Utah State keeps winning through coaching and administrative changes

Published Jan. 23, 2025 2:50 p.m. ET

Associated Press

Most programs would not do well with the level of turnover Utah State has experienced, but the Aggies not only have managed their way through constant change, they have thrived.

Jerrod Calhoun was the fourth coach hired in the past seven seasons by three athletic directors, including one in an interim role.

And yet the Aggies won at least 20 games each year but one with four NCAA Tournament appearances. They are 17-2 this season with a recent though short-lived appearance in The Associated Press poll.

The program has become a coaching springboard, with Craig Smith landing at Utah, Ryan Odom at Virginia Commonwealth and Danny Sprinkle at Washington.

“I get asked quite often: ‘How are you going to keep Jerrod Calhoun?’” athletic director Diana Sabau said. “It's a great problem to have, but also a challenging problem in this ever-changing environment.”

The one constant that Sabau and current and former coaches point to as a key to the program's success is the student section known as “The HURD.” About 4,500 students fill their part of the stands about an hour before the game, and from delivering the “I believe” chant before tipoff to the “winning team, losing team” one once victory appears secured, they are relentless in making it difficult for opposing teams to communicate.

And, Sprinkle swears, a student section that was responsible for helping win games in his one season last year.

“There's not that many places like that in the world, not in the country, in the world that has the care factor that those people have,” Sprinkle said. "The (Dee Glen Smith) Spectrum is older, but there's so much history in that building, kind of like Allen Fieldhouse where Kansas is or Duke. It has that mystique. I can't tell you how many times with eight minutes left in a game when our crowd would get going.

“It gave me chills a couple of times when I was coaching there. It gave me a confidence we're not losing.”

Utah State's success is not new — its first NCAA Tournament appearance occurred in 1939 — but the program didn't truly blossom until Stew Morrill took over in 1998. He went 402-156 over 17 seasons, winning seven regular-season Western Athletic Conference or Big West titles and six league tournament championships. The Aggies made the NCAA Tournament eight times under Morrill.

They failed to make the tournament, however, in Morrill's final four seasons and were left out the following three years that Tim Duryea ran the program.

Then Smith took over in 2018 and made the NCAA Tournament in two of his three seasons. Utah State would have qualified in 2020 as the Mountain West Tournament champion if not for the cancellation of the national tourney because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Smith chose not to comment.

The Aggies went 18-16 under Odom in 2021-22 and failed to make the tournament, but then finished 26-9 the following season and returned to the field of 68.

“Utah State is a special place because of the players,” Odom said. “They’ve had some great players throughout the years whether it be Jaycee Carroll, Tai Wesley, Sam Merrill, Neemias Queta, Justin Bean, Taylor Funk, who have a tremendous sense of pride in the school and representing the Aggies. You also often end up having a mature group of players that want to win and who understand the value of hard work and commitment to the team and program.”

There weren't a lot of players around when Sprinkle succeeded Odom. It was a rebuilding job to the extreme.

“We had to go recruit the entire team,” Sprinkle said. “Even as successful as they've been, it was hard.”

He wanted to land a couple of recruits who asked for a less than $50,000 name, image and likeness deal, but he said the entire team combined didn't receive that much money. So when he and his staff put together a roster, they weren't sure what to expect.

The Aggies went 28-7 and made the second round of the NCAA Tournament.

When Sprinkle then left for Washington, Calhoun entered and kept the winning going. He saw the same qualities that attracted his predecessors, but he faces unique challenges as well.

Losing recruits to other schools over close to $50,000 might not be sustainable. Calhoun said Utah State is about sixth in the Mountain West in how much NIL money is spent, and while he has put the Aggies in position to make another NCAA Tournament, the long-term future is on his mind as well.

Calhoun said he would love to stay at Utah State and take advantage of the attributes that made it so strong year after year. Maybe he will be the next Stew Morrill or he could be like Utah State's most recent coaches and find the allure of coaching at a program with more financial resources too difficult to resist.

“This is a basketball school,” Calhoun said. "I want to coach at a basketball school where you can win a national championship. I truly believe you can do that at Utah State. I have three little girls that love Logan. We've got to get up in the times with head coach's salary, assistant coaches' salary and the NIL for our players.

“We're lacking in all three departments. We need to be in the top three or four. We're never going to get to one or two. That's OK.”

Calhoun said he believed Utah State can reach those levels of spending and that entering the Pac-12 in 2026 will be a major help.

Whether he's along for that ride remains to be seen, but Sabau was hopeful.

“That move to the Pac-12 will definitely elevate all 16 sports at Utah State,” Sabau said. "It will be a lot more opportunities for television. It will be a lot more opportunities to participate in the postseason.

“I know in my conversations with Jerrod, he was real excited for that."

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