U. hoops coaching job is step 3 in 4-step plan

As the search for its basketball coach widens, and one name after another surfaces, this is probably a good time to remember that the University of Utah is a commuter school and the coaching job is a commuter job.

A sort of drive-through position, where the coach is either on his way up or on his way out.

After decades of success, the Utah job is still considered a good one but not a destination. It's still a transition stop, one step shy of the prize. Thanks for the memories, see you on The mtn. — if you can find it. The job remains a position for the Colonial Athletic Association, Big Sky or Mid-American conference coach of the year, not someone famous.

Thus, almost before fired coach Ray Giacoletti had turned out his lights, former Stanford and NBA coach Mike Montgomery said no and former Jazz player Larry Krystkowiak took the head coaching job

with the Milwaukee Bucks. So once again the Utes are scouring the ranks of mid-majors: Winthrop's Gregg Marshall, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi's Ronnie Arrow, Old Dominion's Blaine Taylor, Oral Roberts' Scott Sutton, Kent State's Jim Christian and others have been mentioned. Then there are the assistant coaches at programs Utah aspires to be, such as Michigan State's Jim Boylen.

You get the idea — it's a job for the upwardly mobile. That isn't to say they aren't all good coaches, or that local coaches such as Jeff Judkins, Dick Hunsaker and Randy Rahe couldn't do nicely. It also doesn't mean the coach at, say, Washington is better than the coach at Florida A&M. Timing, personal preference, politics, connections and luck all factor in to getting every job. It only means that despite being the ninth-winningest program in history, Utah still isn't likely to steal a name coach from a name job.

It still doesn't have the power that UCLA had to get Ben Howland from Pittsburgh or that Indiana had to get Kelvin Sampson from Oklahoma.

Having paid Rick Majerus around $1 million annually, and Giacoletti $500,000, it isn't money alone that is keeping the Utes from landing a name coach. It's not tradition or facilities, either. It's not even the ever-popular excuse that coaches don't want to live in Salt Lake.

Considering there are coaches living in Ames, Iowa, Lubbock, Texas, and Stillwater, Okla., location can't be a huge obstacle.

It's the conference, stupid.