Report: Saint Mary’s coach Randy Bennett considering leaving for ASU job
Saint Mary's coach Randy Bennett is reportedly "in serious discussions" with ASU about its men's basketball coaching job.
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Saint Mary’s coach Randy Bennett is “in serious discussions” with Arizona State about its men’s basketball coaching job, Sun Devil Source’s Chris Karpman reported on Saturday.
Arizona Sports’ John Gambadoro added that no hire would be made until Monday at the earliest.
ASU is one of several open jobs after it informed Bobby Hurley he would not receive a new contract after 11 seasons as head coach on March 11.
The Gaels lost their Round of 64 matchup to Texas A&M, freeing the coach up to consider other jobs. Saint Mary’s finished the year 27-6 and as WCC regular-season champs.
The 63-year-old Bennett is a Valley native whose father, Tom, coached at Mesa Community College for 19 seasons.
He has seven wins across 12 NCAA Tournament appearances, making it as far as the Sweet 16 once. He has a record of 589-228 (.721) in 25 seasons with WCC regular-season titles in each of the last four years (seven overall).
Bennett’s Gaels squads ranked top 20 in defense each year 2021-26, including as high as eighth in 2024-25, per KenPom. They ranked top 25 in offense, including as high as 11th in 2017-18, over 2016-20.
The coach has had a habit of international recruiting long before the rise that came with NIL and transfer portal changes, including recent standouts Augustas Marciulionis (Lithuania) and Alex Ducas (Australia).
Bennett got his first coaching job at San Diego working under Hank Egan, who was the Air Force coach that gave Gregg Popovich his first coaching job. Bennett also assisted Lorenzo Romar at Pepperdine and Saint Louis prior to getting the Saint Mary’s job.
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Comments
13 Comments
Randy Bennett was not my preferred choice either, but this isn't a flex for leverage and it won't be another June Jones debacle. He also won't just be coming here to collect a check because this is ASU basketball we're talking about. There are consistely low expectations for this program and they play in a 1970's dungeon.
The alumni and the donors value baseball and hockey more than they do basketball. At least they'll be hiring a coach who understands that too.
Looks like the new ASU coach will be singing "When I'm 64" with Sir Paul after all.
I think it's a good fit. Hopefully it happens. Even better would be Flynn Clayman, he's probably a hot commodity right now.
Herb Sendek was mediocre at ASU, but even he was better than Hurley, and he's done a nice job at Santa Clara the last 10 years. He's won almost 60% of his games at Santa Clara.
Bobby was .526 at ASU and over his career .548
Herb was .537 at ASU and over his career .586
It's time for an upgrade instead of a regression. Bennett is an upgrade, no doubt about it.