hill’s tenure wasn’t without controversy prior to the incident. Last August, Hill hired Sal Mantesana as an assistant coach, which meant one of the current assistants either had to leave or move to another position on the staff. With that hire, he made Craig Carter the recruiting coordinator, which meant he was no longer an assistant coach and could not recruit. Not only is Carter a good recruiter who is well-liked and respected in the New York/New Jersey area, but the move left the team without a black coach on the entire staff, which had some in New Jersey up in arms until Carter was moved back into his assistant coaching role a month later. While Hill did move him back into the position before the season started, that he removed Carter from the assistants in the first place was an instance of dropping the ball at a bad time.
A milder controversy came early on, when Rutgers played a game against St. Peter’s in Jersey City. Although it was not on campus at the Yanitelli Center, it was basically a home game for St. Peter’s, the kind of road game a team like Rutgers basically doesn’t play because they don’t have to. But Hill took them on the road, and they lost the game, which brought some negative publicity. Hill looked at it the way he should have – that the Scarlet Knights have to be able to win games like that if they’re going to be able to win Big East games – but playing the game was seen as a questionable move. Perhaps it was a sign of things to come: they couldn’t beat a rebuilding MAAC team, and had trouble winning games for all of Hill’s tenure.
Even with all of that, surely no one foresaw the end to his tenure that occurred. No one would have been surprised if his tenure ended after another losing season that included a 6-12 Big East record, but this was a surprise. The New Jersey boy came home for his first head coaching job, and went out the door not in the best of ways. It was hardly a storybook ending, much like the prior four years were hardly storybook in nature.
