South Florida Coach Brian Gregory to return for 2022-23 season
South Florida men’s basketball fans have watched their team suffer 15 losing seasons over the past 20 years, dating all the way back to the era of former head coach Seth Greenberg. When Brian Gregory took the reins of the program in March 2017, Bulls fans hoped for a turnaround.
In Gregory’s second season with the Bulls, 2018-19, he guided USF to the best turnaround in the NCAA by leading the Bulls to a school-record 24 wins, 14 more victories than the season before, on the way to winning the College Basketball Invitational for the program’s first postseason tournament championship since 1990.
Since that season USF has won just 31 games and Bulls fans are restless – often calling for a coaching change on social media and message boards – but, as BullsInsider.com reported on our premium message board on Wednesday, barring a mass exodus of players like last year, I feel confident in saying that Gregory will be back to coach the Bulls next season.
To some, this might seem like ‘water is wet’ reporting. After all, in a Jan. 4 press release, Michael Kelly, USF Vice President of Athletics, announced that Gregory signed a contract extension through the 2025-26 season. Still, some Bulls fans believe change is needed now.
USF ended the season with a loss Thursday against UCF in the American Athletic Conference Tournament. Its 8-23 finish marks the low point since Gregory became the Bulls head coach. Now, Kelly and all those invested in the program will look ahead to next season.
Kelly spoke publicly about Gregory the day before USF played UCF.
“Well, obviously, the results this year are disappointing. No one ever wants to be in single digit victories and I know we've had a really hard year shooting the ball and that's been a big part of our lack of results. But I will say this, we accomplished a great deal over Brian’s time-frame here,” he said on the 95.3 WDAE Ronnie And TKras Show. “I've talked before about how I believe in patience and the way that we do things the right way in that program. Clearly we've got to continue to develop players. We've got to continue to recruit players that can help us win.”
USF’s recruiting did pick up under Gregory who landed three high school prospects in his first recruiting class – David Collins, Justin Brown and Alexis Yetna – who now hold places in the USF record books.
When Caleb Murphy stepped on the Yuengling Center court on Nov. 25, 2020 he became the highest ranked prospect (No. 63 overall in the 2020 class) to play at USF in the Rivals.com era. Corey Walker Jr. (No. 68 overall in the 2020 class) was close behind Murphy.
With a roster of ten newcomers -- eight transfers with college basketball experience and two incoming freshmen – the Bulls (8-23, 3-15 AAC) underachieved in the win column but as the season continued you saw improvement in several players. Something that has factored into Kelly’s support of Gregory.
“So, we're going to keep building we got to get behind this team and we're going to continue to see what the offseason brings,” Kelly said.