Predicting Which Veteran Coaches Will Make Their NCAA Tournament Debuts in 2016

While legendary coaches like Mike Krzyzewski, Tom Izzo, Bill Self, Bo Ryan and Mark Few are looking to extend their already ridiculous streaks of consecutive NCAA tournament appearances, the opposite end of the spectrum contains a litany of college basketball coaches still searching for their first trip to the Big Dance.

Veteran, tourney-less coaches like Yale's James Jones and Rhode Island's Dan Hurley have a very, very long way to go to catch some of those wildly successful counterparts, but this could very well be the year that they get off the schneid and start a tournament streak of their own.

To qualify for the list, a coach had to meet three criteria:

1. No previous NCAA tournament appearances as a head coach. That one should go without saying.
   
   
2. Currently employed as the head coach of a D-I program. Also goes without saying.
   
   
3. At least 80 career wins as a head coach at the D-I level. This knocked out a couple of up-and-comers, but we're really just interested in coaches looking to break a personal drought.

From that longer-than-you-might-expect list of possible candidates, our top 10 coaches were selected and ranked in ascending order of perceived likelihood of making the tournament this season.

By no means do we expect all 10 of these coaches to make the tournament this year.

There were only three coaches who made the 2015 tournament after opening the season with at least 80 career wins and no dances: Bill Coen (Northeastern, 121 wins), Andy Toole (Robert Morris, 90 wins) and Larry Shyatt (Wyoming, 148 wins). North Florida's Matthew Driscoll (73 wins) and UC Irvine's Russell Turner (69 wins) nearly qualified, but even that only makes five coaches who finally made the tournament last season.

Assuming more of the same this year, the top three coaches on our list are the only ones we'd feel pretty comfortable betting on. However, these are the 10 most solid candidates to snap a dry spell.

Honorable Mentions

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Ten nominees is probably already too many for this list, but here are four other honorable mentions to make their first NCAA tournament appearance.

Willis Wilson, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
Career Record: 269-313

As an alumnus of the school, Willis Wilson had quite the long leash during his time with Rice. Because he lasted 16 years there, he is the winningest head coach in Owls history. But after a 3-27 became a brutal final chapter on nearly two decades without a tournament appearance, Wilson was let go from his post before landing at A&M-CC a few years later.

The Islanders went 20-14 last season and were the only Southland team to beat Stephen F. Austin. They bring back just about everyone except for their starting point guard, John Jordan. It's a big loss, but so is SFA's loss of Jacob Parker. Perhaps this is the year someone dethrones the Lumberjacks, and perhaps Wilson is the coach of that team.

Jeff Lebo, East Carolina
Career Record: 298-236

If Jeff Lebo isn't already the most successful coach to never make the tournament, he's got to be getting close.

Most of the coaches on this list are just barely (or not even) putting together a .500 record for half a decade, but Lebo has won 56 percent of his games over the span of nearly two decades. He left Tennessee Tech with a winning record, left Chattanooga with a winning record, was fired from Auburn with a winning record and is 87-80 in his five seasons with East Carolina. Eventually, something has to give.

But it probably won't be this year. Though the Pirates do retain the vast majority of their primary producers from this past season, the AAC should be substantially stronger than it was a year ago when they only went 6-12 in conference.

Joe Jones, Boston
Career Record: 155-164

Joe Jones had a pretty great team two seasons ago, but the Terriers ran into some Kryptonite in the Patriot finals in the form of American. They lost three key seniors and an outstanding sophomore (Mo Watson Jr.) from that team, so it's not a surprise that they struggled this past year. But if this very young team figures out how to play some defense this offseason, they will compete for a conference title.

Zack Spiker, Army
Career Record: 83-98

If Boston doesn't get the Patriot League's autobid, maybe Zack Spiker can lead Army to its first tournament in school history.

The Black Knights finished in dead last in the conference standings last season, but an overall record of 15-15 is a solid foundation to build upon—especially considering there wasn't a single senior on the team who averaged more than three points per game.

That won't be the case this year, though, as all four of last year's leading scorers will now be seniors. Led by Kyle Wilson's scoring prowess and Tanner Plomb's marksmanship, Army just might be a bracket buster.

10. Kevin Willard, Seton Hall

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Career Record: 127-129

Best Season: 21-10 with Iona in 2009-10

Last Season: 16-15 with Seton Hall

After losing Jaren Sina in the middle of last season, Brandon Mobley to graduation and Sterling Gibbs as a graduate-transfer to Connecticut, it doesn't seem overwhelmingly likely that Seton Hall will make the tournament.

However, there might not be a coach on the list who needs to reach his first dance more than Kevin Willard does.

For most of the programs represented here, winning in men's hoops isn't exactly the norm. While it would be really nice if they could lead a team to the NCAA tournament, their seats won't be on fire as long as they're competitive.

