Jeff Borzello
Utah is firing men’s basketball coach Craig Smith after nearly four seasons, sources told ESPN on Monday.
The Utes fell to 15-12 — and 7-9 in the Big 12 — after losing at UCF on Sunday. Utah beat Kansas and Kansas State in back-to-back games earlier this month and also own a win over BYU.
Smith has a 65-62 record at Utah. He is owed approximately $5 million from a fully guaranteed six-year contract that he signed in 2021, sources told ESPN.
The Utes have failed to reach the NCAA tournament in any of Smith’s three previous seasons as coach, and they are not on track to hear its name on Selection Sunday this season. Utah won 22 games last season but dropped eight of the final 12 regular-season games to fall out of consideration for the NCAA tournament. They did accept an NIT invite and made a run to the semifinals.
Utah hired Smith away from Utah State after he guided the Aggies to two NCAA tournaments — it would have been three if not for COVID canceling the 2020 NCAA tournament. With Smith, Utah State won a share of the Mountain West regular-season title in 2019, won the conference tournament championship in 2020 and received an at-large bid in 2021.
Smith had also been the head coach at South Dakota for four seasons from 2015-18, winning a Summit League regular-season championship in 2017.