Impatience is natural enough, I suppose, but the gathering consensus that speed and virtue are the same thing in hiring a basketball coach is misinformed.

In fact, the only distinction fast hires have had in the past is the subsequent opportunity to discover résumé errors that require yet another fast hire to put the first fast hire in the rearview as fast as possible.

In other words, CU athletic director Mike Bohn is doing exactly the right thing by waiting for Jeff Bzdelik to become available to coach Buff basketball.

It's not Bohn's fault Air Force is still playing. In fact, it's proof of Bzdelik's coaching ability, confirmation of Bohn's apparent decision to offer him the job as soon as he gets the chance.

What is the argument here? That Bohn should abandon his best candidate because his team is playing too well?

Other Front Range schools are unaccountably receiving fulsome praise simply for being quicker about making a men's basketball hire, as if extra points will be awarded next fall for the pace of the hiring process.

The most curious of these was the University of Denver's selection of Joe Scott, not to mention the gibberish that followed it.

Scott, you may recall, is the former

Princeton point guard who converted a single winning season out of four at Air Force into a "dream job" coaching at his Ivy League alma mater. Three years later, following the worst conference record in the history of Princeton basketball, about the time the Daily Princetonian ran a 1,300-word story headlined, "Scott faces fire on campus," DU offered him a five-year contract. He jumped at it.

No fool, I'll give him that. He stayed one step ahead of the posse.

"These days, I don't know if there are dream jobs," Scott said at his DU introduction last week.

Well, no, not when you take over a senior-dominated team that won the Ivy League title under John Thompson III and direct it to a losing conference record. Not when you go 2-12 in the Ivy League in your third season. Not when your team ties the Division I record for fewest points in a game since the inception of the three-point shot by scoring 21 against Monmouth, the well-known Presbyterian basketball power.

A group of Princeton students, led by a member of the baseball team, formed a facebook.com group called "Fire Joe Scott," according to the Daily Princetonian. It takes some doing to get Ivy Leaguers up in arms about a coach.

No question, Scott has had some inspired moments. His 2003-04 Air Force team was the best in school history to that point. Bzdelik is quick to credit him with recruiting the seniors that carried this year's team.

But Scott's career coaching record is 89-108 (39-59 in conference) and he coaches a slow-motion brand of basketball that can charitably be described as soporific.

Colorado State, at least, hired a guy with a winning record everywhere he's been. North Dakota State, Southwest Minnesota State and Mayville State may not be household names - I didn't even know Mayville was a state - but gems have been found in deeper mines. The University of Maryland-Baltimore County, for example, Bzdelik's first head coaching job.

At CSU's financial station, it must gamble on up-and-comers. Tim Miles qualifies. Whether he works out is another question. His 99-71 record at North Dakota State suggests competence more than dominance, but it earned him a step up. CSU is doing the best it can with what it has.

CU, by contrast, has a chance to hire above its station in the basketball food chain. Among coaches, this is not one of the country's prized jobs. The school's commitment to the sport is perpetually in doubt. Not many coaches who had top-20 teams this season would be intrigued.

Bzdelik is. As much as he loves the spirit and community he found at Air Force, the post-graduate commitment the academy requires of cadets puts a ceiling on its athletic programs. Bzdelik has shown what his attention to detail can do for what he calls the Division I "suspects" Air Force can recruit.

But can he do the same in the Big 12? CU basketball has neither the reputation nor the facilities to compete for talent consistently with the conference elite. Bzdelik will again have to make coaching matter, as he has at Air Force, but at a higher level of competition. It's a big challenge with a big potential reward. If Bzdelik can do for CU basketball what no one has done for 30 years, it will confirm his reputation as a miracle worker.

He is available primarily because he has two teenagers and no desire to leave Colorado. CU is wise to take advantage of this circumstance.

Apparently, someone has been in touch with Bzdelik on behalf of CU, which understandably annoys Air Force athletic director Hans Mueh. But you can't accuse CU of both doing too little and doing too much. If Bohn is going to wait on Bzdelik, it's understandable he would want an ongoing indication of mutual interest.

Assuming he hasn't breached the relationship with these contacts, Bohn soon should be rewarded for his patience and ambition. CU fans who dream of better days ahead should be grateful for both.

kriegerd@RockyMountainNews.com

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