Last spring, BYU men’s basketball coach Mark Pope was a hot name during college hoops’ annual coaching carousel after leading the Cougars to the NCAA Tournament.
This season, the Cougars are squarely on the bubble and so perhaps Pope won’t be talked about quite as much (plus BYU’s upcoming move to the Big 12 makes his job more high-profile), but there’s at least one national observer who is keeping an eye on him.
On Thursday, ESPN’s Jeff Borzello released his annual massive guide to the upcoming carousel, and although Pope wasn’t heavily linked as a possible candidate at any particular school, Borzello did mention him near the end in a section of 16 names he titled “Mid-major names to monitor.”
Of Pope, Borzello wrote, “The Cougars are struggling down the stretch of the season and will need to win some games in the WCC tournament to hear their name on Selection Sunday — but Pope’s reputation is good enough to get him in the mix regardless. He’s won at least 20 games in each of the past four seasons and he’s on track to do it again this season.”
BYU is currently 19-9 with two more games scheduled this week before the conference tournament next week.