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New York Times
5 days ago
- Sport
- New York Times
UNLV's next step in the desert: Become the next G5 giant, or watch its big bets go awry?
LAS VEGAS — On a good day, when he gets lucky enough to hit more green lights than red, Erick Harper can make it from his parking spot outside of his office at the Thomas & Mack Center to the tunnel of Allegiant Stadium in about 15 minutes. It's a 3.3-mile drive from the edge of UNLV's sprawling campus to the bright lights of the $2 billion NFL stadium — built to welcome the Las Vegas Raiders — where the Rebels also play their home games. Advertisement 'There's no reason we can't get 40,000 to 60,000 people to come to UNLV football games on a regular basis,' said the UNLV athletic director entering his fourth year at the university. Build yourself into a marketable winner in college athletics, and fans will follow. Even in the city in the desert that offers anything and everything, Harper believes that UNLV is on the doorstep of transforming into one of Sin City's most talked-about attractions. It's the same talking point bandied about in recent years: University leadership believes the Rebels can carve out a spot in the hearts of Vegas sports fans and visitors alike. The Rebels have come within one game of hoisting a Mountain West Conference title in consecutive seasons but have come up short against the crown jewel of the Group of 5, Boise State. The required next step is making the hypothetical a reality. There's a ceremonial 2024 Mountain West title game floor mat inside Harper's office that serves as a reminder of just how close UNLV has been. UNLV, long a floor mat itself in football, had its two best consecutive seasons in football history in 2023 and '24, winning 20 total games. A win over the Broncos likely would've meant a berth in the 12-team College Football Playoff that debuted last season. Former coach Barry Odom took the job at Purdue two days after the Mountain West title game loss. Less than a week later, Harper stunned the college football universe and hired former Florida and Mississippi State coach Dan Mullen. 'I'm taking over a team that was one half away from the College Football Playoff,' Mullen said. 'There's a lot in place already here that we just have to build on.' In March, Harper fired men's basketball coach Kevin Kruger after four years in charge and replaced him with former Memphis and Georgia Tech coach Josh Pastner, who was named ACC Coach of the Year in 2017. Like Mullen, Pastner spent recent years as an analyst at ESPN. Outside the Thomas & Mack Center, a massive new banner of Pastner is plastered on the glass windows as a sell to the UNLV fan base that better days are ahead on the hardwood, too. Advertisement Once a lightning rod of college hoops under legendary coach Jerry Tarkanian, the Rebels have failed to qualify consistently for the men's NCAA Tournament since the early 1990s. Their last appearance was 2013, the longest dry spell in program history. Harper says all the pieces are in place for UNLV to make its move among the elite contenders outside the power conferences. Now comes the hardest part: Proving you're worth the price of admission year-in and year-out. UNLV averaged over 32,000 fans at home football games in 2024, a jump of nearly 10,000 from the 2023 average of over 23,600 per home game. It's there inside the stadium, just a few minutes' jaunt away from the radiant glitz and glam of The Strip, where Harper dares to dream. Such an uptick might not make the stadium look packed yet on TV, but it's proof of concept that in Vegas, winners become a draw. 'If you look at the history of the Mountain West, we were the league of BYU, Utah, TCU,' said Mountain West commissioner Gloria Nevarez. 'Schools come here and really rise to the top if they really put their minds to it and invest. I do think there's a lot of opportunity going forward.' But for its grandiose ambition and recent success in football, UNLV is saddled with significant debt in the athletic department, estimated to be in the range of $25-30 million. And as college realignment in athletics continues to swirl, UNLV is one of many universities with options and massive decisions on the horizon. 'We definitely want to be in the upper echelon of the G5, but also we have to be the best we can possibly be,' Harper said. 