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The Wisconsin athletic department officially posted the men's basketball head coaching job opening late this week, a major step toward revealing the official replacement for Bo Ryan. Complete applications must be submitted by 4:30 p.m. CT on March 3, with the start date beginning on or after March 8.
As the calendar moves through the latter half of February, Badgers fans have been wondering when Barry Alvarez might remove the interim tag from Greg Gard, who replaced Ryan upon his retirement earlier this winter. Those questions first popped up when Gard led the Badgers into College Park and overwhelmed Maryland, and they grew louder after the Badgers out-punched Iowa in a 67-59 road win on Tuesday. Now, the time seems right to say that Gard deserves the job at UW.
@jaypo1961 @JimPolzinWSJ Looks like Barry is ready to make a hire pic.twitter.com/OBiOVlB2Ei
— Kevin Sutter (@kesutter34) February 26, 2016
As we all know, there's a bureaucratic process for naming a coach on a permanent basis at Wisconsin, and there have always been names tied to this job that are worthy enough to cause consternation when you have a fanbase that is so behind a head coach like Badgers fans are with Gard at present.
The process seems merely a formality before making Gard the official head coach considering the timing of the posting so close to conference tournaments and the NCAA tournament, though would-be coaches from Herb Sendek to Drew Hamm [ed. note: the latter, one of B5Q's writers and #RUNTHEDANGBALL enthusiast] will be applying and a few will likely get interviews.
Gard has led Wisconsin to an 11-5 record since taking over as interim head coach, including a 9-1 record in the last 10 games with two road wins over top-10 teams -- something that hasn't been done since 1955.
Long story short: with the timing of the position posting and the results on the court, it seems likely the Badgers will soon name Gard their official head coach.