Willard, on the other hand, has probably exhausted his allotment of "as long as you go .500, you can keep your job" seasons. Seton Hall hasn't been to the tournament since 2006, but almost only counts for so long in the Big East—regardless of whether you have a contract through the 2019-20 season.

To get the job done, Willard will need some serious help from Massachusetts transfer Derrick Gordon. The sophomore quartet of Isaiah Whitehead, Angel Delgado, Desi Rodriguez and Khadeen Carrington is a strong core, but they desperately need Gordon's veteran leadership. With Gibbs and Chier Ajou both transferring, the Pirates won't have a single junior or senior who was on the roster in 2014-15.

The Big East doesn't figure to be overwhelmingly strong this season, but it's going to be difficult for Seton Hall to be competitive unless Gordon at least partially replaces the scoring and leadership of Gibbs.

9. Scott Cherry, High Point

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Career Record: 96-91

Best Season: 23-10 with High Point in 2014-15

Last Season: 23-10 with High Point

Best of luck finding a team that has been more unlucky than High Point in conference tournaments over the past three seasons.

The Panthers have gone 37-13 against Big South opponents during the regular season, earning at least a share of three consecutive Big South championships. We wouldn't call it a Kansas or Gonzaga level of consistent domination, but there's no denying that High Point has been the best team in the Big South for a few years running.

Until the conference tournament, that is. The Panthers are 0-3 in the Big South tourney with a one-point loss in 2013, a two-point loss in 2014 and a one-point loss in overtime in 2015. For whatever reason, they just haven't been able to get over that quarterfinals hump.

Still, High Point remains the best team in this conference by a sizable margin for John Brown's final season of college eligibility.

The big man has been a consistent source of major points, averaging 18.5 per game over his first three seasons—good for 1,680 thus far in his career. While every other team that finished top five in the Big South loses its most important player, Scott Cherry retains what has been the best player in the conference for the past three years.

Whether it's enough to actually make the NCAA tournament for a change remains to be seen, but perhaps Brown can find an extra gear of motivation this March to will the team to a few more games than usual.

8. Joe Dooley, Florida Gulf Coast

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Career Record: 101-75

Best Season: 22-13 with Florida Gulf Coast in 2013-14

Last Season: 22-11 with Florida Gulf Coast

Joe Dooley won 57 games for East Carolina back in the late 1990s before spending the next 14 years as an assistant coach between New Mexico, Wyoming and Kansas. After Andy Enfield led Dunk City to the 2013 Sweet 16 and bolted for a much higher paying job at USC, Dooley finally got another shot at a head-coaching job at Florida Gulf Coast.

Thus far, it has gone quite well. The Eagles have won 64.7 percent of their games under his watch.

However, it hasn't yet led to a return to the NCAA tournament, and it is inevitably going to be much more difficult this season without Brett Comer and Bernard Thompson. Dooley will now have to carry on without any of the names we remember from that magical tournament run a few seasons ago.

Are Marc-Eddy Noralia and Demetris Morant ready, willing and able to become the driving force of a tournament team? Or will Dooley follow the same path that he did two decades ago, treading water for two seasons before falling flat with the players he actually recruited to play for him?

The good news is that as long as you have five players who can dribble a basketball, you can have a competitive team in the Atlantic Sun. We've got another coach from this conference higher on the list, but let's just say Dooley doesn't need to put together the Sistine Chapel of coaching jobs to legitimately vie for the Atlantic Sun's automatic bid.

7. Porter Moser, Loyola-Chicago

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Career Record: 161-175

Best Season: 24-13 with Loyola-Chicago in 2014-15

Last Season: 24-13 with Loyola-Chicago

The Ramblers haven't been to the NCAA tournament since 1985, but they have really turned a corner over the past few seasons with Porter Moser at the helm.

They hit rock bottom in his first season (2011-12), posting a 7-23 overall record while going 1-17 against Horizon League foes. They rebounded nicely the following year, but they dropped back down to 10-22 in their inaugural season in the Missouri Valley Conference.

This past season, however, they went 24-13 while winning the CBI.

Will they continue the up-and-down trajectory, or will they remain on an upswing for their third year of March Madness?

Based on all that's coming back, they should be in pretty good shape. Christian Thomas (11.2 PPG, 4.5 RPG) is a pretty tough graduation to swallow, but nothing compared to everything that the likes of Illinois State, Indiana State and Northern Iowa lost this summer. Those three teams won a combined 38 MVC games last season, but it's pretty unlikely they remain that strong this year.

If Milton Doyle can stay healthy and if Devon Turk can continue being one of the most lethal three-point assassins in the country, Moser might finally make the tournament in his 12th season as a head coach.

