COLLEGE BASKETBALL – Tobin Anderson, a former Siena men’s basketball assistant coach who guided Fairleigh Dickinson to a memorable upset win last week in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, will take over control of one of the Saints’ top rivals.
A day after Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame member Rick Pitino left Iona to coach St. John’s, Iona announced Tuesday it had hired Anderson to lead the Gaels. Anderson reportedly signed a five-year contract to coach at Iona, the defending MAAC champions.
“I appreciate this tremendous opportunity from Matt Glovaski and Dr. Carey to be the next leader of one of the most storied basketball programs on the East Coast,” Anderson, referencing the Gaels’ athletic director and president, said in a statement issued through the school. “Iona University represents everything my family and I were looking for in a school, a basketball program and a campus atmosphere. Our goal is to build upon the tremendous tradition of Iona basketball and elevate the program to greater heights.”
Last week, Anderson led Fairleigh Dickinson to a play-in victory, then coached the No. 16 seed to the second-ever upset of a No. 1 seed in the men’s NCAA basketball tournament. Fairleigh Dickinson, which had the shortest average height of any team in the country, defeated a top-seeded Purdue team that featured 7-foot-4 Zach Edey, the likely national player of the year.
“If we played them 100 times, they’d probably beat us 99 times,” Anderson said after that game, according to an Associated Press report. “Play them 100 times, we have one win. But tonight’s the one. We had to be unique. We had to be unorthodox. We had to make it tough on them, just be different.”
A couple days later, Fairleigh Dickinson’s tournament run ended with a loss to Florida Atlantic. That defeat finished a 21-16 season for Fairleigh Dickinson, a campaign that served as Anderson’s only one leading the team that had finished 4-22 the previous season.
“We are very excited to introduce Tobin Anderson as Iona University’s men’s basketball head coach,” Glovaski said. “We have long known him to be a fantastic coach and an even better person. Now, with his team’s impressive run in the NCAA tournament, everyone paying attention to March Madness also knows this. We’re delighted that he will be at the helm of our men’s basketball program.”
Anderson worked at Siena as an assistant coach from 2011 to 2013 for Mitch Buonaguro. The 51-year-old has been a head coach and assistant coach for Division I, II and III programs, and served for a decade as head coach at Division II St. Thomas Aquinas prior to heading to Fairleigh Dickinson.
Iona is coming off a 27-8 campaign, but Anderson will need to rebuild the Gaels after Pitino’s departure. On Tuesday, two of Iona’s stars — MAAC Player of the Year Walter Clayton, Jr. and Nelly Junior Joseph, both of whom were first-team All-MAAC selections — were among several Gaels to enter into the NCAA transfer portal.
Contact Michael Kelly at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @ByMichaelKelly.
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