The Athletic's article today from EIC Stewart Mandel really hit a nerve with the Northwestern higher ups involved with promoting Braun to head coach. Mandel wrote that the promotion "might be shortsighted", that Braun coached his 8-5 season "with someone else's staff" and the hire was "an indictment AD Derrick Gragg that he couldn't convince an established Power 5 head coach to go to a Big Ten program with deep pockets and modest expectations."
A source close to the search committee shared with me today that those comments were far from the truth, and Northwestern hired Braun from a position of strength in their search.
1) targeted hire date at the start of the process was Nov 27 if a candidate was not in a conference championship, Dec. 4 if they were
2) search firm had a 30+ list in late October, plans to narrow for a two-week interview blitz in mid-to-late November
3) team lobbied heavily for Braun in early November when Gragg met with the team
4) finalizing list of target candidates when NU almost beat Iowa w/o Bryant "best on-field playing intensity and defense anyone had seen since 2020" then had “a dominant performance at Wisconsin”
5) realized after Wisconsin that he was on track for a COTY campaign while "displaying the qualities and character that are foundational to anyone leading our program." and jumped Braun to front of the pool. He crushed interviews with his "insights, strategy and plans for the program". It was clear he was the guy. Originally had planned to give him another week and play through as much of the schedule as possible before interviewing.
6) At the time of Braun's hire there were 12 candidates with strong interest “including 5 with success as Power Five head coaches” and an expected group from Group of Five jobs, though they won't share names to protect confidentiality. Doesn't mean they'd all interview, but at that time in the search none had turned them down.
A source close to the search committee shared with me today that those comments were far from the truth, and Northwestern hired Braun from a position of strength in their search.
1) targeted hire date at the start of the process was Nov 27 if a candidate was not in a conference championship, Dec. 4 if they were
2) search firm had a 30+ list in late October, plans to narrow for a two-week interview blitz in mid-to-late November
3) team lobbied heavily for Braun in early November when Gragg met with the team
4) finalizing list of target candidates when NU almost beat Iowa w/o Bryant "best on-field playing intensity and defense anyone had seen since 2020" then had “a dominant performance at Wisconsin”
5) realized after Wisconsin that he was on track for a COTY campaign while "displaying the qualities and character that are foundational to anyone leading our program." and jumped Braun to front of the pool. He crushed interviews with his "insights, strategy and plans for the program". It was clear he was the guy. Originally had planned to give him another week and play through as much of the schedule as possible before interviewing.
6) At the time of Braun's hire there were 12 candidates with strong interest “including 5 with success as Power Five head coaches” and an expected group from Group of Five jobs, though they won't share names to protect confidentiality. Doesn't mean they'd all interview, but at that time in the search none had turned them down.