'The same challenge of getting there with every institution in the country is always going to be financial. That's just the matter of the business. To weather the storm, the best way to generate more revenue is to win, and win at a high level consistently.' One of those big choices came last fall, when UNLV opted to stay in the Mountain West rather than join a rebuilding Pac-12 with Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State and Utah State. On Sunday, those five departing members officially filed their intent to leave the Mountain West, meeting a deadline to avoid doubling their exit fees, a person involved in the decision told The Athletic. Advertisement UNLV, which was thought to still be a potential Pac-12 target, stood pat. That would seem to fully rule the Rebels out of becoming the eighth football-playing member of the Pac-12, which must still add one more school by next summer. Asked in April whether UNLV was still committed to remaining in the Mountain West, Harper said yes. What kept the Rebels in the Mountain West was a hefty payday from the $150 million in exit fees and poaching fees to come from the Pac-12. Forty-nine percent of the first $61 million will be split between UNLV and Air Force, according to a copy of the conference's memorandum of understanding obtained by The Athletic. Another $21 million would be split the same way. That money is needed. In a Nevada Board of Regents meeting in March, Harper and other UNLV administrators were challenged by several regents regarding the financial state of the athletic department. Regent Joe Arrascada asked Harper whether he's transparent with current and prospective donors about the department being in an estimated $30 million hole, and how he planned to fulfill Mullen's five-year, $17.5 million deal. Harper responded that the school had the funds to pay the first two years of Mullen's contract, then watched national reports fixate on that answer as an implication that the school had promised Mullen more than it could afford to pay over the final three years. Harper shoulders the blame for not being more direct in his explanation, saying he has 'zero fear' the athletic department will have trouble fulfilling any coaching contracts on the books. 'We work with the generated dollars, we work with state and institutional support and we work through our endowments,' he said. 'Our salaries and payroll for all coaches and staff is generated through revenues on an annual basis. What was missed is the fact I said, 'and we also generate ticket sales, donor contributions, multimedia rights partners with Learfield, all those self-generated revenues that pay for salaries.'' The school also received a $3 million buyout when Odom left for Purdue. Harper said UNLV has surpassed $2.5 million in revenue sales for the upcoming football season, compared to $1.8 million last spring. He said over 1,000 new season ticket holders joined the fold and that the season ticket holder count was over 5,000. In that March meeting with the regents, Arrascada told Harper, 'Impressive numbers, but fans are fickle. One bad season, those numbers can plummet.' UNLV's financial challenges made its decision to stay put during this round of realignment more logical. Along with the influx of additional funds, that new Mountain West deal allows its members to leave the league for a Power 4 conference at no cost. So rather than pay potentially upward of $18 million to join a still-unsettled Pac-12 situation, UNLV stayed put to get some much-needed cash. People in the Pac-12 and Mountain West believe UNLV is instead hoping for a future Big 12 invitation. Advertisement 'We all know conference realignment has not ended. It will not stop,' Harper said. 'So where we land is the fact there is no buyout for UNLV out of the Mountain West, to be able to have your opportunity to have free agency and always be able to position UNLV in the best possible space for its growth as an institution. We're one of the top markets that's not in a (Autonomy/Power 4) conference right now.' The Pac-12 and some departing Mountain West schools have sued the league over the exit fees UNLV and the MW leftovers are in line to receive, and the sides are currently in mediation, but Harper did not sound too concerned about the final numbers. 'If I was an attorney or judge, I could probably give you a better answer,' he said. 