[Cactus Jack]

Everyone who is set on something above Scott Drew is probably setting themselves up for disappointment. Hurley is a pipe dream that will quickly be shut down in the next couple of days, if not by tomorrow night.

Would be great if someone better than Drew takes the job? Sure. But I'm starting to think that it's Drew and then everyone else.

Outside of him and Donovan, who I'll discuss below, there's a chance that it's an Oats, Pearl, or current college head coach. Past those, a pro assistant dropping down or someone jumping up from a school that hasn't been mentioned would be out of left field at this point.



As for Donovan:

Even if the Bulls were to fire him, he's about to turn 59 years old. Does he really go back to the college game and the demands that come with traveling for recruiting, evaluation, and in-home visits? There's a difference in getting on the team's jet to go to Salt Lake City, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, or Memphis on a weeknight versus doing the same for Starkville, Columbia, and Knoxville, or jumping off the runway in Tulsa and grabbing a rental car to drive three hours to see Jasper Johnson at Link Academy in Branson, Missouri.

There's also the matter of his spending the past decade working his way up the NBA ladder-- Oklahoma City to Chicago isn't exactly a small jump, and he's probably got at least one more stop in him.

For those types of reasons, as well as the risk he'd be taking by leaving for Kentucky if he ever wanted to get back into the pros at a later time, it's probably just as likely that he stays in the NBA as opposed to leaving for Kentucky even if he gets canned.

In Lexington, this isn't really the kind of decision that you want to rush, but next season is probably going to depend on what the next coach is able to pull out of the portal and even if the Bulls move on from Donovan, they'll want a replacement in place as well, so it could be awhile (read: after the NBA Finals) before they do so.