Dan Earl knows how a basketball season follows a coach around town.
“If you have a really good year or you win a big game, it’s easier to walk into a restaurant or to go play tennis or come to work,” Earl said. “People greet you a little bit differently. … So the inverse is true, too, right? You walk into these places, and everyone’s like, ‘Ah, what’s going on with the team?'”
At home, the questions come from his young kids: “How the heck did you lose that game, Dad?”
Earl said he never hid from anybody after last season, his fourth leading the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men’s basketball program. He also doesn’t pretend going 13-19 overall — with a 7-11 record in Southern Conference play and a loss in the opening round of the league tournament — was easy.
“It was not a fun year last year,” said Earl, whose third season in Chattanooga had been capped by a run to UTC’s first National Invitation Tournament title. “Team-wise, around town, for anybody coming to the games, but personally as well. It took a toll on us. We want to put really good teams out there, and we feel like we should at Chattanooga.