I’m a sentimental guy sometimes.
I like nostalgia and things that connect present day optimism to past successes and celebrations and good vibes.
So it should be no surprise that I was excited when news broke of UMass Basketball hiring Derek Kellogg as an assistant coach. Or should I say, re-hiring?
Yep, DK is back folks.
Some background for those who don’t bleed maroon-and-white or browse UMassHoops.com on the regular:
Derek Kellogg was a basketball player for UMass from 1991-1995. He grew up in Springfield, MA — in the shadow of the basketball Hall of Fame — starred at Cathedral High School in Springfield, and was recruited to UMass by then head coach / God-figure John Calipari. It was the beginning of the Golden Era for UMass Hoops.
He was the local star point guard who would help guide the hometown team (“your state U”) to four consecutive conference titles and a spot at #1 in the AP rankings in 1995. Alongside “TV Lou” Roe, Marcus Camby, Jim McCoy, Harper Williams, Tony Barbee, Will Herndon, Donta Bright, Dana Dingle, Edgar Padilla, Carmelo Travieso, Ty Weeks, Mike Williams and the rest of the early-to-mid 90s squad, they brought UMass basketball to national prominence.
Good times indeed.
Seriously, to this day still some of the best times of my life. Those who lived through it with me will attest.
When the tiny Curry Hicks Cage (UMass’ home for 60+ years) was rocking, it was one of the loudest arenas in the country. We were fortunate back then that a fledgling sports-focused TV network called ESPN was about an hour’s drive south of campus. Their production vans and trucks could drive up I-91 to televise a lot of games, and the notoriously unruly UMass lunkheads got lathered into a frenzy for each one. Early games, late games, weekday games, weekend games, midnight games… Ooooohhhhh the midnight games…
“The Cage” closed in 1993 so the up-and-coming UMass basketball program could move into the brand new Mullins Center on campus. It set the stage for one of the loudest and most raucous fan experiences in college sports — affectionately known as “The Last Rage In The Cage”. Give it a quick watch below. Tip off is 5 mins into the video. First basket scored by guess who. Sorry it’s not HD qualify. Best I could do from YouTube.
The UMass basketball team went on to continued success after DK graduated in 1995 — including a Final Four appearance in 1996 led by eventual NCAA Player of the Year and #2 pick in the NBA draft Marcus Camby. But DK will always be remembered in my mind as one of the core building blocks for the team’s rise to prominence.
Like most point guards, he was a student of the game and had “a high basketball IQ” as they say. So much so that he got into coaching shortly after graduation. After a couple short stints at George Mason and Youngstown State, he eventually found his way back to Coach Calipari as a member of his staff at the University of Memphis from 2000-2008. DK became known as one of the best recruiters in the country and a top assistant on Coach Cal’s staff. Memphis went all the way to the national championship game in 2008 before losing to Kansas for the title.
After that game UMass called DK to come home and be our next head coach, replacing Travis Ford who left to become the head coach at Oklahoma State.
Kellogg had mixed results as head coach at UMass.
- Finished with a record of 155-137 over nine seasons
- Led the Minutemen to the NCAA tournament once and the NIT tournament twice
- Won 20 games — the college basketball benchmark for a good season — three times
- Restored some traditions and relationships that had gone missing for a number of years between “the glory days” and his return
- Several star players from 90s teams returned to campus and even joined the program in an official role
- Hosted a throwback game at The Cage in 2010 vs. Holy Cross
- Overall fan and alumni interest had returned for a brief period
Like most things, however, results (and finances) drive decisions and DK was fired following the 2016-2017 season after finishing with a 15-18 record. The University was in the midst of a transition to FBS Football, was desperate need of wins (this was before their Frozen Four and national championship runs in hockey), and they were hoping to secure a spot in a power conference as a wave of “realignment” was hitting the NCAA conferences. Where have I read THAT before recently??? The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Kellogg was replaced by Matt McCall, which turned out to be a disastrous 5-year run when the team never made a post-season tournament and just never had any stability with its staff or its players. The Transfer Portal era hit the program hard. McCall was able to recruit some decent players (primarily through sketchy hires of assistant coaches who were related to the recruits or coached them previously). But they either transferred out when the coaches left or they just fizzled out and never cut it at the NCAA level.
Fast forward to March of 2022 when former University of South Carolina coach, Frank Martin, was formally introduced as the new head coach of UMass Mens Basketball.
Frank led South Carolina to the Final Four in 2017 before he and the team parted ways after the 2021-2022 season. Prior to South Carolina he was head coach at Kansas State and an assistant at Northeastern and Cincinnati. He has a career head coaching record of 288-201 and a pair of top-3 finishes in the loaded SEC conference. Much optimism ahead, for sure.
It was at Northeastern between 2000 and 2004, however, when Frank met his future wife, Anya Forrest. Anya was a star on the UMass track-and-field team in the late 90s, setting school records in the 55m hurdles and 100m hurdles. I’m with you, Frank. I’m a sucker for the hurdlers myself. 🙂
The return to Massachusetts — and to UMass and Amherst, specifically — is a homecoming of sorts for the Martin family. How can you not route for that?
Meanwhile, back to the topic at hand, when Derek Kellogg left UMass he was hired by Long Island University (LIU) as their new head coach. Hey, it’s not Duke or North Carolina but it’s a job. The guy had a family after all. Plus, he still had all those connections recruiting New York and across the northeast. It was a good fit for a still-young coach to get a 2nd chance.
Kellogg immediately led LIU to the 2018 NCAA Tournament after getting the automatic bid by winning the NEC Tournament Championship. His finished at .500 or better in 4 of his 5 seasons at LIU before (yet again; tough gig as a college basketball coach) getting fired.
As Frank Martin was building his new assistant coaching staff to prepare for the upcoming 2022-2023 school year, and to really dig into the process of recruiting the northeast during the important summer AAU circuit, he turned to a familiar face in our boy, DK.
Kellogg was officially brought back to campus on August 17th, 2022 as a member of Coach Martin’s staff.
I honestly don’t know how things will turn out for the program. I have optimism and high hopes for a team that captured my heart back in November of 1989 when I was a goofy freshman on campus. 30+ years later I still watch, still attend games, still read the message boards, still stress over recruiting battles and transfer rumors and starting lineups and conference realignment.
This time I hope DK gets to stay home and finish out his career as a UMass Minuteman. It will be full-circle for a guy who gave everything he had to the school, region, and team — twice. Now the third time is a charm. I hope it’s a lucky one.
Welcome back, DK. UMass legend.
GO….GO U….