POSSIBLE COACHING CANDIDATES
With the surprise resignation of Gene Cross, Toledo is once again searching for a head basketball coach. Here are some possible candidates:
Brett Reed, Head Coach
Lehigh - Reed is in his third season as head coach at Lehigh. The Michigan
native has guided his team to a 24-10 record this season and has the Hawks
headed to the NCAA Tournament.
He had been an
assistant at Lehigh for the previous five years, serving as associate head coach
for the 2006-07 season. Prior to coming to Lehigh, Reed served as the top
assistant coach at
Reed played at Eckerd College in Florida and earned Masters and Doctoral degrees from Wayne State University in Detroit.
He is one of the top young head coaches in the nation, and recruited freshman point guard C.J. McCullom (Canton, Ohio) who was this year's Patriot League freshman and player of the year.
Paul Lusk, Associate Head
Coach, Purdue - Lusk is in his sixth season at Purdue, and his second
after being elevated to the rank of associate head coach in July of 2008.
Prior to his arrival in West Lafayette, Lusk spent the 2003-04 season as an assistant on Matt Painter's staff at Southern Illinois, his alma mater. The duo guided SIU to a 25-5 record, an NCAA Tournament berth and a national ranking as high as 15th during their year together in Carbondale.
The New Baden, Ill., native began his coaching career at Southwestern Illinois College, where he was an assistant during the 1996-97 season before assuming the same position at Missouri Southern from 1999-02. Before joining Painter at SIU in 2003, Lusk served as head coach at Division III University of Dubuque for the 2002-03 campaign.
Lusk scored 1,031 points during his playing career at Southern Illinois, propelling the Salukis to three-straight NCAA Tournament berths from 1993-95. He garnered second-team All-Missouri Valley Conference honors in 1994 after averaging 15.2 points per game, and was named to the both the MVC All-Tournament Team and MVC Scholar-Athlete Team as a senior in 1995.
Prior to joining the Salukis, Lusk was a member of the University of Iowa basketball program during the 1990-91 season.
Lusk holds a bachelor's degree from Southern Illinois and a master's degree from Southwest Missouri State.
Jeff Boals, Assistant
Coach, Ohio State - Boals joined the Ohio State men’s basketball staff as an
assistant coach in 2009.
He spent three seasons as a member of the successful Akron basketball staff, his final as the associate head coach. He served as the program’s recruiting coordinator and was responsible for the development of the team’s post players.
Boals joined the Zips program after spending two seasons (2004-05 and 2005-06) as the top assistant coach at Robert Morris. While at Akron he successfully recruited Anthony “Humpty” Hitchens, a Chillicothe, Ohio native, who was a member of the MAC All-Freshman team in 2008-09. Boals also recruited Zeke Marshall, a Top 35 national recruit who is a member of the 2009-10 Zips program.
In his two seasons at RMU, Boals worked with the Colonials’ post players and served as recruiting coordinator. He spent the 2003-04 season as the associate head coach at Division II University of Charleston in Charleston and also coached at Marshall and Ohio.
A 1995 graduate of Ohio University with a bachelor of science degree in biological sciences, Boals was a four-year letterwinner on the Bobcats’ basketball team. Also a two-year captain, he helped guide OU to the 1994 MAC tournament and regular-season championships.
Ron Hunter, Head
Coach, IUPUI - Hunter is in his sixteenth season at IUPUI. He led the
Jaguars from Division II to a successful Division I team.
In 2007-08, the Jaguars set a new single-season record with 26 wins. Since 2002, his team has compiled 133 victories (19 wins per year), including the program’s first-ever Mid-Con Regular Season title (2006) and first-ever NCAA Tournament berth (2003).
The Jaguars were 24-10 in 2009-10 as they advanced to the Summit League tournament final.
One of his players, George Hill, was a first round NBA draft choice by the Spurs.
Hunter earned his bachelor’s degree in education at Miami in 1986 and a master’s in 1987. He was a standout player on the strong Miami teams of the mid-1980’s, along with high school and college teammate Ron Harper.
Although he plays in a substandard gym and doesn't have a large salary, it could be tough to pry Hunter out of Indianapolis where he recently signed a contract through 2015.
