Coach Grobe held a press conference just a little while ago on campus just outside the football facilities. He avoided answering specific questions regarding any specific job, saying only that he is excited about this team and next season and that he couldn't leave because of his relationships with players. He also said that any rumors of him making more money here at Wake are not true, and that he didn't get an even longer deal. He does not deny that he will pay attention when other jobs become available to him, but that he loves things here at Wake, particularly the way he and his staff are treated by AD Ron Wellman.

Not suprisingly, Coach artfully dodged anything specific (as he should, I suppose, even if it's very frustrating to us fans) but at this point I'm satisfied to just be happy with the fact that Grobe is still here.

If you're interested, News 14 has the video up on their website.

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Obviously there have been considerable distractions over the last 18 hours, and so for those of you interested in my comments regarding last night’s basketball game against Vanderbilt, I apologize for getting so thoroughly sidetracked (thought I probably shouldn’t think so highly of myself).

Since that situation seems to be settling down quite nicely (and quite favorably for us) I am excited to get back to the task at hand – writing about our performance on the hardwood last night.

Let’s start with some cold hard facts. We lost the game 83-80, giving up 23 more points than we have to any other opponent this season, but also scoring more than we have in any game other than Fairfield. Considering the fact that Vanderbilt had scored over 90 in their previous two games and averages over 80, our defense did a pretty good job. Before the game I would have said that we would need to hold them under 80 to win. If we had done that we would have won, but we didn’t and that’s the way it goes. I was very impressed with Vandy’s A.J. Ogilvy who scored 23 points and gave our defense fits (particularly Chas when he was in there). On the season Vandy’s been shooting just over 50% from the field and 43% percent from beyond the arc. Last night they only shot 44% from the field and 33% from outside. Although they definitely missed some open shots they probably don’t usually miss, some of that credit should go to our defense. It wasn’t our best defensive night of the season, but it certainly wasn’t the worst and it should have been good enough to win.

James Johnson looked like our leader on the floor last night (LD still played well, but did it more quietly than usual) but although he scored plenty of points (18) his 5 of 16 shooting from the field is disappointingly low – I didn’t even realize it had been that bad. He was 0-4 on 3-pointers, including the miss from the top of the key that would have tied the game in the final seconds. He did contribute 13 rebounds and played a solid game overall, but I would love to see his shooting percentage improve. Some may not like it, but I didn’t have any problem with James bringing the ball up the floor on fast breaks. He looked calm and comfortable doing it and was quite successful on several occasions. He just needs to work a bit on his shot selection in those situations.

It was great to see Harvey Hale bust out of his slump last night. He was 4-6 on 3-pointers and 8-10 overall, matching James’ 18 points. When he shoots well like that we will stay in basketball games. I saw people saying it on the message boards, and I’m starting to believe it’s true – as Harvey goes, so does the Deacon offense. LD was also 3-4 from beyond the arc and scored 11 points, but was quiet on the boards and surprisingly quiet on the defensive end.

Ish is frustrating me for the most part, but then every once in awhile he makes it hard to be mad at him. His shooting is pretty terrible overall (5-14 overall, but 2-5 for 3) however he hit a couple of clutch shots. Considering his 5 turnovers (which I think mostly came in the 1^st half, so he improved late) I was more frustrated than happy with him last night. He just seems out of control and isn’t taking good shots.

Jeff Teague got the start over Harvey Hale last night and played alright, scoring 10 points but only shooting 30% from the field. If coming off the bench helps Harvey play better for any reason, than I’m all for sticking with Teague in the starting lineup. Chas did not have a good game last night, only playing 9 minutes due to foul trouble and generally poor play. Hope to see him bounce back this weekend. Jamie Skeen did a pretty solid job off the bench, however all of his shots were three pointers (he made 3 of 8) and scored nine points. Not a bad spark to have, and I think we’ll see more of him Saturday.

As a team we shot almost 45% from beyond the arc (which was actually better than we shot from the field overall), a huge improvement over what we’ve been doing (27%). That’s an encouraging sign as well.