'I don't know. Do I think the numbers will be where they were reported? Should be somewhere in that neighborhood.' To sweeten UNLV's Mountain West decision further, the conference agreed to continue to hold its basketball tournaments at UNLV and plans to move its headquarters from Colorado Springs to a new home base: Las Vegas. Like so many Sin City transplants, Mike Palm found himself hooked by one Vegas show in particular: Mountain West basketball. Palm, who grew up a sports fan in the Midwest and was once a middle school teacher in Iowa before rising up the gaming industry ranks, could not get enough of hoops at the Thomas & Mack Center. Kawhi Leonard was introducing himself to America at San Diego State. Jimmer Fredette was shooting it from the logo for BYU. Palm, the VP of operations for Circa, The D and Golden Gate Casinos in downtown Vegas, said for so long UNLV football was a local afterthought. Until Odom arrived. The city was in the midst of a sports revolution, with the Raiders arriving after the Vegas Golden Knights of the NHL and Las Vegas Aces of the WNBA. And UNLV football was suddenly something worth talking about. Palm knows a thing or two about the topic du jour as a regular on Las Vegas sports radio. And when Vegas became the epicenter of the name, image and likeness messiness last September, Palm attempted to get involved. Advertisement Before UNLV went on to compete for a second consecutive conference title, its former starting quarterback, Matthew Sluka, announced he was leaving the program amid a dispute over funds he said were promised to him but not delivered by the school's NIL collective. The Rebels were 3-0 and coming off a 23-20 win at Kansas. Sluka's exit was a flashpoint in college athletics — a starting quarterback leaving his team in the middle of a season with tremendous promise. Palm, on behalf of Circa Sports CEO Derek Stevens, offered to pay Sluka $100,000 during the dispute. By the time the public offer was made, officials at UNLV informed Palm that there would be no negotiating with Sluka. In January, the former UNLV quarterback announced he was signing with James Madison. That's the singularity of Vegas in $100,000 nutshell. Stevens, a casino owner who isn't a UNLV alumnus, offered to help keep the Rebels' start red-hot. Palm, who said he's gone to several UNLV games the last two years, said the home game atmospheres are more vibrant than Raiders games. He said Mullen's hiring quickly negated the deflation around town after Odom left for Purdue. But Palm said he's realistic about what challenges still lie ahead. Harper said this spring he has not yet mapped out how UNLV will share revenue with players if the House v. NCAA settlement is passed as expected sometime this summer. He did confirm that the majority will go to football. In conversations with his peers in athletic departments around the country, he's heard some plan to invest anywhere from 50 to 75 percent of their allotment into the biggest money-driving sport in college athletics. 'Obviously Dan's going to need financial support to help them get to the next level,' Palm said. 'And he's going to have to win, and he's going to have to win pretty early.' And with the Athletics on track to move to Las Vegas after leaving Oakland, the already-crowded sports marketplace around the shimmering lights of this town will only be harder to punch through. Advertisement 'Great pro towns don't tend to be great college towns,' Palm said. 'The more this becomes a pro sports town, I'm not sure this doesn't hurt the prospects of UNLV.' Mullen vows that if UNLV plays an attractive style of football and can still contend for a CFP appearance, harnessing the aura of Vegas to get those 40,000 to 60,000 inside Allegiant Stadium won't be hard. 'When you come on our campus and you go to the stadium we play in, you are around this environment, you feel like you're at a major program,' Mullen said. 'You go to recruit and kids are looking out here at The Strip and they go, 'There's a lot of opportunities for me in this town that didn't use to be available that, in today's world, is all legal.'' Harper said the attraction of Vegas under coaches like Mullen and Pastner will be too good to pass up for some athletes. Here, you can get decent seats to a UFC event and fist-bump a bloodied fighter after a victory. Or you can have Kenny Chesney saunter through the halls of your $35 million football facility to work out while he's in town for a series of shows at The Sphere. 'Nobody else can have what we have on a regular basis,' Harper said. The stakes are high, which is one of the many reasons Mullen said he took the job. A good football season doesn't move the needle locally or nationally like a great one. A great season gets you in the College Football Playoff, which could be a landscape-altering achievement for a university that would see immediate financial benefits and an athletic department still waiting to earn its long-desired close-up.
