Kudos, Bison

Just got done watching North Dakota State's exciting win over Oakland to win the Summit League tournament and clinch an NCAA Tournament berth in their first year of eligibility. The Bison are coached by former UW assistant Saul Phillips, who will likely be a hot coaching prospect moving up the ladder in coming seasons. Saul, of course, played for Bo Ryan at Platteville and coached under him at UWM and UW.

Bo's son, Will, is an assistant under Phillips, and it wouldn't be a stretch to project him moving up with his boss or back to work with his dad at some point in the future.

That team has a lot of seniors, many of whom were on the court three years ago when they shocked the Badgers at the Kohl Center in what is undoubtedly still the biggest head-scratching loss of the Bo Ryan era.

Other Wisconsin ties from North Dakota State include director of basketball operations Dan Weisse, who played at Oshkosh West and UWM, and senior Mike Nelson of Madison Memorial.

Best of luck to these guys against whichever #1 or #2 seed they draw, hopefully they can pull a shocker like they did in Madison that horrible day in January 2006.

Close call at Drake?

Rob Schultz of The Capital times has been on his offseason game lately, yesterday with his Big Ten/ACC Challenge breakdown, today with his blog speculation that Gary Close is a logical candidate to replace Keno Davis at Drake. Read the post, makes perfect sense.

While we obviously don't want to lose him from Bo's staff, he deserves a shot at running his own program and would be a nice extension of the Badger coaching tree.

Any speculation on candidates to replace Close on the staff? Would this be a good time for Bo to bring his son Will back into the fold? Maybe a former player coaching in Division III like a Mark Vershaw?

Badgers basketball coaching tree

It's funny: when doing the Wisconsin football coaching tree, I was able to remember dozens of former assistant coaches, even guys who were only with the program for a couple years. But when trying to remember basketball assistants, I drew a blank. Thankfully the media guide materials available for download at uwbadgers.com has a list of all former assistant coaches, just as it did for football.

Writing this before I start the compilation, my gut feeling is that this list might be even more impressive than the football list. Let's see.

-Stu Jackson, executive vice president of basketball operations for the NBA. The man who really got the ball rolling on the Badgers' basketball renaissance is in the news a lot, mostly for suspension and referee-related issues.

-Stan Van Gundy, head coach of the Orlando Magic. Stan Van was the head man during my freshman year, 1994-95, arguably the most underachieving team in UW athletic history. How do you finish with a losing record with Rashard Griffith, Michael Finley, and others? Still, if Pat Riley had an ounce of selflessness in his body, Stan would have won an NBA title with the Heat two years ago, on the heels of the league refs' Dwayne Wade free throw-a-thon. Good for him.

-Tony Bennett, one of the hottest coaches in the nation for the job he's doing at Washington State. Give Dick a lot of credit for his plan, it worked out well for both WSU and his son. My gut says that Tony should move on to a better job after this season, since he'll lose a lot from a veteran team. Maybe he, not Jeter, is Bo's heir apparent.

-Rob Jeter, leading a baffling turnaround at UWM. If he gets some more talented kids who play with the kind of chemistry and fire his current kids are playing, they'll be a force.

-Saul Phillips (left), head coach at North Dakota State. He's an up-and-comer, and has Bo's kid, Will Ryan (right - what a resemblance!), on his staff. Also of note from this staff: Dan Weisse, former UWM and Oshkosh West standout, is Saul's director of basketball operations.

-Brad Soderberg recruited the players who scored 20 points in a game for St. Louis a couple weeks ago, and current coach Rick Majerus is throwing him under the bus. Classy, Rick. (If you haven't, read the SI story about Majerus, it showed a side of him I hadn't heard about before. Interesting guy.)

-Mark Vershaw, head coach at Monmouth (Ill.) College. From the little bit I've seen, his team is struggling.

-Howard Moore returned to UW after Jeter left and is doing a nice job for Bo.

-Tracy Webster has hooked up with Billy Gillispie at Kentucky. They're struggling, last night's win over Tennessee notwithstanding, but even money says Billy has them in the Final four within five years. He just needs time to fix the roster after Tubby Smith left it relatively bare.

-Brian Hecker, scouting information director for the Miami Heat.

-Sean Miller, an assistant for one year under Stu, is the coach at Xavier and one of the real rising stars in the profession.

-Tim Buckley, an assistant under Stu, is back at Marquette after stints at Ball State and Iowa.

-Bob Beyer, the third assistant on the 1993-94 staff, is an assistant at Dayton.

-Dave Bollwinkel, an assistant under Van Gundy, is a part-time scout for the Boston Celtics after serving as St. Mary's coach.

-Ray McCallum is an assistant with Kelvin Sampson at Indiana after being a head coach at Ball State and Houston.

Whew! That's more than I thought there would be. Who am I forgetting?