Alexander Brown
The likely final addition of the university carousel in this 2024 cycle may be the most unexpected of all. Green Bay has hired sports radio host and former Oklahoma State standout guard Doug Gottlieb to be its next men’s basketball coach, the school announced Tuesday. It’s a flashy move for the Horizon League program, which is making its third coaching hire in five seasons and has one NCAA Tournament appearance in nearly three decades.
The contract is for five years.
Gottlieb is a well-known and occasionally controversial sports media personality due to his often unfiltered opinions, but his reputation as a basketball analyst has long been held in high regard. Gottlieb has been a studio and college basketball game commentator for the past two decades in his time at ESPN, CBS Sports and Fox Sports. He has also been public over the years about his desire to go into college coaching; Gottlieb interviewed for the Oklahoma State job in 2017 and was in fact one of the finalists for Green Bay’s 2023 opening.
He lost last year to Sundance Wicks, who just left Phoenix to coach at Wyoming after pulling off a 15-win turnaround in 2022-23 at Green Bay.
As part of the terms of his employment, Gottlieb will continue to host his nationally syndicated daily radio show for Fox Sports Radio, Phoenix athletic director Josh Moon told CBS Sports. It’s an unprecedented arrangement: Gottlieb will be a Division I coach and a member of the media simultaneously.
“What he’s doing now is a two-hour radio show. Balancing that is no different than what other people have done in this area,” Moon told CBS Sports. “This is different — I’m not saying it’s the same thing — but the commitment to it in terms of how many hours a day, Doug can balance that with where he is in his career. you balance the takes, the opinions and the things that drive this process.
With his unique coaching position and having a national microphone, CBS Sports asked Moon if Gottlieb would be allowed to give opinions on his radio show about players, coaches or college basketball topics, in addition to offering tournament picks and/or predictions. of the NCAA.
“They (Fox Sports) are going to have to sort this out with what it looks like on the radio side, and us on our side,” Moon said.
Moon quickly turned to Gottlieb after he had to find a replacement for Wicks, who on Monday came out after one season with Green Bay to coach Wyoming. Gottlieb has no college coaching experience, but has coached California grassroots/AAU teams for several years and previously served as an assistant and head coach at the Maccabiah Games in Israel. Gottlieb was born near Milwaukee. His late father, Bob, coached the UW-Milwaukee Panthers from 1975-80.
It’s an innovative signing and is sure to draw a lot of attention, if not some skepticism. Gottlieb is well-known in basketball and has connections that go back decades, but he is the rare person hired to run a DI program despite never having previously worked at a college.
“We went a long way with Doug last year,” Moon said of the 2023 coaching search. “Getting to know him more, understanding what he does, how much passion he has for this sport and for coaching. His background—being someone in his professional career that he’s always won—obviously connected and can move the needle for us and be creative, outside the box as a midsize institution, the crazy world of college athletics.”
Gottlieb, 48, began his career at Notre Dame but excelled for three years at Oklahoma State from 1997 to 2000. His 947 assists are 11th most in NCAA Division I men’s history.