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
After surprise retirement, here's who could succeed this ACC basketball coach
Photo by Erica Denhoff/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Two months after signing a contract extension that would have kept her in midtown Atlanta through 2030, Georgia Tech head coach Nell Fortner announced her retirement on Monday after six seasons leading the Yellow Jackets. Advertisement Fortner, 66, was hired at Georgia Tech in 2019 to clean up the program after former coach MaChelle Joseph was fired amid a scandal. Fortner guided the Yellow Jackets to three NCAA Tournament appearances — including one this season — and an overall win-loss record of 110-75. In 2021, she was named ACC Coach of the Year after taking the Yellow Jackets to the Sweet 16 for just the second time in program history. At her retirement press conference on Tuesday, Fortner called it 'bittersweet' and she knows 'she won't be a college basketball coach' going forward 'but I got a lot of energy left.' She added she had been contemplating stepping away from the game for a while, despite signing that extension. 'Y'all realize how much change has happened in the last six years when I took this job in 2019? It was pretty much normal college athletics… Then came the transfer portal and NIL… But we navigated it,' Fortner said. 'I don't feel like I'm old. I feel like I've got a lot left in the tank, but the atmosphere today in college athletics, it's not for me.' Indeed, in addition to enduring an NCAA investigation from Joseph's time overseeing the program, Fortner had to grapple with what all coaches did over the last six years: the pandemic, then the portal, and then the introduction of NIL. In 2021, the NCAA ruled that Joseph had 'committed practice and coaching limit violations' and 'violated head coach responsibility rules,' which led to a penalty of a $5,000 fine plus 1 percent of the budget for the women's basketball program. Advertisement But Fortner dealt with it all and had four seasons of a .500 or better record in ACC play. She coached two-time ACC Defensive Player of the Year Lorela Cubaj and then ACC Sixth Player of the Year Dani Carnegie this season. This past year started off well for the Yellow Jackets with a 15-game winning streak, a stretch of games that was their best start in program history and included Georgia Tech's first win in Chapel Hill's Carmichael Arena since 2012. But the season ended with a thud as the Yellow Jackets lost six of their last seven games, capped off by an NCAA Tournament defeat to Richmond. A source familiar with the situation at Georgia Tech told SB Nation that its players were being 'tampered with' by other teams as early as February. Before Fortner announced her retirement, five Yellow Jackets — including Carnegie — had already entered the transfer portal. Following Fortner's announcement, three-year starters in Kara Dunn and Tonie Morgan followed. 'No players makes it a tough rebuild,' one ACC assistant coach said of the Georgia Tech opening. Advertisement Fortner shook her head no on Tuesday when asked if she would have any input on who would be the next coach at Georgia Tech. She did say that she encouraged the current Yellow Jackets in the portal to wait and see who the next coach would be before making a decision. 'It's a new era. It's time for a new voice,' Fortner said. 'It just feels like the right time… To be able to walk away on my terms feels pretty good.' Fortner retires with an overall record of 272-192. She won an SEC title at Auburn in 2009 and a Big Ten title at Purdue in 1997. She also coached the U.S. National Team to an Olympic gold medal in 2000. Before becoming a head coach, she worked under Hall of Famers Gary Blair and Leon Barmore. She is one of the few people to win Coach of the Year honors in three different major conferences. In her seven years between Auburn and Georgia Tech, Fortner worked as a television analyst. In almost any sport, Georgia Tech is viewed as one of the hardest jobs in the ACC. Aside from not being as flush with resources — read: money for NIL — it also has high academic standards and difficult admission requirements. It's why former football coach Paul Johnson ran the triple-option for years in the Flats, allowing him to do more with less. It was a scheme that leveled the playing field against the likes of Clemson and Georgia. In basketball however, there is no triple-option. Advertisement Still, Georgia Tech is seen by some as an attractive job at the Power 4 level in a conference that supports and cares about women's basketball. At her retirement press conference, Fortner applauded the support she received from President Angel Cabrera and athletic director J. Batt. For a while, it was assumed that Fortner's longtime assistant coach Blanche Alverson would be her successor. However, after six seasons alongside Fortner — and just six days before her retirement — Alverson was hired as the head coach at San Diego. So, who might get the job? Barring a Manny Diaz-esque situation where Georgia Tech lures Alverson back to the Flats, here are some options that make sense for the Yellow Jackets. Erin Dickerson-Davis Dickerson-Davis is the current coach at William & Mary, played at Northwestern and is a former assistant coach at Wake Forest and Georgetown, so she's familiar with the ACC and how to navigate recruiting hurdles at a high-academic institution. Dickerson-Davis is an attractive coaching candidate right now because of the success she had at William & Mary this season, where she led the Tribe to their first NCAA Tournament berth and first March Madness victory, topping High Point in the First Four. Dickerson-Davis just won — in just her third season — in a place where no coach had before. At Wake, she recruited and coached three All-ACC selections. Aaron Rousell Could the coach that