Coach Avery Johnson Sounds Ready To Hit The Ground Running

In case you missed the news last night, Alabama made it official and announced the hiring of Coach Avery Johnson as the Crimson Tide’s 20th men’s basketball coach.

According to Cecil Hurt, Johnson will arrive in Tuscaloosa today at approximately 5:30 p.m. CT and an introductory press conference will be held on Wednesday.

Coach Johnson hasn’t even arrived yet and you can already feel the buzz among Tide fans that are ready for him to get started.

Al.com’s Michael Casagrande posted a few articles today from an interview they did with him. What comes to my mind after reading them is he is determined and he has the personality to handle the job. Will that translate to wins on the court? We don’t know the definitive answer to that yet but I don’t see why it wouldn’t.

Many of the national analysts say that the one thing that Johnson needs to do is to surround himself with good assistants that know the college game. According to Al.com, he has already retained Coach Antoine Pettway. That’s a win. Players and recruits love him and he will also bring some familiarity to the previous staff that should make the current players more comfortable with the transition.

The one concern everyone seems to have is his recruiting since he’s never done that. That doesn’t seem to bother him and he believes in what he will sell to potential recruits according to that Al.com article.

"“Here’s what I’d say to that, every parent and kid, they’re going to be able to identify with me on some level,” Johnson told AL.com in his first interview since being hired. “One, they’ll be able to identify with me as a quality NBA player, either the parent or the kid. A lot of times with the kids and these video games, they go back and play with the 1999 Spurs, then I’m going to be the point guard, not that I was a very good shooter.”“So the parents or the players identify with me as a former NBA player or a former NBA coach. Both parents and kids, for the most part, watch ESPN. So they probably will have seen me on my NBA Countdown show or SportsCenter.”"

Johnson already has some ties and relationships to the AAU circuit through his son Avery Johnson, Jr., a player for Texas A&M. Johnson pointed out that a lot of the parents told him if he ever coached at the collegiate level, they would send their kids to him. He’s known some of the class of 2015 kids since they were younger so he already has an advantage there.

With ties to national recruits, don’t think he will ignore the ones in the state of Alabama.

“We know where to find you,” he said. “We’re not going to neglect the state of Alabama. It’s a priority in our recruitment.”

It’s time to bring Alabama basketball back to a more competitive level and perhaps beyond that. I think they have the man for the job.