‘I’m not thinking about making a change’: K-State AD continues to back Bruce Weber
Kansas State athletic director Gene Taylor made his strongest comments yet about the future of struggling men’s basketball coach Bruce Weber during a radio interview on Monday.
After publicly supporting Weber last week to a pair of media outlets, including The Wichita Eagle, as the Wildcats sputter through a disappointing season, he reiterated that “it’s certainly my plan and our plan” for Weber to remain as coach beyond this year.
When later asked if Weber’s buyout of $2 million factored into that plan, Taylor didn’t flinch.
“I’m not even thinking about that,” Taylor told KMAN Radio in Manhattan, “because I’m not thinking about making a change.”
Taylor wouldn’t normally talk publicly about the status of his coaches in the middle of a season like this, but he feels that the situation needed to be addressed as speculation has grown surrounding Weber’s future with the Wildcats.
He said he is looking forward to sitting down with Weber after the season and having a long, big-picture discussion about the program, which is something COVID prevented them from doing last year. He will continue to evaluate Weber and the entire team up to that point. It’s possible his opinion could change between now and then. For now, though, he is coming out in support of his coach.
Though Weber has guided K-State to a pair of shared Big 12 championships and one trip to the Elite Eight during his nine seasons in Manhattan, the team has cratered. A year ago, the Wildcats only won 11 games and finished last in the Big 12 standings. This season, they are off to a 5-15 start and are on a 10-game losing streak.
Worst of all, they have lost a home game to Fort Hays and later suffered a 48-point loss at Baylor, which went down as the most lopsided defeat in program history.
With eight new scholarship players on the roster, Weber began a rebuilding project this season. And things are going slower than expected.
But Taylor can still envision a bright future for this team’s young nucleus of talent, which features potential stars in freshman guard Nijel Pack and freshman center Davion Bradford. If not for the coronavirus pandemic and a plethora of injuries, he thinks the team would have a much better record right now.
“Bruce has done a lot for us and for our program,” Taylor said. “It’s just a year that is hard. People say we’re making excuses or he’s making excuses but the reality is they’re not excuses. They’re facts and they affect the team.”
He said he was particularly pleased with the way the Wildcats battled Texas Tech on Saturday during a 73-62 loss.
“I know how hard they’re working,” Taylor said. “They want to win and they want to play well. They just keep battling and so that was encouraging. I think a lot of times when teams are facing a year like this they pack it in a long time ago. Other than the Baylor game, I would say they have battled as much as they can, in some cases being pretty short-handed.”
Taylor also pointed out that K-State is far from the only basketball team struggling this season, as traditional powers like Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky and Michigan State are all currently unranked.
“How many times has that happened?” Taylor said. “I’m not saying we are that level of program. We can be, certainly. But it’s just how weird this year is, continuing with us.”