Cleveland Cavaliers to hire John Beilein as next head coach

After a lengthy search, the Cleveland Cavaliers have dipped into the college ranks to tab Michigan’s John Beilein as their next head man.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have been conducting a very thorough search for their next head coach, interviewing a variety of NBA assistants as they looked for the replacement for Larry Drew. Drew himself was an interim candidate after Tyronn Lue was dismissed early this season.

The NBA world was abuzz this morning when Adrian Wojnarowski dropped one of his patented Woj bombs with the Cavs’ decision, which came completely out of left field.

According to Woj, the Cavs and Beilein agreed to a five-year contract yesterday, with Beilein informing Michigan’s administration and players that he’s leaving this morning. Beilein is an accomplished college coach, going 829-468 across multiple stops over multiple levels of college basketball.

That run included the last 12 years at Michigan, where Beilein took the Wolverines to the national championship game twice and won four Big Ten titles. Outside of winning a championship, there wasn’t much more for Beilein to accomplish at the college level, so turning down a chance to jump to the pros was hard for him to ignore.

The Cavaliers are clearly hoping that Beilein becomes the latest college coach to have a successful entry into the pro ranks. Two of the most obvious examples include Boston’s Brad Stevens, who took Butler to the Final Four twice before taking over the Celtics, and Oklahoma City’s Billy Donovan, who won a pair of national championships at Florida.

Beilein is entering a difficult situation in Cleveland, however, which is lacking in talent after watching LeBron James bolt for Los Angeles last summer. The Cavs do have a 14 percent chance at the top pick in June’s draft, so perhaps Beilein can get some patented Cleveland lottery luck on Tuesday and begin his rebuild with Zion Williamson.