Kansas State Coaching Search: 5 Candidates to Replace Jerome Tang

Over the weekend, Kansas State officially became the first team from a major conference to throw its hat into the 2026 coaching carousel.

Jerome Tang took K-State to the Elite Eight in 2023, but the team has mostly face-planted this season as rifts between the roster and coaching staff spilled out into the media. Kansas State probably made the right decision to let go of Tang, even if the decision to fire him for cause is completely insane on the merits. 

But that’s a debate for the lawyers. Here, I’ve got a handful of names to suggest as potential replacements for Tang and the Kansas State men’s basketball program.

Travis Steele

Surely, the 44-year-old head coach who is currently in charge of the last undefeated Division I men’s team in college basketball is going to get a look from anyone with a coaching opening.

Steele, who is in his fourth season at Miami (OH), was fired from his previous job at Xavier in 2022. The MAC has become a really good basketball conference, but if Steele is itching to get back to big-time hoops, Kansas State is the first door that’s opened this year.

Leon Rice

Leon Rice has been at Boise State since 2010, and he’s going to turn 63 in the opening weeks of next season. Regardless of whether he stays in Boise or leaves for another job, he’ll be coaching in a new conference next year.

In the final years of his career, Rice might be interested in taking a higher-profile job and seeing if he has a better shot at an NCAA Tournament win. Rice has done good work to elevate Boise (and the Mountain West), earning five tournament berths for the Broncos since taking the job. That includes three since 2022.

But Rice has never advanced past the Round of 64, including three years where his team lost in the First Four. Having led the Broncos to the precipice of the new Pac-12, now would be a natural time to press his hand somewhere else. 

Chris Holtmann

Chris Holtmann is a good coach. He had a winning season every year from 2012-13 (Gardner Webb) to 2021-22, his fifth season at Ohio State. 

The wheels came off in 2023, when his Buckeyes team had one of the most epic in-season collapses of my lifetime. After starting 10-3, the team went 1-14 in its last 15 games and carried the losing streak into the following year. Holtmann was fired midseason.

The ending in Columbus was unusual, but Holtmann is now underemployed at DePaul, where he’s grinding out middling records at the Big East’s most competitively disadvantaged program. 

Holtmann will end up back with a good program – his resume is too good. It’s just a matter of details.

Ben Jacobson 

Ben Jacobson has been in charge at Northern Iowa since 2006, which means this season marks his 20th in charge of the Panthers. He turned 55 a couple of months ago.

Jacobson may want to coach another 10 years and retire as a company man. If so, that’s fine. But like Rice, he’ll have an opportunity to jump to a similar midwestern location in a power conference, if that’s what he wants. 

K-State, in return, would get a lot of head coaching experience in its new hire – perhaps much more than what’s available with many of the other coaches who are interviewed for the job. 

John Groce

I wasn’t kidding when I said the MAC has become a really good basketball conference. Groce is one of several coaches that Kansas State should call, including Toledo’s Tod Kowalczyk and Kent State’s Rob Senderoff.

Groce is the name I’m going with here (along with Steele) because of his previous experience at a power conference job. He won 56% of his games at Illinois – far from a flameout – before he was fired and replaced with Brad Underwood. 

Underwood is an ironic name to show up here, since he’s a Kansas State grad who will be linked back to this job opening by some analysts. But 62-year-old Underwood is rolling at Illinois and is unlikely to leave to rebuild Kansas State at this point in his career. His predecessor at Illinois makes more sense. 

Kansas State Basketball Coaching Candidates

• Travis Steele
• Leon Rice
• Chris Holtmann
• Ben Jacobson
• John Groce