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Pete ThamelESPN
Fairleigh Dickinson‘s Tobin Anderson, the breakout coaching star of the NCAA tournament, has emerged as the top target to be the next coach at Iona, sources told ESPN.
Anderson would replace Rick Pitino, who left Iona for St. John’s on Monday after three seasons. In replacing Pitino, Iona appears poised to strike quickly and land a coach within a short time frame. Pitino left Iona on Monday and is being introduced at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday.
In his first year at FDU, Anderson led the team to what many consider the biggest upset in NCAA tournament history. The 16th-seeded Knights stunned No. 1 Purdue 63-58 for just the second upset of a No. 1 seed in the first round since the men’s tournament expanded to 64 teams back in 1985. That propelled a small-school lifer to become a household name in college basketball in the course of a weekend.
In the wake of the upset, FDU and Anderson emerged as the darlings of the NCAA tournament, including a Monday morning appearance on “Today” upon return from the round-of-32 loss to ninth-seeded Florida Atlantic in Columbus.
The victory illuminated the path of Anderson, an Iowa native who hopscotched his way through a pair of Division III head-coaching jobs and nine seasons at Division II St. Thomas Aquinas before landing the Fairleigh Dickinson job in May. He took over a four-win team and went 21-16.
Sources told ESPN that Anderson impressed the Iona brass when the Gaels job last opened back in 2020. Anderson spoke in person to Iona officials and was one of the three finalists when they hired Pitino back in 2020, per sources. This time, Anderson is in line to replace him.
Anderson’s Fairleigh Dickinson team advanced with two victories in the NCAA tournament — a blowout of Texas Southern in the First Four and the Purdue stunner — despite having what’s considered the shortest roster in all of college basketball this year. But belief compensated for FDU’s size, as the Knights swarmed and rattled Purdue’s guards to capture the victory.
Anderson played for his father, Steve, at Interstate 35 High School in his home state. From there, he played Division III basketball at Wesleyan before grinding his way through the small-school ranks to learn his craft. Wherever he coached, winning has tended to follow.
Anderson served as an assistant coach at Division III Clarkson and Division II Le Moyne before becoming the Clarkson head coach in 1999.
Along with 22 years of head-coaching experience, Anderson also brings experience in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference from his time as an assistant coach for the Siena Bulldogs from 2011 to ’13. Iona has been the alpha of the MAAC in recent seasons, as the school has reached eight of the past 11 NCAA tournaments. That’s an incredible run that spans the tenures of Tim Cluess and Pitino, who reached the tournament in two of the three years he was at Iona.
Overall, Iona has reached 16 NCAA tournaments, with the only postseason win coming under the watch of Jim Valvano in 1980. The school has also won 13 regular-season league titles and 14 conference titles in its existence.