Heel Tough Blog: Dusty May Announces He is Staying At Michigan

Michael Reaves- Getty Images

When Tommy Lloyd announced on Friday that he would be staying at Arizona and signing a long term extension, the focus of the Tar Heels search turned to Michigan head coach Dusty May. While he may have been another longshot, especially after his victory last night over Arizona in the Final Four, he was someone that you had to have tell you no before you moved to the next tier of the search. That day came on Sunday prior to tomorrow’s national championship matchup against Connecticut in Indianapolis.

As first reported by ESPN’s Pete Thamel, Dusty May has informed Michigan officials that he will not be pursuing any other jobs this offseason after the Tar Heels expressed interest. Instead, he will be staying with the program that he hopes to lead to their second national title on Monday night.

With May out of the running, the Tar Heels attention now turns to their second and third tier options from their original board, a territory that decision makers were undoubtedly hoping they wouldn’t have to reach in this search. The top candidate now likely becomes the favorite in many people’s minds from the beginning in former Florida and current Chicago Bulls head coach Billy Donovan. According to a report from Matt Norlander of CBS Sports, Donovan “is open to the possibility” of becoming the next head coach of the Tar Heels. Multiple reports have said, though, that he will not be willing to talk about any new coaching opportunities until after the regular season is over on April 12th. This would be difficult to stomach for a lot of Tar Heel fans because of the opening of the transfer portal on Tuesday. According to multiple reports, however, decision makers in this search are more focused on getting the right candidate no matter how long it takes instead of rushing to find someone for portal purposes. That falls in line with the reporting from The Field of 68’s Jeff Goodman, who says that Donovan is the Tar Heels “sole focus” at this point of the coaching search.

If the team does not go the Donovan direction, there is a list of other names that have emerged according to Norlander. In his report following May’s withdrawal from the job, he listed Vanderbilt head coach Mark Byington, Baylor head coach Scott Drew, Texas Tech head coach Grant McCasland and Iowa head coach Ben McCollum.

This was not unexpected, especially after Friday’s news from Lloyd, but it still hurts that the Tar Heels weren’t able to convince one of the top coaches in the country to take the job. Now, the hope is that they can convince Donovan to take the job as early as possible so they can avoid having to get to their third tier options in this search.