Finding coaching success on the road less traveled

In the span of six years, East Tennessee State coach Steve Forbes has gone from being branded with a one-year show clause penalty (as an assistant at Tennessee) to a preeminent junior college coach in the Florida Panhandle, and to now the first-time head coach of a program fresh off back-to-back 20-win seasons. To describe that path as a wild ride is an understatement, and speaking by phone during a evening bus ride for this past weekend’s game against Western Carolina, Forbes is quick to credit his erratic journey to ETSU: “I moved around to get where I’m at today, but I felt like that’s what I had to do get what I wanted, and I wanted to be a Division I head coach.”

Though the Buccaneers split the weekend road trip, the squad enters the Southern Conference tournament atop the standings, with a substantial chance to crack the NCAA tournament for the first time in seven seasons. Forbes, thanks to his path, was a wholly unconventional choice for the job.

“I think athletic directors ultimately want to win, and they want to hire the right guy,” he says. “But sometimes they get a little too caught up in trying to win the press conference instead of hiring the right person. I am not against search firms, but if you stack resumes in a pile, some guys will get thrown out because on paper they don’t look as good as other guys.”

“Coaches have a hard time leaving what they think is best.”

But what is most interesting about Forbes is that he isn’t a Division I outlier. Under Ryan Odom, who spent last season coaching DII’s Lenoir-Rhyne, University of Maryland, Baltimore County has won its most games (18) in nearly a decade, and Dan D’Antoni has imparted 30-plus years of coaching at the high school level (and ten-or-so years assisting his brother, Mike, in the NBA) at Marshall, installing a pro-level high-paced offense dependent on perimeter shooting.

And there are several others coaching at DI—like Linc Darner (Green Bay), Tim Cluess (Iona), and Nate Oats (Buffalo)—whose paths to the bench didn’t follow what is typically a rote and traditional method of dutifully waiting in the wings. “None of us are as fortunate as someone like [Wisconsin’s] Greg Gard or Bill Guthridge at North Carolina to wait and wait and wait,” says Forbes. “We’re not always blessed with options, and it’s a tough business to stay in.”

Of course, not all ADs are suddenly going to scour the Division II and III or even junior college ranks for their next hire just because Forbes is winning in northern Tennessee. But athletic departments are beginning to notice that it might not be the riskiest decision to take a chance on a coach who has enjoyed success elsewhere andbucked the norms of what can be a profession littered with staid decision making . And as coaches like Forbes and D’Antoni succeed, it’ll only embolden this sort of risk taking. “I think it’s simple — if you can coach, you can coach,” says Odom. “There are a lot of great coaches at every level, and ADs are starting to pay attention.”

When Marshall first announced D’Antoni’s hiring, there were doomsday reactions across the college landscape. Gary Parrish of CBS Sports tweeted, “I got a text from the NBA side predicting Marshall’s hire ‘will be the worst thing you’ve ever witnessed.’ Hahahaha.” But judging by the Thundering Herd’s offensive efficiency rating — 1.10 points per possesion, ranked 69th nationally by Ken Pomeroy — and a 16-win season, Marshall has benefitted from going outside the norm with its coaching search three years ago.

After he spent years assisting his brother at NBA spots in Phoenix, New York, and Los Angeles, D’Antoni installed a high-octane offense that is predicated on using analytics and 3-point shooting to create mismatches all over the court. “The game has changed,” says D’Antoni. “But you’re not teaching multiple choice, you’re teaching your players how to create within an essay test.”

He continues, “You can come scout me all you want. Hell, I don’t know what my players are going to do. Change is always slow. And you have to have a certain mindset as a coach to let the game flow and go — you can be up 20 points as quickly as you are down by 20 — and it’s difficult to ingrain that. Coaches have a hard time leaving what they think is best.”

Though Marshall has struggled on occasion this season, suffering through losing streaks of two games or more several times during Conference USA play, D’Antoni is confident his game plan can disrupt the inherent advantage high major schools have over programs lacking a recruiting edge.

“The worst reason not to change is to claim ‘My players aren’t good enough,’” says D’Antoni. “I am always going to try to do things in a different way. In the end, there are 350 something teams, and only one wins it. The rest are unhappy. So you need to have a type of program that entertains that can still win. There is this thing that ‘if you entertain, you can’t win.’ That’s bullshit. You can win in an entertaining fashion.”

“And just like them, I have a little chip on my shoulder, so I have a clear understanding of what it takes for them to be successful.”

Odom was an assistant for almost twenty years at the DI level, working across a spectrum of low-to-high major jobs, but when Lenoir-Rhyne offered him a chance to be a first time head coach (he had been an interim coach at Charlotte after then coach Alan Major took an indefinite leave of absence), he didn’t want to pass up that chance to float his resume again and merely be another DI assistant. “Being at Lenoir Rhyne helped me a ton for this opportunity now,” he says of the 2016 season, when the team won 21 games. “When I got to UMBC, our guys knew of the success I had, and they greeted me with open arms. It also made them more likely to listen to what I was trying to do here.”

Odom quickly went to work installing a system similar to what Shaka Smart perfected at VCU, implementing a fast and aggressive style of play that takes advantage of a mess of 3-pointers (40.8 percent 3-point field goal attempt rate, second in the America East) early in the shot clock — the team uses about 16 seconds before attempting a shot, which is the second fastest possession length in the conference. “We played fast at Lenoir, which carried over to UMBC, but I’ve always like to play fast,” says Odom, who was a DIII player at Hampden-Sydney (under now William & Mary coach Tony Shaver). “But the team immediately bought in to what I was trying to do.”

The same can be said for East Tennessee State, which received a sudden and vast talent infusion when Forbes, one of the country’s most well-connected recruiters, was hired in the spring of 2015. Ge’Lawn Guyn, Deuce Bello, Peter Jurkin, Hanner Mosquera-Perea, and Tevin Glass all transferred to the school, and Forbes continued to do what he has always done best: mine junior college for top talent, landing TJ Cromer (from Columbia State CC) and Devontavius Payne (from Logan College). “I understand what all of these kids are going through,” explains Forbes, who played juco ball himself. “And just like them, I have a little chip on my shoulder, so I have a clear understanding of what it takes for them to be successful.”

And that grit is ably showcased in the team’s defensive output, a blend of aggressive and athletic man defense and relentless ball pressure (opponents turn the ball over on nearly a quarter of their possessions) which culminates into forcing teams into taking uncomfortable shots within their offense. “We’re not going to get guys that Duke or North Carolina recruit, but maybe we’ll get them on second chance,” he says. “You’ve got to learn how to evaluate, and build a team in a place that may not have a natural talent pool.”

He adds, “But I like putting in that work. You have to go out there and get it done. There is no perfect path to this thing. You have to create the path that fits you, and develops your skillset into being prepared to be ready for one of these jobs.”