One year and four days after his last victory in the Big East, Tony Stubblefield was fired Monday as the men’s basketball coach at DePaul.
The 19-game conference losing streak that led to his dismissal might be remembered as the low point in Blue Demons history. Then again, as bad as things have been for DePaul — which hasn’t been to the NCAA Tournament since 2004 — the disastrous Stubblefield Era kind of felt like more of the same.
‘‘After evaluating the current state of our men’s basketball program, a decision was made to make a change in the head coaching position,’’ athletic director DeWayne Peevy said in a statement. ‘‘We want to thank Coach Stubblefield for his hard work and determination over the last two-plus seasons to move our basketball program forward through a new era for DePaul Athletics. Unfortunately, we did not meet our goals.’’
Stubblefield finished with a record of 28-54 at DePaul, a winning percentage of .341 that almost certainly would have plummeted below Oliver Purnell’s .340 (in 2010-15) had he been allowed to complete his third season. The current team is off to a nightmarish 3-15 start, with an 0-7 mark in the Big East.
Matt Brady will serve as interim coach as Peevy searches for Stubblefield’s successor.
And whom might that successor be? There are proven coaches at winning programs — Dayton’s Anthony Grant, New Mexico’s Richard Pitino — who might be interested in moving up to the Big East if Peevy’s fundraising success lives up to his own goals. There are other coaches in the Atlantic 10, Missouri Valley and American Athletic conferences and elsewhere worth contacting. Would Florida Atlantic’s Dusty May even pick up the phone?
There are DePaul alumni having varied success in the coaching profession, one of whom — Long Island University’s Rod Strickland — knows Peevy well. Peevy is known to be close with struggling Louisville coach Kenny Payne, who was a longtime assistant at Kentucky, where Peevy worked for 12 years. Former Marquette, Indiana and Georgia coach Tom Crean needs a job. Might Vanderbilt’s Jerry Stackhouse be looking for an off-ramp? Will Peevy reach out to Loyola’s Drew Valentine, who’s having a bounce-back season?
It would be difficult to comprehend if Peevy turned someone else into a first-time coach, as he did with Stubblefield. A respected recruiter, Stubblefield clearly had all he could handle and more in the X’s-and-O’s department.
Just last week, Stubblefield told the Sun-Times he thought he could hang on to his job.
‘‘Absolutely,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m going to work my tail off every day from sunup to sundown to try to figure this out and get this turned around.’’
Last month, Peevy told the Sun-Times his ‘‘hope bucket’’ wasn’t empty and said he wanted to avoid an in-season change, barring an ‘‘irregular’’ occurrence beyond just wins and losses. But Peevy also acknowledged, ‘‘At some point, you have to change up and try something different.’’
There will be ‘‘no success’’ at DePaul, as Peevy put it, until it gets back to the Big Dance. Meanwhile, it’s a delicate dance Peevy is doing. He’s trying to build on plans for an on-campus practice facility by increasing the budget for a new coach and amassing an NIL war chest that other Big East schools don’t scoff at. In all, it’s a seriously heavy lift.
But that’s where DePaul is at. It needs a real coach with a real shot at winning. It has been far too long.
