5 candidates to replace Sean Miller at Arizona

2. Brian Dutcher, San Diego State Head Coach

In four seasons as head coach at San Diego State, Dutcher has a 96-31 record. First-round exits in each of two NCAA Tournament appearances is a buzzkill, but the cancellation of the tournament in 2020 robbed a 30-2 Aztecs’ team of an opportunity to make a real run.

Dutcher is best-known as a long-time assistant of Steve Fisher at Michigan and San Diego State. In that job he had a lead role in bringing the “Fab Five” to Ann Arbor, and in bringing some little-known kid named Kawhi Leonard to San Diego State.

Given his ties to the state and the school, Dutcher was easily a top candidate to replace Richard Pitino at Minnesota. His buyout at San Diego State is also substantially lower if he were to take the Golden Gophers’ job.

Via the contract extension he got last fall, Dutcher is the highest-paid coach in the Mountain West. But a move to a job in a bigger conference would obviously bring a substantial raise in pay, and he’s among the easiest candidates to point to when a bigger job that looks like any sort of fit comes open. It’s fair to assume he has turned down some opportunities elsewhere before he seriously surfaced in media reports.

Arizona should have interest in Dutcher. The question is if he’ll have interest in them.