Jerome Tang feels settled at Kansas State, but he’s still evolving as a head coach
Whenever a college basketball coach switches jobs he goes through a transition period in which his new position can feel more like a work retreat than a daily grind.
The first few weeks or months at a new gig are often spent in some form of isolation, as families are slow to move and roster turnover takes time to navigate. That was especially the case for new Kansas State men’s hoops coach Jerome Tang, who is only now starting to feel settled in Manhattan three months after the Wildcats hired him in March.
“I wake up in the morning now and it’s a little different feeling,” Tang said. “I don’t feel like I’m on vacation or this is just pretend. It’s starting to sink in.”
Tang has started to feel at home over the past few weeks. Why? For starters, he finally has more than two players to coach. After bidding farewell to all but two members of last year’s roster, Tang has landed seven newcomers and the majority of them are already on campus.
He enjoys hearing basketballs bouncing inside K-State’s practice facility while he works in his office.
Tutoring this group of new players, even on a limited basis during summer school, is a thrill for him.
“They are all incredible human beings,” Tang said, “highly competitive and fun to be around.”
His wife and children have also made the trek north from Waco, Texas to live with him inside the house he recently purchased near the east side of campus. He brags that he is never more than a six-minute drive away from his work or his family.
You could say he is finally unpacked.
But those aren’t the only reasons he is starting to feel comfortable at K-State. After spending the past 17 seasons as an assistant coach under Scott Drew at Baylor, there were things he understandably had to learn about being a head coach for the first time.
So much so that he has called Drew several times and apologized for being on his case about certain things when they worked together with the Bears. It’s hard, he has learned, to remember every little thing when you are in charge of an entire program as opposed to only one part of it.
Recruiting has also been a major adjustment for him.
“Towards the last three years or so at Baylor we were picking and not necessarily recruiting,” Tang said. “Now, you have really got to recruit and turn over every rock to find some guys. At Baylor, we were just bringing them to the table. Now we have to be active pursuers. That has caught me a little off guard.”
Turns out, finding the missing pieces for a perennial top 25 team every season is different than building a team from scratch.
“I have had to readjust my eyes,” Tang said. “I’m not like looking for the one or two pieces that are going to help us win a national championship. I’m trying to put a team together that can win in the Big 12, which then can propel you from there.”
Trying to find quality recruits in June is also new for him.
“I didn’t recruit late last few years, so I don’t know what’s available compared to what was available,” Tang said. “There are some quality players that are still available that we are pursuing. Something always happens late in the summertime that you don’t expect. I’m interested to see what that’s going to be.”
Tang was slow to bring new players in, but his first roster with the Wildcats is starting to take shape.
Markquis Nowell and Ismael Massoud are back. Cam Carter, Jerrell Colbert, Dorian Finister, Taj Manning, David N’Guessan, Nae’Qwan Tomlin and Desi Sills have all signed. Futhermore, Tang has signaled on Twitter that he gained another pledge on Wednesday.
The Wildcats still have three open scholarships, but their new additions give them enough players to practice five-on-five. They also provide fans with enough information to start projecting a starting lineup for the 2022-23 season.
Tang is beginning to think about that, too, now that he is starting to feel at home in Manhattan.
This story was originally published June 16, 2022 at 10:12 AM with the headline "Jerome Tang feels settled at Kansas State, but he’s still evolving as a head coach."