handed Fortner the final loss of her career succeed her? Perhaps. Currently the head coach at Richmond, Rousell is a hot coaching candidate in this cycle after leading the Spiders to an at-large berth and victory in the NCAA Tournament. He is 78-24 in his last three seasons leading the A-10 program and has had success recruiting in the ACC's traditional footprint up and down the east coast. He is a graduate of Iowa and previously coached at Division II Minnesota State and Division III Chicago before making the jump to Division I at Bucknell in 2012. As a Division I head coach, Rousell is 273-136. Itoro Coleman A native of Georgia and an All-ACC star at Clemson, Coleman has coached all over the country over the past 25 years, from Butler to Penn State to Marquette to North Carolina to now at Virginia Tech, where she's the associate head coach under Megan Duffy. Coleman's previous tenure as a head coach was a rough one — where she went 25-63 in three seasons leading her alma mater — but she's a good recruiter, knows the ACC landscape, and has a knack for working with guards. Last offseason, she was a finalist for the opening at Stony Brook, but the gig ultimately went to Joy McCorvey. In the last five seasons, Coleman has been on coaching staffs that have gone to four NCAA Tournaments. This year, the Hokies were left on the wrong side of the bubble as the first team out. Vanessa Blair-Lewis Blair-Lewis has won everywhere she's been, and at places where winning isn't all that easy. This season, she took George Mason to the NCAA Tournament for the first time ever and won a program record 27 games. Prior to taking the reins at George Mason, she won five consecutive MEAC titles at Bethune Cookman. Before that, she won a pair of NEC regular season titles at Mount St. Mary's. She's eight victories away from 400 career wins.
USA Today
30-03-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
How both Duke basketball teams are embracing each other like family during March Madness
How both Duke basketball teams are embracing each other like family during March Madness Show Caption Hide Caption South Carolina's Dawn Staley and Duke's Kara Lawson have swag South Carolina women's basketball coach Dawn Staley has swag. So does Duke's Kara Lawson. We asked USC and Duke players who has the most. What they said USA TODAY The Duke women's basketball team, embracing the moniker "The Sisterhood," has advanced to the Elite Eight in the NCAA Tournament. Duke women's basketball coach Kara Lawson and Duke men's basketball coach Jon Scheyer, who also led his team to the Elite Eight, have developed a close relationship. Both coaches have been texting each other throughout their March Madness runs, offering support. BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Duke basketball. It's one of the sport's biggest brands. It's referred to by former and current men's players as 'The Brotherhood.' This season, Duke's women's team embraced the moniker 'The Sisterhood,' even wearing it as a logo on their warm-ups. That sisterhood has been on full display in March Madness. 'Family,' junior guard Ashlon Jackson said ahead of No. 2 Duke's Elite Eight game against No. 1 South Carolina on Sunday. 'We're united within anything and everything we do. It's always 'We before me.'' Watch Duke-South Carolina live with Fubo (free trial) Head coach Kara Lawson's team returned all 10 players with remaining eligibility, a rarity in the transfer-portal era. Of course Lawson, like all coaches in today's game, had to work to 're-recruit' her roster. But each player made the decision on her own. Factoring in was the belief the players had in each other as well as in Lawson and her staff. 'There was never a conversation,' Jackson said. 'We just love each other. We're always together, whether that's on or off the court. I could never fake this. This is really a family, a sisterhood.' The leaders of The Sisterhood and The Brotherhood are very well-connected, like their teams. 'We're texting each other every day through this run – just words of support,' Lawson said of Duke men's basketball coach Jon Scheyer. It's the first time since 2013 that the Duke men's and women's team both advanced to at least the Elite Eight. Lawson took over the women's team in July 2020, after Joanne P. McCallie stepped down after 13 seasons. McCallie went 330-107 during her Duke tenure, winning the ACC Coach of the Year award three times and leading the Blue Devils to four consecutive Elite Eights. Although the program is still seeking its first national championship, the bar was high for Lawson. Scheyer can relate. Scheyer played for legendary head coach Mike Krzyzewski at Duke from 2006-10, helping the Blue Devils win the national championship in 2010. After a brief professional playing career, Scheyer returned in 2013 as an assistant on Krzyzewski's staff. In June 2021, the school announced that Scheyer would succeed 'Coach K,' who led his Duke teams to five national championships. In April 2022, Scheyer officially took over. Lawson said Scheyer was taking steps to prepare for the job before he even knew he had it. Part of that process was asking Lawson questions about her experience becoming a head coach at Duke. They spent early mornings in the weight room when he was still an assistant and she was new to Duke. They talked about basketball, of course, and Lawson asked Scheyer questions, hoping to gain more familiarity with her new home. 'It was very easy to see that Jon was very prepared, very sharp, in-tune with what was going on,' Lawson said. The coaches of Duke basketball were back in the weight room prior to the Sweet 16. They're leading The Brotherhood and, now, The Sisterhood through a new era with a familiar Blue Devils outcome – going deep in the NCAA Tournament. Wesley Branch is a student in the University of Georgia's Sports Media Certificate program.
