Nonsense, there's no comparing the two. Ron Guenther had numerous shortcomings, but he cared about the Illini and hired plenty of decent coaches during his tenure (Kruger, Self, Weber, Turner and Zook, Craig Tiley and Brad Dancer, Don Harden). With Mike Thomas, in addition to being hired by someone that should never have been charge of the University of Illinois (the disgraced Phyllis Wise), he was an complete !!!-hat who should have never been anywhere near the reins of a big time athletic program. Decent coaches (as well as most decent human beings) ran away from him as quickly as possible. In his final stint, he lasted 2 whole years at Cleveland State.