NCAA Basketball: Best head coaching hire from each of last 25 seasons

2003: Bill Self (Kansas)

There’s no question that 2003 is the toughest pick and also the year packed with the best head coaching hires. First and foremost, this is when Scott Drew was brought to Baylor and began his resurrection of that basketball program, culminating in a national title just two seasons ago. Additionally, this is when Roy Williams arrived back home at North Carolina, quickly fixing the mess left behind by Matt Doherty and eventually taking the Tar Heels to three national titles. Still, it’s Self who gets the nod for his sheer dominance at Kansas.

Before he was hired by the Jayhawks, Self was certainly a young coach on the rise in the sport. After early stints on staff at Kansas and Oklahoma State, he began his head coaching career at Oral Roberts back a decade earlier. After rebuilding that program, he took jobs at Tulsa and then Illinois, leading both programs to Elite Eight runs and plenty of success in their conferences. It’s not a shocker that the same would follow with the Jayhawks.

In the twenty years since arriving in Lawrence, Self has led Kansas to 17 Big 12 regular season titles and a trip to every single NCAA Tournament. Kansas cut down the nets in 2008 and 2022 and made two more Final Four appearances as well. The Jayhawks have been regular title threats during Self’s tenure and have never even had a down season. The amount of talent he’s recruited to Kansas is a very long list, highlighted by national champions like Mario Chalmers and Ochai Agbaji. You can certainly make the case that this spot belongs to Roy Williams, who won one more title than Self, but it’s Kansas’s consistency and dominance that earned Self this spot.