Throughout his career, Tennessee Basketball head coach Rick Barnes has approached his assistants the way he approached his players. Barnes found young up-and-comers he could develop into head coaches themselves one day, taking pride in the careers they had after him more than what they did for him.
He’s doing the opposite with Steve McClain.
When Tennessee Basketball announced the veteran coach as its new assistant, Barnes sent a clear message: At 71 years old, he wants to win a national championship before he retires. There’s no other explanation for hiring somebody with McClain’s track record given who Barnes usually brings on.
McClain is 64 years old and has 43 years of experience coaching college basketball, including 31 at the Division I level. He also has 17 years as a head coach, including three at Hutchinson Community College in the early 1990s, where he went to the NCAA Regionals every year and won the junior college national title in 1994.
After Hutchinson, McClain spent four years as an assistant with the TCU Horned Frogs and then was head coach of the Wyoming Cowboys for nine years, where he won the Mountain West regular season title twice and also made the NCAA Tournament one year.
In 2015, McClain began a five-year tenure with the UIC Flames, where he made two postseason appearances. Now, it is true that he was fired by Wyoming and UIC, but it’s also true that he has national championship experience, and that’s what Barnes needs on his staff given his NCAA Tournament history.
Over the past three years, McClain was an assistant on recently fired Texas Longhorns head coach Rodney Terry’s staff, and he spent time working under Chris Beard there too. He also worked under Tom Crean with the Georgia Bulldogs for two years before that.
Simply put, McClain is a veteran and can bring a lot to the table. It’s even more proof this is a change in philosophy to win a title with the Way Barnes made room for him. He and the Vols are moving assistant Lucas Campbell over to Director of Player Personnel and Recruiting Coordinator for the program, an off-court role.
Barnes still takes pride in developing talent, as Tennessee Basketball also hired Amorrow Morgan from the Cal Golden Bears to replace Rod Clark, who left to be an assistant with the Indiana Hoosiers. However, his transfer portal moves and coaching hires suggest he wants to go out with a championship. This move is the most recent proof of that.
