Auburn Hires Tony Barbee as next Men's Basketball Head Coach

This a FANTASTIC hire for the Auburn Tigers. Tony Barbee is one of the fastest rising head coaches in all of the nation and the Auburn Tigers couldn't made a better choice, among the available coaches. First let's do a quick Resume check. First let's do a quick resume check: He was a player under John Calipari at the University of Massachusetts and would later join as a Graduate Assistant from 95-98, where he was apart of the staff that lead UMass to a #1 ranking and a 31-1 overall record and a trip to the Final Four. After that he took an assistant coaches job at the University of Wyoming for one season and helped the Cowboys to an 18-10 record and their highest SRS (sports reference.com) since the 90-91 season. He then headed back to UMass as an Assistant Coach under Bruiser Flint, where the Minutemen went 17-16, an improvement over their 14-16 record the year before, before rejoining with Calipari at Memphis in 2000, where he would help lead the Tigers to 3 NCAA Tournament appearances and, in his last year, a #3 ranking in the AP Poll. He would then accept his first head coaching job at the University of Texas-El Paso. In his first season there were some rookie head coaching struggles as the Miners went 14-17 (6-10) finishing 10th in the C-USA, averaging 75.6ppg while allowing 71.6ppg, and finishing with an RPI of 210. But every year after that saw improvement as the next season UTEP went 19-14 (8-8) finishing 6th in the conference, averaging 76.6-73.2, with an RPI of 110, then 23-14 (10-6) finishing 4th in the conference, averaging 75.4-71.9, with an RPI of 82, and this past season he lead UTEP to 26-7 (15-1) record, winning the C-USA Regular season crown, averaging 75.3-64.6, and finishing with an RPI of 40 and a trip to the NCAA Tournament.

He coaches a very similar style of Basketball to his mentor, Calipari, and one of the most important things that he picked up from Calipari was recruiting, where Barbee was named #3 Recruiter (Rivals.com) during his stay at Memphis and helped build them into the National Power they were when he left for UTEP. It was that recruiting that helped him bring the center pieces to this season's UTEP Basketball team into place, as Barbee brought in, and coached up, 1st team All C-USA G Randy Culpepper, and 2nd Team All C-USA F Derrick Caracter. Barbee himself was named C-USA Coach of the year.

This is going to be big for Auburn because they are coming off a rough season and there isn't much there right now that points to a good season next year. They finished tied for 4th with rival Alabama in the SEC West but other then that did not have much success this season. In former Head Coach Jeff Lebo's last season the Tiger struggled to win away from home going 3-12, and struggled against good teams as they finished with a 3-14 record against teams with an RPI of 1-100. They did however play these teams well as the average margin of loss is just over 6 points in those games and would've been much less if they hadn't been ripped to be pieces by Tennessee 81-55. The roughest part of all is losing Seniors Lucas Hargrove, Brendan Knox, Tay Waller, and most of all DeWayne Reed. Both Reed, Waller, and Hargrove are fantastic players that made my All-SEC teams, Reed making the my 2nd team and Hargrove and Waller making my 4th team. The Tigers were a 3 guard team this past season and they lose their leader in Reed, Shooter in Waller, and their two big guys in the post in Hargrove and Knox. They do however return Frankie Sullivan who just missed making my All-SEC teams. After that though they are really going to need someone else to step up. Devan Downey did it alone for South Carolina and Sullivan is NOT Devan Downey. They are going to need someone to step up. Newcomers Kenny Gabriel, Ty Armstrong, and Roy Chubb are going to be asked to step up in the post in their 2nd season with the Tigers. The Tigers have 6 newcomers coming next season and the one that should benefit the most is athletic C Shawn Kemp who has a chance to be like Caracter was this season at UTEP, and with the loss of Hargrove and Knox he can step in and play immediately.

But this is where Barbee is going to have to get to work immediately. Barbee runs a similar style of offense as Calipari and while I think he can make Frankie Sullivan, and freshman Earnest Ross work, I think he can recruit better. Auburn won't be a pushover under Barbee next season but I can't wait to see what he has for the Tigers over the next few seasons.