Rutgers hires new men’s basketball coach Steve Pikiell
Turning Stony Brook into conference champions from scratch, Pikiell looks to do the same with the Scarlet Knights
Not even two weeks after firing Eddie Jordan, Rutgers has found their new men’s head basketball coach. Former Stony Brook head coach, Steve Pikiell has agreed to become the new head coach of the Scarlet Knights yesterday on a five-year, $1.6 million per year deal.
This is just another move handled by new Athletic Director Pat Hobbs since he was appointed to the position back in November. From the response of this new hire, it’s so far, so good grabbing another respectable coach to turn things around.
For many who don’t know about Pikiell, he has a record of turning programs around. While serving as head coach for 11 years, Pikiell has turned around Stony Brook into a tournament contender, winning four America East regular season titles, accumulating five straight seasons of 22 wins or better. Going 192-156 during his five years.This year’s Stony Brook team finished 26-7 winning the American East Conference Tournament. They made the NCAA tournament for the first time, only to fall to Kentucky on Thursday.
Basically, turning that team into a conference champion from scratch, Pikiell looks to do so with the Scarlet Knights.
But one thing’s for sure, this isn’t the American East Conference here, he’s stepping into Big Ten territory. However, Pikiell accepts the challenge and brings many pros with him as to why he’s a great replacement.
One reason and most importantly, is recruiting; in order for a team like Rutgers to even have a chance to be respectable in the Big Ten it starts there. While at Stony Brook, Pikiell managed to recruit seven New Jersey breed players to his program, and even better has recruited players from six different countries and 11 different states.
He comes from the coaching tree of one Jim Calhoun of former conference rival UCONN; for who he played for in college before becoming an assistant coach. Learning from one of the greatest men’s coaches in history, he has enough knowledge about what it takes to build a successful program.
As he embarks on this 2016 offseason, there’s no doubt that he has a lot of work to do before training camp starts. Success doesn’t happen overnight, but in due time Rutgers hopes that Pikiell will repay them by producing a winning program. Because having successful men’s coach to complement C. Vivian Stringer on the women’s side isn’t a bad look either.