Fox Sports
25-03-2025
- Sport
- Fox Sports
Josh Pastner will try to restore UNLV basketball glory days as he takes over the program
Associated Press LAS VEGAS (AP) — Josh Pastner was named UNLV coach Tuesday, the latest to try to turn around a college basketball program that has gone from one of the nation's best to one that is largely irrelevant. The Rebels have not made the NCAA Tournament since 2013 and have not advanced to at least the Sweet 16 since 2007. It's quite a fall for a program that won the 1990 national championship. 'This has always been a dream job for me, and I fully recognize the significance of UNLV in the landscape of college basketball,' Pastner said in a statement. "The program holds great importance for both the Las Vegas community and the region, and I am eager to unite Rebel Nation with the goal of restoring the program to national prominence.' Pastner, 47, takes over for Kevin Kruger, who was fired March 15 after going 76-55 over four seasons and failing to reach the NCAA Tournament. Pastner most recently coached at Georgia Tech, going 109-114 from 2016-23, ending with losing records in each of his final two seasons. But Pastner did have some success, leading the Yellow Jackets to the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament title and NCAA Tournament in 2021. He also was the ACC Coach of the Year in 2017 after going 21-16. Most of his success came at Memphis, where Pastner was 167-73 from 2009-16. The Tigers made four NCAA Tournament appearances, won three Conference USA Tournament championships and captured two regular-season titles. 'He is a fearless and relentless recruiter with success as a head coach, and is also an exceptional communicator, deeply committed to engaging with the Las Vegas community,' UNLV athletic director Erick Harper said in a statement. "Furthermore, Josh is committed to connecting with Runnin' Rebel alumni, ensuring that everyone feels involved in the program's success. We are confident that he will lead us to win championships and return the Runnin' Rebels to the NCAA Tournament.' ___ AP March Madness bracket: and coverage: Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. recommended
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Josh Pastner will try to restore UNLV basketball glory days as he takes over the program
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Josh Pastner was named UNLV coach Tuesday, the latest to try to turn around a college basketball program that has gone from one of the nation's best to one that is largely irrelevant. The Rebels have not made the NCAA Tournament since 2013 and have not advanced to at least the Sweet 16 since 2007. It's quite a fall for a program that won the 1990 national championship. 'This has always been a dream job for me, and I fully recognize the significance of UNLV in the landscape of college basketball,' Pastner said in a statement. "The program holds great importance for both the Las Vegas community and the region, and I am eager to unite Rebel Nation with the goal of restoring the program to national prominence.' Pastner, 47, takes over for Kevin Kruger, who was fired March 15 after going 76-55 over four seasons and failing to reach the NCAA Tournament. Pastner most recently coached at Georgia Tech, going 109-114 from 2016-23, ending with losing records in each of his final two seasons. But Pastner did have some success, leading the Yellow Jackets to the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament title and NCAA Tournament in 2021. He also was the ACC Coach of the Year in 2017 after going 21-16. Most of his success came at Memphis, where Pastner was 167-73 from 2009-16. The Tigers made four NCAA Tournament appearances, won three Conference USA Tournament championships and captured two regular-season titles. 'He is a fearless and relentless recruiter with success as a head coach, and is also an exceptional communicator, deeply committed to engaging with the Las Vegas community,' UNLV athletic director Erick Harper said in a statement. "Furthermore, Josh is committed to connecting with Runnin' Rebel alumni, ensuring that everyone feels involved in the program's success. We are confident that he will lead us to win championships and return the Runnin' Rebels to the NCAA Tournament.' ___ AP March Madness bracket: and coverage: Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. Mark Anderson, The Associated Press
