Florida State's Leonard Hamilton Reacts To Jim Larranaga's Sudden Miami Departure

With a matchup around the corner, the old guard of the ACC reacts to a shocking decision from his rival.

Austin Veazey | 22 Hours Ago

FSU men's basketball head coach Leonard Hamilton coaches as Florida State takes on Syracuse University at the Donald Tucker Civic Center Saturday, Jan. 4, 2024. / Mishalynn Brown/Tallahassee Democrat / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

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Florida State and Miami will play their first matchup of the 2024-25 season on Wednesday, but the opposing sideline won't feature Jim Larranaga for the first time since the 2010-11 season. Larranaga shocked all of college basketball by stepping down as Miami's head coach on December 26th after getting off to a 4-8 start with losses to Mount Saint Mary's and Charleston Southern.

Leonard Hamilton was asked about Larranaga's decision to step down in an ACC Zoom call on Monday morning and ahead of Wednesday's game.

"Jim has demonstrated that he's a class act. He's a guy who thinks things through," Coach Hamilton started. "I'm sure the decision didn't come as a knee-jerk reaction to anything particular. I'm sure it came with a lot of thought over a longer period of time and for him to have the courage to stick with his convictions and what he believed is the best thing to do, not only for his team and for the university, players that have played for him before (and it) is to be tremendously respected. I talked to very few coaches who really don't feel some of the similar things that seems to have been on Jim’s mind. It's just where we are. I don't see anything coming in the future that will eliminate the reasons why he made the decision that he did, and I think I have a lot of respect for him for how he did it."

Coach Larranaga cited things like exhaustion and the ever-changing NIL market as reasons for stepping down. Coach Hamilton is in his own hot water with NIL after six former players sued him last week over alleged promised NIL money that was never delivered. So Hamilton can relate to some of the issues Larranaga was dealing with.

Larranaga isn't the only ACC coach to make a shocking untimely retirement, as Virginia's former coach Tony Bennett stepped down about a month before the season started. Leonard Hamilton was already the longest-tenured head coach in the ACC by a mile with 23 seasons in Tallahassee, with Clemson's Brad Brownell in second with 15 seasons, but the third-longest tenured coach in the ACC after Larranaga's and Bennett's retiring is now Kevin Keatts at NC State, who started in 2017.

Florida State and Miami will play in Coral Gables at 7 p.m. on Wednesday.

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