She's still putting up winning records and has Arizona at least on the bubble, after qualifying for the Tourney 4 years in a row. UA was a dumpster fire before she took over. They've gone backward from the National Runner Up w/ Aari, but they would be crazy to fire Barnes. Look at these other coaches being mentioned on the hot seat, it's night and day different compared to where she's at w/ UA.
Um, yeah. But only sort of.
It was pretty clear in the paper that she almost certainly needs to accept a lower salary to continue after the end of her contract. UA has no money. I got to talk to a fairly big donor ($50K a year according to the web site) and he said as much as well. Basically, it sounds like the athletic department wants to be a national championship contender for all sports but to do it on the cheap. Exactly how you accomplish wthat goal is beyond me.
Barnes is a good coach in many ways. As has been discussed, by fans, on this board, and actually at least obliquely in the paper, she has had retention problems because her biggest weakness seems to be handling player expectations regarding playing time, etc. Its hard to get an exact handle on it, because the players actually seem to like her, but the rational for how playing time is dispensed is difficult to determine from outside. And part of the issue, at least this year, is players who do really good things on court, but they don't score or try to score. Some of the players that are aggressive don't apparently do "the little things" Frustrating.
