BOSTON (AP) -Steve Donahue, who led Cornell to three straight Ivy League titles and to the round of 16 in the NCAA tournament, was hired on Tuesday to replace Al Skinner at Boston College.
Donahue led the Big Red to a 29-5 record this season – the most wins in Ivy history – and victories over favored Temple and Wisconsin in the NCAA tournament. The first Ivy team to reach the Sweet 16 in more than 30 years, Cornell lost to No. 1-seeded Kentucky 62-45 in the East Regional semifinals.
“Anytime somebody leaves like that, it’s hard to swallow,” Cornell guard Louis Dale said in Ithaca, N.Y., where Donahue flew back on Tuesday so he could meet with his team on campus. “But you, at the same time, were such a fan of coach Donahue that we’re BC fans now. We want to see him do well.
‘t mean that we’re going to turn our backs on him.”
Skinner was fired after 13 years in which he became the winningest coach in BC history and took the Eagles to seven NCAA tournaments in a nine-year span. In announcing the decision, athletic director Gene DeFilippo said he was looking for a more exciting style of play than the banging, Big East style that Skinner favored.
DeFilippo was also hoping his new coach will draw fans to the Conte Forum, where attendance has declined for four straight seasons.
BC planned a news conference for Wednesday afternoon, scheduling it for a large auditorium in the new Yawkey Athletic Center instead of the usual basketball postgame interview room in the basement of the Conte Forum. The school also sent out an e-mail to its athletics mailing list for a rally on the Campus Green after Donahue was introduced to the media, proclaiming “A new era in BC men’s basketball.”
Donahue went 74-117 in his first seven seasons at Cornell, which hadn’t won the Ivy title since 1988. They went 16-12 in 2006-07, and the next year the Big Red won its first of three straight Ivy championships to break a string in which Penn and Princeton won or shared every league title but three since 1969.
eve provided and became unselfish.
“I remember watching on a number of occasions in the early years, Steve benching the best player on the team who wouldn’t run the system that was planned for that particular game,” Noel said. “He’d just sit them down and suffered some losses because of that. He developed the discipline, and it ended up bearing incredible fruit.”
Donahue bade a hasty farewell on campus. After addressing the team in a tearful meeting and signing a few T-shirts for fans outside Newman Arena, he left without speaking to the media, honoring a request made by DeFilippo.
Senior Jon Jaques said the emotional Donahue was “pretty composed,” considering the circumstances.
“Obviously, it was somber,” Jaques said. “He’s torn about it because of all the great memories here. I’m sure he’ll always have a special place in his heart for Cornell.”
Dale said the players understood why Donahue left.
“It’s good for him, and we all know that,” Dale said. “The decision he made is based on him and his family. He had to do what’s best for him.”
Noel spoke at an afternoon rally to honor the success of Cornell’s winter sports teams and then reminisced about one of the school’s best hires. He said he tried to retain Donahue, who had already turned down seven or eight offers, but knew that DeFilippo was very interested after speaking with him on the phone.
e’s a terrific person,” Noel said. “We’re very sad to lose him. … Our university really wanted to keep Steve. I’m a little heartbroken, but we turn the page and become a BC fan forever.
“We’re appreciative that we had a decade with Steve Donahue,” Noel said. “We want to build on the terrific work that he did.”
Noel did not give a timetable for hiring a replacement but indicated he wanted someone in place soon.
“There’s already enormous interest,” he said. “It’s just crazy.”
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AP Sports Writer John Kekis in Ithaca, N.Y. contributed to this report.
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