Andy Kennedy is joining the SEC Network; every college basketball fan should rejoice

We’re eight months removed from former Ole Miss basketball head coach Andy Kennedy’s sudden resignation before the end of last season. Ignominious best describes the way his departure from Oxford went down, because Andy Kennedy remains a terrific basketball intellect.

At the time, we predicted that AK would undoubtedly land somewhere on the college basketball landscape by the start of the 2018-19 season, like a mid-major in need of immediate and demonstrated experience. Well, spring and summer came and went, and Kennedy didn’t land anywhere in the CBB coaching menagerie, an indictment on athletics directors across the country.

Kudos then are due to the SEC Network, which on Tuesday announced that it had hired Kennedy on as a college basketball analyst. According to the network’s press release, AK will “appear as an analyst for college basketball coverage across SEC Network and ESPN for the 2018-19 season.” This is an excellent development, because basketball mind aside, Kennedy is downright entertaining and hilarious on television.

It’s yet to be known whether he’ll sit as a live in-game analyst — which everyone with even a passing interest in SEC basketball should hope for — or merely offer his insight from the comfort of SECN’s studios, a role in which his candor and humor would be utterly wasted. The man coached for 12 seasons in every arena in the conference, after all, and his storytelling would be expansive and genuinely interesting.

Nor should you doubt his ability to articulate the complexities of offensive schemes or break down defenses — LORD, his knowledge of defense is vast — on court in the moment. He threw in a short stint with SECN during last year’s postseason, and it was refreshing to witness his passion for, and knowledge of the game of basketball.

And so let’s not delay this news at all: AK starts on Wednesday at SEC basketball media days. Let’s hope he gets to talk to Kermit Davis.