The Missouri State head coaching search has come to an end. The Bears reached out to multiple candidates but have found their man, Dana Ford.
Ford has quite the experience in assistant coaching putting in time with Wichita State, Illinois State, and Chipola College. Ford finally broke through and was hired as a head coach at Tennessee State University where he was hired from.
During his tenure at Tennessee State, Ford led the Tigers to a 57-65 record throughout four seasons and earned a berth to the College Insider Postseason Tournament (CIT.) Although the negative record, Ford led Tennessee State to a winning record in the final three years of his time after drudging to a 5-26 record in his head coaching debut season.
Ford is coming as the replacement of former Missouri State coach Paul Lusk who went 106-121 over a seven year span. Missouri State failed to reach expectations under Lust as they were predicted to win the Missouri Valley Conference multiple years, but failed to finish higher than third place in any of the seven seasons.
With the firing of Paul Lusk and the departure of Alize Johnson to the NBA draft, this gives the Bears a fresh, new outlook for next season. Johnson was the anchor of the team last year averaging a double-double with 15.1 points per game and 11.6 rebounds per game along with 2.8 assists.
The main complaint with the past seasons of Missouri State teams wasn’t the talent on the floor, but the lack of coaching from Paul Lusk. While Johnson is off to the NBA draft, Ford will have plenty of young talent and potential to bring the Bears back into contention for the Missouri Valley Conference championship. The future of MSU basketball is in the right hands with Dana Ford, and it’s looking bright.