A new era of UCF basketball will begin Thursday morning when the school will introduce Johnny Dawkins as its next head men’s basketball coach.
UCF athletic director Danny White wasted little time in his search for the next man in charge of the Knights, selecting Dawkins after an eight year stint with the Stanford Cardinal just 13 days after the firing of former coach Donnie Jones.
“I’m confident Johnny Dawkins will be a great leader for our men’s basketball program here at UCF,” White said in a press release. “There was a ton of interest in this position. We targeted Coach Dawkins early on in the process. After our conversations with him and after talking to many well-respected people in college basketball, it became clear to me that he’s the right coach to take our program to the next level. We are very happy to welcome Johnny, Tracy and their family to Orlando.”
UCF had interviewed at least one other candidate for the head job according to reports, but had clearly focused their attention on Dawkins after he was let go at Stanford earlier this month.
Dawkins has experience playing and coaching at the college and NBA levels, winning national player of the year honors in 1986 as a Duke Blue Devil under legendary coach Mike Krzyzewski. He later joined Krzyzewski’s staff from 2000-2008 as an associate head coach, which catapulted Dawkins to Stanford.
At Stanford, he led the Cardinal to five postseason appearances in eight seasons including a Sweet 16 in 2014 and two NIT championships in 2012 and 2015.
He won 20 games four times at Stanford before his team finished 15-15 last year and the Cardinal opted to move in a different direction. This season broke a four-year postseason run for his Cardinal. So he has experienced success.
He expressed some initial enthusiasm about the position in a UCF press release.
“I’d like to thank President Hitt, Danny White and the entire administration for their belief, faith and confidence in me,” Dawkins said. “This is a meaningful opportunity to build and grow a program that we can be proud of. I am honored to represent UCF, the community and the state of Florida.”
Dawkins’ work extends beyond the court though. At Stanford his teams recorded back-to-back perfect APR scores in 2013 and 2014, the last two years APR data is available. He has also had at three Pac-12 All-Academic Team players on his roster for each of the past five years.
Maybe that is expected at Stanford, but still an accomplishment worth noting in college athletics.
Dawkins was an accomplished player in his own right as a two-time consensus All-American at Duke in 1985 and 1986 and the Naismith National Player of the Year in 1986. He was named Duke’s MVP all four years he was in Durham. He had a nine-year NBA career mainly with the San Antonio Spurs and Philadelphia 76ers.
The press conference introducing Dawkins will take place at CFE Arena on Thursday at 11 a.m., with doors opening at 10 a.m. Students and fans are welcome to attend.
