A couple months ago we noted that it had been a bad couple years for NBA alumni coaching in D-III, but that Armon Gilliam was still coaching at Penn State-Altoona.
Uhm, not anymore. Now Gilliam is out as well. His contract was up and was not renewed.
At the end of a coach’s tenure, I often find it interesting to go back and see what was said when he was hired. As such, from the press release following his summer 2002 hiring:
“We are thrilled to welcome Coach Gilliam to Penn State Altoona’s intercollegiate athletics program and are excited by the leadership, skill, and level of professionalism he will bring to our men’s basketball program as it continues to grow in Division III competition,” says Fredina Ingold, director of athletics.
Let’s evaluate: Gilliam took over a team that went 4-22 after a 1-18 start. His first year the Lions started out 1-18 as well (0-18 in fact, before beating Mount Aloysius in game 19). They lost six more before knocking off La Roche in the first round of the AMCC Tournament, finishing 2-25.
Not a great debut. However, the next year his team went 7-18, including a win against 18-9 Bethany. Last year they went 9-16, 7-11 in the AMCC, although four of those seven wins were against the new teams brought into the league. None of the nine wins this past season was as impressive as the Bethany win.
In the end, a career record of 18-59. Was that good? No, of course not. But did the basketball program “(continue) to grow in Division III competition” as proclaimed? Yeah, I think so.
Gilliam played 13 years in the NBA. He was selected by the Phoenix Suns as the No. 2 overall pick in the 1987 NBA draft, after four years at UNLV. And for the record, among the recent NBA alumni coaches, he wasn’t out of place:
Coach, school, record
Dean Meminger, Manhattanville, 18-10 (.643)
Armon Gilliam, Penn State-Altoona, 18-59 (.234)
Chris Ford, Brandeis, 13-37 (.260)
Rusty LaRue, Greensboro, 10-15 (.400)
Meminger needed only one season to win as many games as Gilliam did in three. Of course, he also resigned only weeks before this past season was about to start.
It’s hard to evaluate Gilliam’s tenure at PSUA, because I know little about that school or its circumstances. What I do know is that intercollegiate athletics are relatively new there. It certainly takes time to establish a new athletic department, much less a new basketball program.
I suppose that the PSUA braintrust took that into consideration when they decided not to renew his contract, anyway. But I don’t know that for sure, either. If this was taking place in a league that wasn’t such an information black hole by d3hoops.com standards, it’d be a lot easier to make some sort of reasonable comment about the situation.