The Auburn basketball program just earned their first #1 AP Poll ranking in history and followed it up with a tough win against Missouri on the road, marking the Tigers’ 16th straight victory. The team is poised to make a deep run in the tournament come March, and could potentially have the #1 pick in the 2022 NBA Draft in Jabari Smith.
Despite the clear upward trajectory of the program that head coach Bruce Pearl has spent eight years building on the Plains, people are convinced that he would happily leave Auburn basketball to be the head coach at Louisville.
The argument from those people continues to be that Louisville is a better job with a long history of success in the NCAA tournament and 22,000 fans that fill up their arena to support the Cardinals. However, Louisville basketball is a program that has become entrenched in NCAA violations and currently lacks a full-time president and athletic director.
According to Pat Forde, Bruce Pearl to Louisville “ain’t happening”:
"An early Louisville fan favorite who would seem to stand no chance is Auburn’s Bruce Pearl. This is a school under a massive compliance microscope; hiring a coach who has been sanctioned twice in the last 11 years ain’t happening."
Pearl admittedly made innocent mistakes during his time at Tennessee, and after earning a second chance with Auburn basketball he had to deal with the infractions of former assistant coach Chuck Person, instituting a self-imposed post-season ban last year and undergoing a two-game suspension this season.
As someone who has been on the NCAA’s radar for the past few years, Pearl is not the ideal candidate–solely from an off-court perspective–for a school that is about to spend a lot of time under the NCAA’s microscope.
But it also seems highly unlikely that Bruce Pearl walks away from what he has built on the Plains. Of course, everyone has a price, but without any leadership stability at Louisville and looking at the success of Auburn basketball, hopefully, Tiger fans can remain confident that Pearl isn’t going anywhere.