I said before the game that a loss by less than ten points we prevent me from being overly upset, and true to my word I’m not. It is frustrating to think that we could have had 4 easy points if Ish would just lay the ball up and not get unlucky on the slip (I don’t think I can actually blame him for that) then we probably when the game. Even so, we went into a tough environment on the road and played a game that was better on the whole than probably any game we’ve played so far this season. This is a great encouragement to me, and I look forward to getting a win on Saturday against Georgia.

We aren’t going to be in the ACC cellar this year. No way.

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Reports this morning indicate that Coach Grobe will not be leaving Wake Forest to become the new head coach at Arkansas. Whether or not he ever actually planned to is tough to say at this point.

The Old Gold & Black student newspaper (which I now have more respect for after this story) reports having talked to Ron Welllman this morning and learning that Grobe is staying at Wake after having slept on the decision overnight. Here is the link to the Old Gold & Black story.

12:12 Update - Although things seemed pretty official when I first posted this morning, more and more news outlets are reporting Grobe is definitely staying, including ESPN. At 11:00 this morning there was an impromptu fan rally outside the Pruitt Football center on campus. It looked like about 50 people showed up and the "event" mostly consisted of people standing around talking and looking relieved. Several players, including Riley Skinner, walked by while people were out there. According to the players Coach is currently not on campus and nothing official has been said to the players. Nonetheless, they are hearing the same things we are and are feeling much better about the whole situation.

I will continue to follow this story throughout the day, but as of now it looks like all is right here in Winston-Salem.

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Final update from me for tonight. The only thing that would make me post anything else would be something official, but it seems pretty clear that nothing but speculation will happen tonight. For what is being said by big media outlets, see my last post.

Being on campus I have conversations/hear of conversations with players on a somewhat regular basis, and not suprisingly tonight is the type of night when everyone wants to find out what they know. Interestingly, it seems there are some different perspectives of what's going on even among the team. It is mostly unanimous that Grobe was acting weird tonight both at practice and then at a meeting after. Some have said assistant coaches were crying, others that they weren't. Grobe definitely didn't say anything specific about Arkansas or any other situation, only that they need to focus on the bowl game and not anything else that may be going on. Some players don't seem overly concerned about it, others seem to be pretty stressed about it, some even to the point of saying they will be transferring.

At this point all we can do is wait and see what happens tomorrow. I haven't heard anything official from media relations (although I've asked them to keep me updated - but they don't always do that) about a press conference or anything else, but I've heard rumors of an 11:00 presser tomorrow so I'll probably head over there and see what's going on even if I don't hear anything. Hopefully we get this all resolved tomorrow. Either way, I just want to have this situation done as soon as possible.

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I've been avoiding this all day, partly because I'm busy and also because I prefer to have solid information. Nonetheless, this is looking worse and worse, don't know what to make of this most recent publication from the Arkansas News Bureau...It's the most concrete I've seen...

Grobe is New Razorback Coach

So I'm going to update this...
Really hard to decide what to make out of all this. Arkansas fans seem to think it's a done deal, we're of course all hoping it's not. According to one random unnamed Arkansas fan (clearly not credible, but doesn't mean he's wrong) the premium subscriber message board on Arkansas's Scout.com board says Grobe has agreed to a deal for over $1.5 million- I'm pretty much convinced this is made up, as I seriously doubt they have that kind of detailed info.

Meanwhile, WXII here in North Carolina supposedly says that "WXII says their sources at Wake say it is not a done deal. Not to mention the plane is still at RDU. Arkansas Foundation plane still at RDU with no flight plan scheduled," but this info also comes from an unsubstantiated source who does not make their connection to WXII clear.

At this point I don't feel like anyone can really say anything concrete. I certainly hope this isn't going to work out this way, on such short notice with apparently little communication between Coach, his players, and the school. Could be in for a long night...

4029 TV in Arkansas is also reporting this is a done deal, including video of their news report. Be interesting to if all these people have to eat their words. I certainly hope so.

Now the Associated press is getting in on the act - a salary supplement has been approved for Grobe, which is a "strong indication" that he will be their next coach - ESPN/AP link. Also, Arkansas Morning News has a bit more in depth report.

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