Jeff Lebo, Former Head
Coach, Auburn - Lebo was just fired as the Tigers head coach. In six seasons
at Auburn, Lebo had an overall record of 96-93 and a Southeastern Conference
record of 35-61. This season, Auburn was 15-17 and 6-10 in the SEC. The Tigers
lost in the first round of the SEC Tournament to Florida, 78-69.
The Carlisle, Pennsylvania native has won wherever he has coached. He has been a part of two Southeastern Conference Championships at different schools, three Atlantic Coast Conference Championships, two Ohio Valley Conference Championships and a pair of Southern Conference titles.
In six years as a collegiate head coach prior to Auburn, Lebo turned around two programs at Tennessee-Chattanooga and Tennessee Tech en route to a 115-63 career record, an average of 19.2 wins per season. A pair of Ohio Valley Conference Championships at Tennessee Tech and coming within one game of the NIT Final Four with Tech dot Lebo's ledger.
He was an assistant coach for eight years at South Carolina, Vanderbilt and East Tennessee State after playing the 1989-90 season with the NBA's San Antonio Spurs.
As an All-ACC point guard and four-year starter at the University of North Carolina from 1986-89, Lebo helped lead the Tar Heels to a 116-25 record and four trips to the NCAA Tournament, two to the Elite 8 and a pair of Sweet 16 appearances. The Tar Heels won two ACC Regular Season Championships and one ACC Tournament Championship with Lebo, who was a two-time All-ACC Tournament selection and an All-ACC second-team pick in 1988.
Joe Lombardi,
Head Coach, Indiana University of Pennsylvania - Lombardi is in his
fourth season as IUP head coach and in that short period of time has returned
the Crimson Hawks to the upper echelons of the Pennsylvania State Athletic
Conference and NCAA Atlantic Region.
IUP improved from six wins in Lombardi's first season to 13 in 2007-08 and then took a giant leap a year ago, posting a record of 22-8 and qualifying for the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2005. This season, his team has a 28-2 record as they prepare for the Division II national tournament and are currently ranked #2 in the nation.
Lombardi helped Pitt post a record of 76-22 from 2003-06. The Panthers advanced to the championship game of the 2004 and 2005 Big East tournaments and made a third consecutive trip to the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA tournament at the end of the 2003-04 season when Pitt set a school record by going 31-5 and won the Big East regular season title.
Before arriving at Pitt, Lombardi gained a reputation for helping to build overachieving basketball programs. Lombardi served a two-year stint as an assistant at LaSalle from 2001-03. He also coached at St. Bonaventure, St. Francis, Ohio and his alma mater Youngstown State. Lombardi was a four-year letterman at Youngstown State from 1977-81, serving as team captain in his junior and senior seasons. He graduated with honors with a degree in education.
Lombardi has international coaching experience as a member of the 1992 Pan American National Team coaching staff which participated in the Olympic Qualifying Tournament of the Americas against the United States' "Dream Team." He has coached a number of players who made it in the NBA during his career.
Rodney Watson, Head
Coach, University of Southern Indiana - In his first season, Watson's
University of Southern Indiana men’s basketball team finished 2009-10 campaign
ranked ninth in the final NABC/NCAA Division II Top 25 poll. The Eagles finished
the season with a 24-3 overall record, 15-3 in the GLVC, and set a school record
with 23 straight wins to start the year. They now prepare for the national
tournament.
He spent 21 seasons at Southern Illinois University. He was the associate
head coach his last two seasons after spending 19 seasons as an assistant coach
under head coaches Rich Herrin, Bruce Weber, Matt Painter, and Chris Lowery.
During Watson's tenure at SIU, the Salukis won 11 Missouri Valley Conference
championships and qualified for nine NCAA Tournaments and six NITs. SIU also
compiled a 430-237 record, a .645 winnings percentage, and was ranked in the top
15 nationally in scoring defense four times in the last five seasons.
Watson helped direct five Salukis to Missouri Valley Conference (MVC) Player of the Year honors; four to Newcomer of the Year awards; five to Freshman of the Year accolades; and nine to Defensive Player of the Year honors. The Salukis had 30 players earn All-MVC honors (18 first team and 12 second) during Watson's 21 seasons. The Salukis' success was not limited to the basketball court, with 23 of the last 24 seniors earning bachelor's degrees since 2002.
He was born in Paris, Illinois.