6. Marty Simmons, Evansville

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Career Record: 126-134

Best Season: 24-12 with Evansville in 2014-15

Last Season: 24-12 with Evansville

Before we go penciling Loyola-Chicago in for second place in the Missouri Valley, though, it might be a good idea to look at how strong Marty Simmons and Evansville could be.

While the Ramblers return most of the team that won the 2015 CBI, the Purple Aces get back all seven of the leading scorers from last year's CIT championship team. Most notably among them are D.J. Balentine and Egidijus Mockevicius.

Balentine nearly led the nation in scoring last season with 20.2 points per game. As was the case in 2013-14, he played a ton of minutes, shot nearly 40.0 percent from beyond the arc and was unquestionably the most skilled athlete on the court more often than not.

Meanwhile, Mockevicius nearly led the nation in double-doubles, racking up 12.5 points and 9.9 rebounds per game in just 27.9 minutes of action on average. The 6'10" center from Lithuania is a pretty fine shot-blocker, as well, with more than 200 swats thus far in his college career.

If that dynamic duo can keep doing what it does best for one more season, Evansville could be one minor role player away from helping Wichita State make this a multi-bid league for the fourth time in five years.

In other words, if Simmons can bring about a bit of player development from a guy like Mislav Brzoja or Duane Gibson, he should have little difficulty coaching his way to his first NCAA tournament.

5. James Jones, Yale

Mark Humphrey/Associated Press

Career Record: 231-232

Best Season: 21-11 with Yale in 2001-02

Last Season: 22-10 with Yale

James Jones currently holds the unflattering record of longest-tenured coach without a tournament appearance.

Mark Few was named Gonzaga's head coach on July 26, 1999. He has since led Gonzaga to 16 consecutive NCAA tournaments. Jones was hired by Yale two months earlier on April 27, 1999 and is still searching for his first dance.

He came so painfully close to ending the drought last year, but the Bulldogs gave away a late lead against Dartmouth in the season finale before losing a tiebreaking game to Harvard by a two-point margin.

They do still have Justin Sears and Jack Montague from that team, but they lost the other three members of their starting five to graduation. Harvard also had some significant casualties, though, with Wesley Saunders and Steve Moundou-Missi no longer in the fold, so Yale shouldn't have slipped any further behind what has been the standard-bearer in the Ivy League for the past half-decade.

What's particularly crazy about Jones' streak is that he has actually been quite successful in the Ivy League. Yale has finished in fourth place or better in each of the past 15 seasons. Since a lackluster 5-9 rookie season, Jones has won 58.6 percent of conference games, finishing .500 or better in all but one season.

There has just always been a juggernaut in his path. When Jones started at Yale, Fran Dunphy was busy leading Penn to 10 tournaments in a span of 15 years. Once the Quakers faded, Cornell dominated for a couple of seasons. And it has been all Harvard since then.

Is it finally Yale's turn to sit atop the throne for a few years, or is another team like Columbia or Princeton going to catch fire and keep Jones at bay yet again?

4. Jim Engles, NJIT

Mel Evans/Associated Press

Career Record: 91-124

Best Season: 21-12 with NJIT in 2014-15

Last Season: 21-12 with NJIT

Up until about eight months ago, the only reason anyone knew that the New Jersey Institute of Technology had a D-I men's basketball program is because it lost 51 consecutive games spanning from February 2007 to January 2009.

But then the Highlanders shocked the world by winning at Michigan in December and managed to parlay that into a new home with the Atlantic Sun. For the first time in program history, they actually have a shot at an automatic bid to the tournament.

Not a moment too soon, either, because Jim Engles will get back all five of his leading scorers from this past season while joining a conference that was absolutely desperate for a new member after losing Northern Kentucky to the Horizon League.

With sharpshooting Damon Lynn still in the mix for at least one more year, there's no good reason NJIT can't swoop in and immediately represent the Atlantic Sun in the NCAA tournament. North Florida lost arguably its best player (Jalen Nesbitt). USC Upstate lost its top two scorers. Florida Gulf Coast lost its top three scorers. And the rest of the conference was either bad, really bad or just plain awful last year.

As long as Engles and company can handle the constant traveling back and forth from New Jersey down to Florida, the Highlanders could be the favorites to represent this depleted conference in the Big Dance.

3. Steve Pikiell, Stony Brook

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Career Record: 166-149

Best Season: 25-8 with Stony Brook in 2012-13

Last Season: 23-12 with Stony Brook

Much like Scott Cherry at High Point, Steve Pikiell has had the misfortune of watching great seasons amount to nothing because of an inability to win conference tournaments.

Pikiell's career record is nothing great, but that's because Stony Brook was terrible for his first few years. Since those growing pains, he has gone 130-68 over the past six years, winning at least 22 games in five of those seasons. The Seawolves are 74-22 in the regular season against America East opponents during that stretch, including three regular-season titles.

