University of Iowa men’s basketball coach Steve Alford appears to have reached an agreement with the University of New Mexico to become the new head coach for the Lobos. Alford’s departure has been rumored for years due to his flirting with other teams about taking their jobs and the mediocre performance of recent years on the basketball court and lack of solid attendance numbers at home basketball games.
Hawkeye fans and many people at the school became very upset with Alford once he began discussions with university of Missouri about their head coaching position at the end of last season. The Missouri job however would end up going to Mike Anderson, the former UAB coach was considered the better candidate to replace Quin Snyder. Once Alford’s name was floated out there, it was the last straw in the eyes of many and the fans certainly haven’t come out in support of the idea of Alford staying at Iowa.
Since taking over for Dr. Tom Davis at Iowa following the 1999 season Alford has lead the Hawkeyes to a total of two NCAA Tournament appearances in eight seasons. This is a major disappointment in the eyes of many due to the fact that Alford had taken the Missouri State Bears to the Sweet 16 including an upset victory over Big Ten rival Wisconsin the year before taking the Iowa job.
It was always assumed that Alford was on steady ground as far as maintaining his job in Iowa City as long as his friend Bob Bowlsby would continue to be the athletic director there, however when Bowlsby left Iowa to take over the athletics program at Stanford and Gary Barta, someone who had no allegiances to Alford was hired the writing was on the wall so this gave Alford more of a reason to bolt to the Land of Enchantment.
Alford comes with his share of controversy and baggage following the Pierre Pierce scandal, the sub par academic performance of many of his players and the high transfer rate of many of his prize recruits such as Courtney Scott, Alex Thompson and Carlton Reed among others. Alford is also a protégé of legendary head coach Bob Knight who was rumored to have been pushing buttons behind the scenes in order to help Alford land this gig at New Mexico. Alford played for Knight for four years at the University of Indiana, having grown up in Indiana before going to play for four years as well in the National Basketball Association for the Dallas Mavericks and the Golden State Warriors.
Knight, who is now the coach at Texas Tech apparently still has some contempt for Iowa due to those past recruiting battles in the Midwest and was more then happy to see his former player leave the Hawkeye state. Alford came under fire recently for appearing in a favorable piece for the Christian Broadcasting Network due to his so called “hypocrisy” of being a good Christian man and then coddling a known sexual predator in his basketball program in order to win basketball games.
Alford has signed a contract extension with Iowa that goes through the 2011 season. The fact that the team did not make it to any postseason tournament for the first time since 1977 may have been the straw that broke the camel’s back however and New Mexico considered this a marquee opportunity to land a guy who coached at a Big Ten school.
Steve will be replacing Ritchie McKay in Albuquerque after McKay was fired following a lackluster 2007 season and a middle of the pack finish in the Mountain West Conference. McKay was the coach at New Mexico for five seasons and Alford takes over another program with down falling home attendance. Alford was not the only candidate who was considered for the coaching positions.
Names that were bandied about for the opening included current Winthrop head coach Gregg Marshall, former Arizona state head coach Rob Evans and former Utah Utes head coach Rick Majerus. On the other side of the coin possible replacement candidates for Alford at Iowa include Creighton coach Dana Altman, former Stanford coach Mike Montgomery and New Mexico State coach Reggie Theus. The Hawkeyes would go on to hire former Butler coach Todd Lickliter
