MU reaches out to Kim Anderson, Tim Floyd’s name emerges

The search for Frank Haith’s replacement as Missouri’s men’s basketball coach entered its fifth day on Tuesday with athletic director Mike Alden bunkered in as promised.

“The next time that I would talk to you, after this today, will be when we introduce our next head coach,” Alden said Friday in a news conference at Mizzou Arena after Haith decided to leave for Tulsa.

Still, another potential successor emerged Tuesday night: Texas-El Paso and former NBA coach Tim Floyd. ESPN’s Jeff Goodman reported Floyd had “emerged as a strong candidate.”

But neither Floyd nor Alden has asked UTEP athletic director Bob Stull about the Missouri job, according to a text message sent by Stull to The Star on Tuesday night. Stull, a former MU football coach, also said he believed those parties would have talked to him if Missouri had made contact with Floyd.

Stull previously told The Star on Tuesday that MU had not sought permission to speak with Floyd, who reportedly expressed interest in the job. Stull said he’d played golf with Floyd in the last few days and the topic never came up.

Floyd, 60, resigned from Southern California in 2009 amid an NCAA investigation into the recruitment of O.J. Mayo. Floyd was later exonerated.

During a 20-year college coaching career, Floyd is 409-232, though 21 of those wins during the 2007-08 season were vacated by the NCAA because of the Mayo scandal. Floyd led both Iowa State and USC as far as the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.

Central Missouri coach Kim Anderson, a former star for the Tigers who also served on Norm Stewart’s staff for 11 seasons in two stints as an assistant, is the only coach Missouri is known to have contacted.

MU reached out to Anderson but not directly by Alden, a source told The Star. The source said he thought Anderson had been contacted by a search firm or consultant.

Anderson, 58, said Monday night he was still coach of the Mules and had no comment on any other jobs.

MU is using a search firm, a source familiar with the situation told The Star, but it’s not known if Dallas-based consultant Bob Beaudine is working with Missouri on this search. In 2011, Missouri used Beaudine to guide the process that led to the Haith’s hire.

Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall, a presumed prime target, and his agent had yet to be contacted by Missouri or any potential intermediary as of late Tuesday afternoon.

That may be a sign that MU thinks it can’t afford to make a run at Marshall, who guided the Shockers to the 2013 Final Four and a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament last season and is making about $2 million a year with incentives.

Marshall’s agent, Myles Solomon, told The Star on Monday that he thought Missouri was an attractive destination for a coach, but that he’d never had a specific conversation with Marshall about the Tigers’ gig.

“Just speaking for myself and my personal opinion, I think Missouri definitely is one of the top basketball jobs in the SEC and that at times it’s shown what it can do,” Solomon said. “It seems to be a good opportunity, but I am not in all the nitty gritty of it and how it is trying to recruit kids there.”

It’s understood that Marshall sees MU as a rebuilding task and would want in the neighborhood of $2.8 million to $3 million a year and a long-term contract to consider leaving Wichita, where he has built a strong program and enjoys support that one source said rivals what Nick Saban must feel at Alabama.

Stephen F. Austin coach Brad Underwood, a former Kansas State assistant for six seasons under Bob Huggins and Frank Martin, has not been contacted by Missouri, though Underwood told The Star on Tuesday that he’d be interested.

“That’s an unbelievable job,” he said. “That’s my type of job. The basketball aside, it’s been a great spot for many years with a ton of great players. It’s a great university, but I’m still the coach at Stephen F.”

Purdue coach Matt Painter hasn’t been contacted by MU either. Missouri interviewed Painter in 2011 and the position was his if he had wanted it, but he turned down the job and instead signed an eight-year extension with the Boilermakers.

Villanova’s Jay Wright and former California coach Mike Montgomery, who retired last month and was replaced by Cuonzo Martin from Tennessee, also have not been contacted about the job.

Tennessee hired Southern Mississippi coach Donnie Tyndall on Monday after talks reportedly broke down with Louisiana Tech coach Michael White.

This story was originally published April 22, 2014 at 6:42 PM with the headline "MU reaches out to Kim Anderson, Tim Floyd’s name emerges."