Late Wednesday night, The Post Crescent‘s Tim Froberg released a story from Wednesday in which Wisconsin Badgers’ basketball coach Bo Ryan said he may not be retiring after this season after all. Ryan had announced in June that he would be retiring at the end of this season.
Ryan’s statements were very interesting from the interview, which came from the U.S. Venture Open golf reception at Van Abel’s in Kaukauna, WI. The coach, the guest speaker at the event, claimed that he truly announced his decision to notify recruits that he may not be around for all four of their years at Wisconsin.
“Well, I needed to get a statement out there knowing I wasn’t able to tell recruits I could guarantee them four years and I wanted to be fair to our staff and Barry (Alvarez) and the athletic department” – Bo Ryan
Coach Ryan went on to explain that he has not filed any papers to Alvarez, and joked, “Barry said I could change my mind at any time…I haven’t submitted anything…So I might stay for another four or five [years].”
The report comes coincidentally after ESPN’s Andy Katz also featured Ryan in his “3-Point Shot” segment earlier today. Katz talked about how Ryan had three choices to ensure that the Wisconsin basketball program continued to go in the direction he wanted it to: (1) retire, (2) make sure the Badgers will hire assistant Greg Gard once he departs, or (3) stay longer to ensure program continuity.
It will be interesting to see if Ryan ends up retiring or not. He talked about in the interview how young this team will be, without a scholarship senior. The bond he builds with these younger guys could determine whether or not he continues. Ryan, 67, has one thing figured out for sure: he will be on the sideline for the 2015-16 basketball season.
Image via UWBadgers.com