By Derrick Ow — Reporter
Tell me if you’ve heard this before, San Jose State is looking for a head men’s basketball coach.
The Jean Prioleau era ended on March 12. It was a rocky four-season experiment that resulted in a 20-93 record with eight conference wins.
Granted, 13 players did transfer from SJSU in his four year tenure. It started with Brandon Clarke who turned into a superstar at Gonzaga and became a first round draft pick. And it ended with Seneca Knight, who headed home and transferred to LSU.
I do give credit for Prioleau keeping his players motivated during this roller coaster season impacted by COVID-19. It was not easy having to relocate to Arizona and play the majority of your games away from San Jose. They only had two true home games at the Provident Credit Union Event Center, both at the end of the season.
It does get old recycling through coach after coach trying to search for the ultimate guy to resurrect SJSU basketball.
My colleague Jarra Gojolo recently wrote that the next head coach will be a well traveled assistant coach getting hired. He is even betting his stimulus money on it.
The Spartans have been down that road before and have hit rock bottom every time. They need to find an experienced head coach who is willing to build a winning culture despite the limited recruiting budget provided.
Athletic director Marie Tuite has one of the biggest decisions of her career. She has to sell a coach on rebuilding a program has not moved the needle since 1996.
Here are a couple of my options for the department to consider. These coaches come in no particular order.
HOME RUN HIRES
Steve Lavin: The administration here at SJSU might want to follow the football route and hire a head coach who has local ties in Brent Brennan. Steve Lavin fits the bill.
Lavin was born in San Francisco and raised in Marin County. He had a stellar prep career at Sir Francis Drake High School where he was a part of the 1983 state championship team.
He has had successful tenures at UCLA and St. John’s. In 10 total seasons as a Division I coach, he has led teams to eight NCAA tournament appearances. SJSU basketball did not even eclipse the eight win mark in the Prioleau era.
Lavin has not coached since 2015 when he got fired from St. John’s in a controversial departure. However, he has kept his eye on the game as he has been broadcasting for Fox and CBS Sports.
I do not know if he would want to make his return to the sideline building a team from the ground up. The university administration will have a lot of persuading to do and might have to open up the Provident Credit Union account to bring Lavin back.
Rick Croy: Here is another coach with local ties to the Bay Area. Rick Croy is an under the radar candidate for the job.
Croy was born in San Diego but played his high school ball at Northgate High School in Walnut Creek . He was a part of the 1995 CIF Championship Team. He played four years also at SF State.
He started his head coaching career at Citrus Community College in 2005, 135 games including a state championship in his five seasons as the Owls coach. He moved on to be an assistant coach under Randy Bennett at Saint Mary’s from 2010- to 2013.
Since 2013, Croy built California Baptist into a perennial Division II tournament team before making the jump to Division I in 2018. In his first five seasons at the helm, the Lancers won two conference titles and made the Division II tournament all five years.
The Lancers went 13-10 this season in the WAC. He has never had a losing season as a college basketball coach and has managed to do that at schools you might not have never heard of.
It is no secret that the recruiting budget at SJSU is tighter than Bay Area traffic. I believe Croy can get the best out of his players and also recruit locally. The local recruiting pipeline has thinned out so it would be great to see Croy get that going.
Dan Majerle: If President Papazian wants a winning product on Walt McPherson Court, maybe hire a former NBA player who knows what it takes to win.
He played 14 seasons in the NBA and was an integral part of the 1992-93 Phoenix Suns team that made the NBA Finals. He was a premier sharpshooter of his era.
Dan Majerle helped transition Grand Canyon University from Division II into Division I. He coached seven seasons at GCU where the Antelopes never had a losing season until the 2019-20. He went 136-89 and got fired after going 13-17 in his final season. He did fire a lawsuit against the university for their handling over his firing and pending salaries.
He knows what it takes to get to the NBA. He can maybe convince senior guard Richard Washington to stay another year. Imagine trying to sway leading scorers to stay as SJSU tries to build a winning culture.
Solid Hires
Todd Simon: Simon is only 40 years old but has worked his way up to be a Division I head coach.
He started out as a JV head coach at Harrison Community High School in Harrison, Mich. He spent a season there before becoming an assistant coach at Pepperdine in 2003. He then moved on to UNLV where spent another two years as an assistant coach.
He stayed in Nevada but became an assistant coach at Findlay Prep in 2006. He would spend six seasons coaching the likes of Avery Bradley, Cory Joseph and Tristian Thompson. He spent the 2012-13 season as the head coach before going back to UNLV.
In the 2015-16 season, head coach Dave Rice was fired after starting conference play 0-3. Simon got promoted to interim head coach and went 9-8 the rest of the way
After the season he took the job as head coach of the Southern Utah Thunderbirds in 2016.
In five seasons, he has resurrected the Thunderbirds program as they won their first regular season conference title in 20 seasons. He went from winning six games in his first season to 19 this season.
If anyone knows how to turn around a program into a winner it is Simon.
Greg Kamansky: He might be the best head coach you might not even heard of.
Greg Kamansky has been the head coach at Cal Poly Pomona for the past 20 seasons. He has led the Broncos to six conference titles and a Division II National Title in 2009-10.
He has won 417 games and has made Pomona into a basketball mecca. He also has experience as an assistant athletic director at Fresno Pacfic University from 1993-98.
He knows how to run a program and build a winning culture. Will he be willing to leave a place that his family has roots in? It will take a lot of convincing for him to come and rebuild a SJSU program that has not won a conference title in the 21st century.
Mike Magpayo: Magpayo is someone still unknown to the greater college basketball community. He is a pioneer as he is the first Division I head coach of full Asian heritage.
He knows every aspect of finance and sports considering he is a former CEO of a multi-million dollar real estate company in Southern California.
He does have coaching experience. He was a high school basketball coach in the area before heading to Columbia in 2010 as an assistant coach. He spent five seasons there before heading to Campbell where spent three seasons before leaving to UC Riverside as a assistant coach. He did get promoted to head coach after David Patrick left to become an assistant coach at Arkansas before last season.
One thing that stood out to me was that he has experience on the administrative side. He was the director of basketball ops for University of San Francisco in 2017-18.
He did go 13-7 in his first season at the helm. I don’t think he will want another move but we have seen crazier things happen.
Wild Card Hires
Mark Jackson: Every time a head coach position pops up, I always put Mark Jackson on my mind.
I feel like he would give Spartan basketball instant credibility and valued leadership. Players would gravitate towards him and recruiting will instantly pick up.
He set the blueprint for the Golden State Warriors dynasty. In his four seasons, he made the Warriors a defense-first team. I just do not think SJSU has the money to lure Jackson back onto the sidelines. After all, he loves his broadcasting job with ESPN. However, if he gets hired then the Event Center would actually fill up for an athletic event. Who would have thought?
John Mosley: This is the biggest reach out there, but the Spartans could go down the Netflix route.
Mosley is the head coach at East Los Angeles College. If that school sounds familiar, that is because it was recently the team on the Netflix show “Last Chance U”. The show covered the team’s previous season that ended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mosley has coached eight seasons at ELAC. He has a 189-50 record and has made eight straight state playoff appearances.
He knows how to maximize the talents of the players he recruits. I would not be surprised if he would be willing to take on this challenge.
I know the athletic department will not read this column. But as a Spartans fan, all that I ask is to hire a coach with head coaching experience
You do not want to keep setting this program back. It is time to ignite this program into the 21st century.
Follow Derrick on Twitter @derrickq42