Travis Steele is out as the men’s basketball coach at Xavier following multiple meetings between Steele and the administration on Wednesday, sources confirmed to ESPN.
The Musketeers beat Cleveland State in the NIT on Tuesday night, but speculation began to grow Wednesday morning that Steele could be let go before their next game in the NIT. The sides agreed Wednesday afternoon to end Steele’s tenure as head coach, sources told ESPN.
Xavier is expected to begin its search for a replacement immediately.
Steele, 40, has been at Xavier in different capacities since 2009. He was an assistant coach under Sean Miller for one season, before spending the next eight seasons as an assistant under Chris Mack. When Mack left for Louisville, Steele was promoted to the top spot.
In four seasons as head coach, Steele is 70-50 — but hasn’t made an NCAA tournament appearance. Before Steele took over, the program had reached the tournament in 16 of the previous 18 seasons. Xavier seemed like a certain bet to make it this season, sitting at 16-5 in early February. But the Musketeers lost eight of their final 10 games to end the season, including an overtime loss to Butler in the Big East tournament.
It was the second season in a row Xavier faltered after a promising start. In 2020-21, the Musketeers were 11-2 at the end of January before losing six of their final eight games and missing the NCAA tournament. They also lost five of their final eight games in 2020 and likely would’ve missed the tournament had it not been canceled.
A potential replacement consistently mentioned by industry sources will be familiar to Xavier fans: former head coach Sean Miller, who went to four NCAA tournaments in five seasons — including an Elite Eight run in 2008 — during his time with the Musketeers. Miller was fired by Arizona last spring and faces potential NCAA punishment stemming from the 2017 FBI investigation into college basketball, but he’s yet to be directly sanctioned and is currently available.
Former Xavier head coaches Chris Mack and Thad Matta are also available, as is Cleveland State’s Dennis Gates, who was on the losing side of Wednesday’s NIT game.
The news of Mack being out was first reported by 247Sports’ Xavier affiliate.