Conference USA Basketball: Top 10 head coaches of the century (2000-20)

By Joey Loose | Jun 18, 2020

SAN ANTONIO - APRIL 07: Chris Douglas-Roberts #14, Derrick Rose #23 and Antonio Anderson #5 of the Memphis Tigers walk off the court in the second half against the Kansas Jayhawks during the 2008 NCAA Men's National Championship game at the Alamodome on April 7, 2008 in San Antonio, Texas. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images) /

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LOUISVILLE, KY – MARCH 19: Head coach Jerod Haase of the UAB Blazers (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images) /

9. Conference USA Basketball head coach rankings – Jerod Haase

UAB (2012-2016)

It’s hard to get a better start to your basketball career than Haase received, playing and coaching under Roy Williams at Kansas and North Carolina for nearly two decades. He finally left the Tar Heels for his first head coaching job at UAB, tasked with making this team potent in Conference USA once again after a few struggling seasons. Suffice to say, he did his job well in the four years on campus.

His Blazers increased their win total in each of his four seasons with the program. While the first two years were mediocre, his third team won the C-USA Tournament and upset 3-seed Iowa State in the 2015 NCAA Tournament. The following year’s team won the conference regular-season title and 26 total games, but couldn’t get the job done again in the conference tournament. Still, he averaged 20 wins a year and won nearly 62% of conference games.

Haase departed UAB for Stanford in 2016 and is working on pulling off a similar turnaround, leading the Cardinal to 20 wins this past season. The upset win over Iowa State is his clear highlight and represents a moment that Blazers fans won’t soon forget. After watching the program struggle under successor Robert Ehsan, it shows even more that UAB was lucky to have Haase on their sidelines for those four years.