The Fran McCaffery era of men’s Iowa basketball has concluded. The longtime Hawkeyes basketball coach was fired on Friday after 15 seasons.
The legendary head coach has a career record of 548-384 across 29 seasons of coaching. During his long career, he coached at Lehigh, UNC Greensboro, Siena and Iowa.
In Iowa’s loss and elimination from the Big Ten Tournament on Thursday night, McCaffery was ejected from what became his final game as the Hawkeyes head coach.
The writing was on the wall for McCaffery, as he had not led Iowa to the NCAA Tournament since the 2022-23 season. The Hawkeyes have also not gotten above No. 25 in the AP Poll since the 2021-22 season.
To paint an even bigger picture, Iowa has not advanced past the second round of the NCAA Tournament since the 2014-15 season, McCaffery’s fifth season as head coach. Ten years without an appearance in the Sweet 16 is tough to survive at any Power 5 school.
It is unclear if McCaffery will continue his coaching career. Even if he decides not to, he will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest college basketball coaches ever.
