UNLV has had a rough season in year two of the T.J. Otzelberger era. But Iowa State has been worse, and Cyclone fans want Otzelberger to be their next head coach.
Iowa State is 2-14 and has yet to win a Big 12 game in 11 tries. They are fresh off a 14-point loss to Kansas on Saturday, which was an improvement from the 33-point beat down the Jayhawks handed the Cyclones on Thursday.
Steve Prohm is in his sixth year at Iowa State. After making the NCAA Tournament in each of his first two seasons, he has made it just once since. Iowa State is 14-34 over the last two seasons.
There very well could be a new coach in Ames, Iowa. And a portion of the Cyclone fanbase wants to see T.J. Otzelberger leave Vegas.
You can check out a whole collection of tweets of Iowa State fans asking for T.J. Otzelberger here.
Otzelberger was an assistant coach at Iowa State under Greg McDermott and Fred Hoiberg. Iowa State made four straight NCAA Tournaments under Hoiberg.
If Otzelberger were to leave after this season he would owe UNLV $3.15 million. His buyout is structured to pay UNLV 75% of his remaining salary.
Part of the fear with any coach at UNLV is that they will leave for a better job. But normally that is assumed after a few years of success. A few runs to the NCAA Tournament.
Not after two seasons with no postseason and a record hovering around .500.
His style of offense does not really fit runnin rebel basketball. No real transition or fast break. Sad to say. The last time we had a good team was with Dave Rice. How does this program get back to that?
Otzelberger’s teams at South Dakota State did play that way. They were top 75 in tempo his last two years. But I think he has realized his team isn’t good enough in his first two seasons at UNLV, so he isn’t playing fast.