March Madness isn’t just about buzzer beaters and Cinderellas—it’s also turning into hiring season, with bigger programs scooping up mid-major coaches as soon as their teams get knocked out. With the transfer portal opening in weeks, schools are moving fast, and the tourney is becoming a high-stakes coaching carousel.
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From Michigan’s Dusty May to NC State’s Will Wade, men’s college basketball has an off-court tradition during March Madness: Mid-major coaches get picked off by high-major teams when their programs get bounced from the Big Dance.
And given that the transfer portal opens in just two weeks (at the conclusion of the men’s Final Four in April), schools with vacancies are heavily incentivized to lock down their coaches in March, often as the tournament is still going.
This year, the carousel has already led more than half a dozen coaches to new homes—including several teams that have already participated in the tournament.
Perhaps the most high-profile move: Syracuse’s hiring of Gerry McNamara, a former star player at Syracuse (and member of the 2003 national championship team) and assistant coach under Orange coaching legend Jim Boeheim.
McNamara has spent the last two years as the men’s basketball head coach at Siena. Amid the rumors that he was a contender for the Syracuse role last week, McNamara led the No. 16 Saints, who also won the MAAC tournament title, to a stunning performance against No. 1 overall seed Duke—though the Saints ultimately lost 71–65, the Blue Devils trailed for the first 35 minutes of the game.
“College basketball has changed,” said McNamara, who replaces Adrian Autry. “How you build a program, recruit talent, compete for resources, and win looks different than it did even five years ago. I know that. I’m ready for it.”
On Tuesday, Syracuse, which also just hired a new athletic director in Bryan Blair, launched a men’s basketball donation link to help him “recruit the very best student-athletes.”
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Around the Carousel
On Sunday, Providence, also a member of the Big East, hired South Florida coach Bryan Hodgson to replace Kim English, who it fired after the Friars lost in the Big East tournament. The official statement came just three days after the Bulls, the American Conference tournament champions, lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament to No. 6 Louisville.
Then, on Monday, Arizona State announced the hiring of Saint Mary’s coach Randy Bennett to replace Bobby Hurley; Bennett’s contract is reportedly for five years and starts at $3 million. Bennett is renowned for the 25 years he spent building the Gaels into a mid-major powerhouse alongside Gonzaga in the West Coast Conference. Saint Mary’s appeared in the Big Dance this year, but fell to Texas A&M in the round of 64.
On Tuesday morning, Cincinnati announced the hiring of alum Jerrod Calhoun away from Utah State just days after the Aggies’ brief but impressive run in the NCAA tournament. Calhoun signed a six-year deal starting at $3.7 million per year, with an annual raise of $100,000 per year, the school said. During the round of 64, the nine-seed Mountain West tournament champions took down No. 8 Villanova before falling to No. 1 Arizona during the round of 32.
One mid-major that was able to retain its coach, however, was VCU. The Rams announced that head coach Phil Martelli Jr. signed an extension just one day after losing to Illinois in the round of 32. Martelli’s contract now extends to the end of the 2031–32 season.
The carousel is expected to keep spinning over the next week as UNC considers whether to fire Hubert Davis after another early-round NCAA tournament loss and longtime Kansas coach Bill Self considers whether to retire.
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EXCLUSIVE
Taylor Twellman Joins Yahoo Sports for World Cup
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Former ESPN analyst Taylor Twellman is joining Yahoo Sports as a video contributor for its multiplatform World Cup coverage, marking a return to working with several former colleagues, the sides confirmed to Front Office Sports.
Twellman will appear across shows including Yahoo Sports Daily and The Cooligans as part of expanded coverage tied to the 2026 men’s tournament, as the company builds out its soccer presence ahead of the event. Read the story.
ONE BIG FIG
Back-to-Back Winners
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$1 million
That’s the prize in Warren Buffett’s March Madness men’s bracket contest for Berkshire Hathaway employees, which has now produced winners in back-to-back years after going a decade without one.
Across college and pro sports, coaches and athletes are utilizing the latest tech to play even smarter. With predictive strategies, data-backed play-calling, and advanced analytics, next-gen tech has reshaped how coaches execute their game-day vision. Athletes, too, have been getting even stronger with the help of precision training tools, allowing them to push the limits of human excellence.
Dive into the 2026 Sports Tech Briefto see how Comcast Business is revolutionizing the way coaches and athletes experience the game they love.
STATUS REPORT
Two Up, Two Down
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TGL⬆ Tiger Woods will make his 2026 season debut for his Jupiter Links Golf Club on Tuesday night in Match 2 of the TGL Finals against Los Angeles Golf Club. Woods hasn’t played on the PGA Tour or TGL since his latest back surgery in October. LAGC won Match 1 of the TGL Finals on Monday night and could clinch the Season 2 championship with a victory in Match 2 on ESPN at 7 p.m. ET. If Jupiter Links wins, the series would go directly into a winner-take-all Match 3 at 9 p.m. ET also on ESPN.
Pro Padel League⬆ Rick Schnall, co-chair and governor of the NBA’s Hornets, is leading a $15 million Series A investment in the league, betting on the racket sport’s U.S. expansion. The funding, which follows a $10 million seed round, aims to help turn padel from a participation sport into a spectator entity, similar to what’s happening in pickleball.
PGA of America revenue ⬇ The organization reported $166.43 million in revenue during its 2024–25 fiscal year, according to its most recent tax filing. That’s down from $172.29 million the prior year. The 2024–25 fiscal year does not include last September’s Ryder Cup in New York, which was projected to bring in record revenue.
World Cup ticket prices ⬇ Football Supporters Europe joined with consumer group Euroconsumers in a formal complaint against FIFA before the European Commission that the global soccer governing body abused its position and imposed excessive ticket prices for the upcoming 2026 men’s World Cup. FSEpreviously accused FIFA of a “monumental betrayal” as it estimates it would cost at least $6,900 for a fan to follow their team from the start of group-stage play to the final.
