Sources: FDU’s Anderson replacing Pitino at Iona
10:58 AM ET Pete ThamelESPN Fairleigh Dickinson’s Tobin Anderson, the breakout coaching star of the NCAA competition,
has consented to a five-year offer to become the next coach at Iona, sources told ESPN.The deal has been finalized, according to sources, and Anderson is anticipated to inform his team at a meeting Tuesday afternoon.Anderson will change Rick Pitino, who left Iona for St. John’s on Monday after 3 seasons. In replacing Pitino, Iona has actually
struck rapidly and lands a coach who caught the nation’s attention with two NCAA tournament victories last week.In his very first year at FDU, Anderson led the team to what many consider the most significant upset in NCAA tournament history.
The 16th-seeded Knights stunned No. 1 Purdue 63-58 for simply the 2nd upset of a No. 1 seed in the preliminary considering that the males’s competition expanded to 64 groups back in 1985. That moved a small-school lifer to end up being a family name in college basketball in the course of a weekend.In the wake of the upset, FDU and Anderson emerged as the darlings of the NCAA competition, consisting of a Monday morning look on “Today”upon return from the round-of-32 loss to
ninth-seeded Florida Atlantic in Columbus.Editor’s Picks 2 Related The victory brightened the path of Anderson, an Iowa local who hopscotched his way through a pair of Department III head-coaching jobs and nine seasons at Division II St. Thomas Aquinas prior to landing the Fairleigh Dickinson
job in May.
He took control of a four-win team and went 21-16. Sources told ESPN that Anderson impressed the Iona brass when the Gaels task last opened back in 2020. Anderson spoke in person to Iona officials and was among the 3 finalists when they employed Pitino back in 2020, per sources. This time, Anderson will change him.Anderson’s Fairleigh Dickinson team advanced with 2 triumphes in the NCAA tournament– a blowout of Texas Southern in the First 4 and the Purdue stunner– regardless of having what’s thought about the quickest lineup in all of college basketball this year. But belief made up for FDU’s size, as the Knights swarmed
and rattled Purdue’s guards to capture the victory.Anderson bet his father, Steve, at Interstate 35 High School in his home state. From there, he played Department III basketball at Wesleyan before grinding his method through the small-school ranks to learn his craft. Wherever he coached, winning has actually tended to follow.Anderson functioned as an assistant coach at Division III Clarkson and Division II Le Moyne before becoming the Clarkson
head coach in 1999. Together with 22 years of head-coaching experience, Anderson likewise brings experience in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference from his time as an assistant coach for Siena from 2011 to ’13. Iona has actually been the alpha of the MAAC in recent seasons, as the school has reached eight of the previous 11 NCAA competitions. That’s an extraordinary run that covers the tenures of Tim Cluess and Pitino, who reached the tournament in 2 of
the three years he was at Iona.Overall, Iona has reached 16 NCAA competitions, with the only postseason win coming under the watch of Jim Valvano in 1980. The school has actually also won 13 regular-season league titles and 14 conference titles in its existence.