Illinois head coach Tim Jankovich is one of three options for the men’s basketball assistant coach, including Jerrance Howard and Rod Strickland. (Associated Press)
The search for the men’s basketball head coach has ended. However the search for his staff continues.
Marquette University associate head coach Tony Benford was in the running for the head coach job. After it was given to Larry Brown, SMU asked Benford to be a coach-in-waiting on the Mustang staff.
After a weekend of interviews at University of North Texas, the mean green hired Benford as its new head coach.
His deal is expected to last five years and will be signed at a press conference at 2 p.m. on Wednesday.
With Benford out of the picture, it has been widely reported that former University of Illinois assistant Jerrance Howard, former University of Kentucky assistant Rod Strickland and University of Illinois head coach Tim Jankovich are prospects. No contracts have been signed and no reports have been confirmed.
Howard was fired from his alma mater Illinois in early April after a new head coach, John Groce, was hired.
Groce replaced Kansas State head coach Bruce Weber who was fired in March. Howard was paid a $180,000 at Illinois and would be expected to make much more than that in a deal at SMU.
Strickland works in the administration for the Kentucky basketball program. He was a first round NBA draft pick for the New York Knicks in 1988 and continued to play for Miami, Orlando, San Antonio and Houston.
Jankovich is currently the head coach at Illinois State. If hired on Brown’s staff, reports have expected him to become the head coach when Brown decides to retire.
It is also rumored that he could receive more than double his $400,000 salary from Illinois if he accepted an assistant job at SMU.
All three coaches have ties to the two coaches who faced off in the 2012 NCAA championship – former Illinois coach and current Kansas coach Bill Self or John Calipari, who coached the New Jersey Nets from 1996 to 199 and currently is the head coach at Kentucky.
Self and Calipari worked as assistants under Brown at Kansas. Jankovich was an assistant coach at Kansas from 2003 to 2007.
The most important thing Brown’s staff could add to the SMU basketball program is help in recruiting Dallas players. Jankovich and Strickland could create some Texas ties that Brown lacks.
Neither Brown nor the university have released statements concerning the search for a coaching staff.
