Tommy Lloyd received the second highest grade for being hired by Arizona, as Matt Norlander of CBS Sports wrote, "Grading college basketball's 2021 coaching carousel: How hires fared at UNC, Arizona, Indiana and more" was posted on Wednesday."
Norlander gave Lloyd, Micah Shrewsberry, then of Penn State and Shaka Smart of Marquette B+'s in the 2021 coaching carousel. T.J. Otzelberger of Iowa State, with an A-, is the only coach in the 2021 hiring cycle to receive a higher grade than Lloyd.
Norlander wrote a nearly 200-word summary of Lloyd's Arizona tenure. Norlander began his summary mentioning Lloyd has won 112 games in four seasons to make him one of the most successful coaches to begin a career with only 33 losses. Also pointed out was that Arizona has failed to make an Elite Eight under Lloyd.
Norlander continued by pointing out Arizona has been a one seed, two seed twice and a fourth seed in the NCAA Tournament in Lloyd's four seasons. Arizona winning four combined Pac-12 regular season and tournament titles in Lloyd's first three seasons before moving to the Big XII in 2024-25 was mentioned by Norlander.
Among the other points made by Norlander were Arizona finishing third in the Big XII after recovering from a 4-5 start. Norlander mentioned the grade was kept in mind with the fact that he thinks Arizona is one of the 10 best jobs in college basketball. Lloyd received a B+ instead of an A because of the lack of an Elite Eight appearance
In addition to what Norlander mentioned, Arizona has made three conference tournament championship games in four seasons under Lloyd, four players have been drafted and the Wildcats are 21-13 in that span, which is the fourth best nationally.
Norlander closed his summary of the Lloyd era by making the bold statement, "Mark me down for Lloyd getting the Wildcats to the Final Four at some point in the next four seasons." Arizona signed one of the best 2025 classes and returns three starters in 2025-26. Could 2026 end the 25-year Arizona Final Four drought?