Monday, April 04, 2011

Smart stays at VCU

The darling of the NCAA tournament, Shaka Smart, has inked a new pact with VCU, as the university wasted no time in offering a compensation package to Smart that got it done, pronto. The scuttlebutt has his annual salary at $1.2 million a year.

Kudos to VCU's president, Michael Rao.
At the age of 33, Smart is among the 10 youngest head coaches at the Division I level and has guided the Black & Gold to 55 wins over the past two seasons. That is the highest win total over any two-year span in VCU history.
Click here to read the rest of the story at the Fan District Hub.

"Living a Final Four Dream" is piece that looks at VCU's miracle run in the NCAA men's basketball tournament. It was penned by yours truly and is up at Richmond.com.

When I was running errands on Saturday afternoon, before the game, I was in the Grace and Harrison Streets area. It was teeming with people. Most of them, old or young, were wearing VCU gear. Visually, it was amazing. There were temporary stands selling bootleg VCU T-shirts in the parking lots. I could hear a crowd cheering and chanting on Broad Street, a block away. Even the mumblers and panhandlers in front of the convenience store were outfitted in goldenrod and black T-shirts.

Click here to read the entire piece.

1 comment:

J. Tyler Ballance said...

Yep.

Good thing that the Board jacked up tuition by 24% so they could afford to boost the coach's salary!

If I had my way all of our Virginia schools would be low cost, non-scholarship, Division III. But, given the reality that we have, congratulations are certainly deserved by Coach Smart and the VCU Men's basketball team. They played their guts out in the tournament. I hope that all of the seniors get drafted by the NBA.