Kenny Payne is, almost certainly, done at Louisville, after finishing Year 2 with an 8-24 mark following a 94-85 loss to NC State in the first round of the 2024 ACC Tournament on Tuesday.
Not that what continues to dog Louisville Basketball is all Payne’s fault.
What’s rotten in Lousville goes back to Rick Pitino, who was forced out in 2017 after the latest in a series of scandals – not the sex scandal involving the wife of his equipment manager, not the escort-sex scandal that forced a national-championship banner down, but the other one, involving a pay-for-play scandal.
Then there was the mess with Chris Mack, who was forced out after the odd situation with one of his assistants, Dino Gaudio, who threatened Mack after he was fired – the threat was to expose Mack’s violations of NCAA rules regarding recruiting videos and the use of grad assistants in practices.
Gaudio would be convicted on one count of extortion, and Louisville decided just to part ways with Mack and start over, again.
Holy crap, right?
Which gets us to Payne, a Louisville alum and highly-regarded college and NBA assistant whose job was to get the program back on a good footing both ethically and competitively.
The ethics side of this has been, well, there haven’t been any new scandals at Louisville since Payne took over, so, check.
The competitiveness hasn’t been there. Payne’s teams have compiled a 12-52 record in his two seasons, and if Tuesday’s loss was the last for Payne at his alma mater, his tenure will end with eight straight losses.
To his kids’ credit, they went out playing hard.
NC State (18-14), which had lost 10 of its last 14 coming in after a 13-4 start, led by just three, at 83-80, after another Skyy Clark three – the sophomore had a career-high 36 points on 12-of-17 shooting, 7-of-9 from three – with 2:37 to go.
State, which advances to Wednesday’s second round to face Syracuse (20-11, 11-9 ACC), put the game away by going 9-of-10 at the line in the final 1:43.
So, to Payne, who as of about an hour ago was still employed by Louisville, as far as he knew.
A reporter asked him at the postgame presser if he had been in contact with anyone in the athletics administration about his future – his answer: “No, I have not.”
A follow-up asked Payne what he would say in terms of making his case for a Year 3.
“For me, I go back to Day 1,” Payne said. “It’s unfortunate that we’re talking about this right now. When I walked into the program as the new head coach, I talked about, I needed everybody on the same page. We sort of forgot that.
“I talked about how I’m not going to let you blame me, I’m not standing up here by myself, I need all of Louisville with me. We sort of forgot that. I talked about it’s going to take time, and I’m going to watch and see who jumped on and off the Titanic. We sort of forgot that.”
“We talked about, I gave a specific time. I said three or four years. And I’m good with it. That’s what I believed at that time, and that’s what I still believe it takes to fix this program,” Payne said.
Oh, yeah, he knows.
“Whether I’m the coach or not, I can look in the mirror and say I gave it everything I had to help this program,” Payne said. “I love Louisville. I played here. I won a national championship here. This is not a job for me. Contrary to those who criticize, I don’t sleep at night thinking about my brothers, the former players that played here who had no access to the program.
“Should not be talking about this right now, but I have to say this. These young men, to play in a program where there’s so much scrutiny, is unfair to them. They deserve to play in a program where people are uplifting them to be better, not fighting and tearing them down to make them question how good they are. Then you make my job impossible,” Payne said.
Louisville, on paper, is a great job – with the program’s resources, a big arena, the money that comes with expectations.
Looks like it’s the next guy’s turn.
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Chris Graham