But where High Point can't even manage to win a single Big South tournament game, Stony Brook has been even more tortured by the illusion of success. The Seawolves have advanced at least as far as the America East semifinals in six straight years. Four times they lost in the conference championship game. They have been eliminated by Albany three years running.

Cursed as they are, they still have Jameel Warney, the patron saint of the double-double. Stony Brook's big man has won back-to-back America East Player of the Year awards, but he would doubtlessly trade that hardware in if it meant his 16.4 points, 11.7 rebounds and 2.5 blocks per game from last season would actually lead to a tournament berth.

The Seawolves get all seven of last year's leading scorers back and will be adding Longwood transfer Lucas Woodhouse, who averaged 11.5 points and 6.7 assists per game two years ago.

If Pikiell doesn't make it to the tournament this year, he probably never will.

2. Michael White, Florida

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Career Record: 101-40

Best Season: 29-8 with Louisiana Tech in 2013-14

Last Season: 27-9 with Louisiana Tech

Sometimes legendary coaches hit the ground running, but oftentimes you can't tell early in a coach's career whether he'll amount to anything.

In Billy Donovan's first four seasons (two at Marshall; two at Florida), he went 62-52 and missed the NCAA tournament all four years. Bill Self went 55-54 in his first four years at Oral Roberts and didn't make the Big Dance until his sixth season as a head coach.

Heck, through eight seasons between Army and Duke, Mike Krzyzewski was 111-106 and had yet to appear in a tournament.

I'm not saying 38-year-old Michael White is a sure thing (or even a particularly likely one) to eventually join the pantheon of college basketball coaches. But as a guy averaging 25.3 wins per season just four years into his career, it won't be long before more people start doing the simple math to determine that he's on pace for more than 900 career wins by the age of 70.

And that's without having even competed in the tournament. Just wait until he leads Florida back to the dance this year and see how many of us start vaulting him ahead of Archie Miller and Shaka Smart on our list of the best young coaches in the game today.

To be fair, his level of competition is about to increase drastically. Not only does Florida play in a much tougher conference than the WAC or C-USA, but Louisiana Tech pretty consistently had a nonconference strength of schedule that kept the Bulldogs from ever really vying for an at-large bid despite routinely arriving on Selection Sunday with around 25 wins.

However, his level of talent and ability to recruit is getting quite the uptick, as well.

Guys like Speedy Smith, Raheem Appleby and Michale Kyser were great for White at Louisiana Tech over the past four years, but they're a dime a dozen compared to what he'll inherit and eventually add with the Gators. With studs like Dorian Finney-Smith, Devin Robinson, Kasey Hill, John Egbunu, Brandone Francis and more already waiting for him, White should be successful immediately with the Gators.

Florida likely won't contend for the 2016 national championship. They probably won't even really give Kentucky much of a scare for the SEC title. But this is a coach poised for a breakout year on a team that is well-set for a bounce-back season. Big things are coming for White and Florida, and they should begin this year.

1. Dan Hurley, Rhode Island

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Career Record: 83-72

Best Season: 25-5 with Wagner in 2011-12

Last Season: 23-10 with Rhode Island

On behalf of everyone who grew up with a sibling who always seemed to get whatever he or she wanted, godspeed, Dan Hurley.

Dan was a pretty solid point guard during his playing days with Seton Hall, but he could never live up to what older brother Bobby did at Duke.

"He was the one who lived the fairy tale in college," Dan told John Feinstein of the Washington Post this past February. "I was the one who got booed on my home floor. It was tough sometimes. We came from the same house, the same high school team, the same coach—and yet he had that something the great players have and I didn't. That wasn't always easy."

And even though Dan got into coaching 14 years before Bobby did—Dan even first welcomed Bobby back from the world of thoroughbred racing, making his older brother an assistant on his staff at Wagner and subsequently at Rhode Island—it was Bobby who made the NCAA tournament in his second season as a head coach at Buffalo while Dan is hoping to punch his first ticket in this his sixth season as a D-I head coach.

Fortunately, he's got the horses to do something special this season.

Rhode Island didn't miss the 2015 NCAA tournament by much, ultimately receiving a No. 3 seed in the NIT. But the Rams get their three best pieces (E.C. Matthews, Hassan Martin and Jared Terrell) back for another year. They will also add immediately eligible transfers Four McGlynn and Kuran Iverson to the mix—the former a very good shooter/scorer from Towson; the latter a highly rated recruit who never fit in at Memphis.

Moreover, VCU, Dayton and Davidson each lost at least one extremely important piece from last year's roster, meaning that the Rams should be gaining ground on a conference that they already won 13 games against last season.

This probably isn't a team that makes a deep run into the tournament, but Rhode Island should be the favorite to win the Atlantic 10. Assuming he leads the Rams to the 2016 tournament, this could be the jumping-off point for Hurley's coaching legacy.

Kerry Miller covers college basketball for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @kerrancejames.