Final summer time, it seemed like Phoenix Suns assistant Kevin Younger was about to change into an NBA head coach. A 12 months later, he is about to be heading to the faculty ranks.
Simply earlier than the Phoenix Suns employed Frank Vogel to exchange fired head coach Monty Williams, NBA pundit Invoice Simmons had repeatedly insisted Phoenix would rent Younger to be their new head coach.
Maybe Younger additionally believed this, since Phoenix rapidly gave him a increase that make the 42-year-old the league’s highest-paid assistant coach. Now, after former BYU coach Mark Pope left for the top job at Kentucky, Younger is ready to return to his hometown of Provo to educate the Cougars.
Younger has an in depth teaching historical past in Utah. He was an assistant coach at Utah Valley State School earlier than working as an assistant and later head coach of the G League’s Utah Flash. He additionally coached the identical franchise after they moved and have become the Delaware 87ers, the affiliate of the Philadelphia 76ers.
He is additionally a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a requirement for BYU head coaches (although not for assistants). All head teaching hires at BYU are topic to the approval of the Board of Schooling and Board of Trustees, which has a substantial amount of overlap with prime church officers.
That could be why BYU was so aggressive in focusing on Younger as a alternative, although he is clearly highly-regarded within the basketball world. Younger has interviewed for 4 completely different NBA head jobs, together with with the Suns final season.
It seems just like the Cougars are going to make an unbelievable rent. And Younger has deserted, or at the very least delay, his NBA desires in favor of an opportunity to construct his personal faculty program, which he’ll begin as soon as Phoenix’s playoff run ends. The NBA’s loss is BYU’s acquire.
