There still is a lot to be determined before judging athletic director Terry Gawlik and the University of Idaho’s decision to hire Alex Pribble as its next head men’s basketball coach. But if we’re going off of Pribble’s 15-year track record, there’s no denying, he’s been successful everywhere he’s been.
In his final two years as associate coach at Seattle University, the Redhawks won 20 or more games for the first time since the mid-1960s.
During his four-year tenure leading NCAA Division II Saint Martin’s University, he led the Saints to back-to-back historic seasons.
His qualifications and accolades are nothing to scoff at, and he is a step in the right direction (see what I did there) from where the Vandals have been.
Fans and media alike will learn more about Pribble and where he intends to take the Idaho program when he’s officially introduced at 3 p.m. Monday in the Alumni Club Room at Idaho Central Credit Union Arena. The news conference will be livestreamed on ESPN+.
One thing I’ll be interested to learn about is exactly how much of a voice the players had in the decision. Gawlik mentioned in a March 1 news conference that she was going to have one-on-one meetings with the players to see what they valued in a coach.
It’ll be interesting to see what kind of input they had and how Pribble matches up.
My curiosity is piqued because none of the players on the current roster interacted with the news when it broke on social media. As of press time, the tweet annoucing Pribble has 400 likes, 70 retweets and 16 replies, none of which came from his future players.
It certainly isn’t the be-all, end-all when it comes to determining player happiness. However, it’s not a bad measuring stick.
While it could be worrisome, the Fairfax, Calif., native has had a remarkable track record with building relationships with his players, so much so, he’s gotten a couple of former players to come with him to a few stops.
How the new hire can handle the transfer portal also might have pushed Gawlik in Pribble’s direction, and he has a success story when it comes to the portal.
Pribble originally recruited point guard Alex Schumacher to play for Saint Martin’s before taking the job at Seattle.
Schumacher strung together three solid seasons for the Saints from 2019-22, then he decided to join his former head coach, where he averaged 12 points per game in 21 minutes of action for the Redhawks this past season.
Before Schumacher, Frederik Jörg went along the same career path. Jörg, who was at Eastern Washington at the same time Pribble was with the Eagles as an assistant, went to Saint Martin’s within two weeks of Pribble getting the top job there. In Jörg’s lone season as a Saint, he played in 25 games, averaging 18.7 minutes and scoring 10.3 points per game.
So he checks the transfer portal box, and when it comes to maintaining guys and recruiting on the West Coast, that’s his bread and butter.
According to his LinkedIn page, at Eastern Washington specifically, he was focused primarily on player development, offensive and defensive strategy, opponent scouting, film review and West Coast recruiting.
Finally, and probably the biggest quality Gawlik was looking for in Idaho’s next coach, was the person’s ability to build a program. When it comes to Pribble, that’s his biggest calling card.
The season before he took charge at Saint Martin’s, the Saints were 6-22. The next season, Pribble got his team above .500, starting a run of four consecutive winning season, two trips to the NCAA tournament and the program’s first round of 16 berth.
That could be a sign of good things to come for the Vandals, who have a young core and haven’t gone above .500 in five years.
Former Eastern Washington assistant and Seattle top man Jim Hayford has raved about Pribble’s ability to unite teams.
“When you look at his successes at Saint Martin’s, you can see the strengths of who he is as a coach,” Hayford said on seattlespectator.com after Pribble’s hire to Seattle on May 15, 2019. “His ability to be innovative on offense, I think he’s really great at building a brotherhood amongst young players so we can build good team chemistry.”
He’s gonna need all of those traits to build a winner in Moscow.
