Kevin O'Neill (USC)

Kevin O’Neill, 52, was named the new USC men’s basketball head coach on June 20, 2009, replacing Tim Floyd who resigned on June 9, 2009 after four strong seasons of leading the Trojans. O’Neill brings 13 years of collegiate and NBA head coaching experience and has worked in the coaching ranks for 30 years. Last year, he served as an assistant coach and special assistant to the general manager of the NBA’s Memphis Grizzlies. He has extensive knowledge of the Pac-10 and West Coast basketball as he served as an assistantat Arizona from 1987-89 when the Wildcats compiled an 82-19 record and went to three straight NCAA Tournaments, reached one Final Four and posted two first-place and one second-place finish in thePac-10. He then served as the Arizona interim head coach for the 2007-08 season when Lute Olson took a leaveof absence. O’Neill guided Arizona to a 19-15 record and into theNCAA Tournament despite directing a team with four of its top five players being freshmen or sophomores. O’Neill began his NCAA Division I collegiate head coaching career at Marquette, where he went 86-62 (.581) in five seasons (1990-94)and had three postseason appearances. His initial team in 1990 went 15-14 and played in the NIT, the school’s first winning season and postseason trip since 1987. His 1993 squad was 20-8 (Marquette’s first 20-win seasonsince 1985) and captured the school’s first NCAA berth since 1983. That season, he was named the Great Midwest Conference Co-Coach of the Year, Basketball Weekly Midwest Coach of the Year and National Association of Basketball Coaches District 11 Coach of theYear and he was a finalist for Associated Press National Coach of the Year. Marquette then went 24-9 in 1994 to earnits first-ever league title and he guided the Warriors to their first NCAA Sweet Sixteen berth since 1979. O’Neill was selected as the 1994 Great Midwest Coach of the Year and the NABC District 11 Co-Coach of the Year. His final two Marquette teams led the nation in defensive field goal percentage. While at Marquette, he was featured in the 1994 Oscar-nominated documentary,“Hoop Dreams.” He then became Tennessee’s head coach for three seasons (1995-97), inheriting a team that had won just five games in 1994 and getting theVolunteers into the NIT by his second season. O’Neill then served as the head coach at Northwestern for three seasons (1998-2000), where he went 30-56. The 1999 Wildcats team was 15-14 (its first winning season since 1994) and played in the NIT, just the third postseason appearance in school history. He then moved on to the NBA as an assistant coach, spending the 2001 season with the playoff-bound New York Knicks and then two seasons (2002-03) with the Detroit Pistons. The Pistons won 50 games, were the Central Division champs and appeared in the playoffs both seasons (advancing to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2003) and were regarded among the NBA’s premier defensive teams. O’Neill served as the Toronto Raptors’ head coach in 2004. His team started out 25-25 and was in position to make the NBA playoffs, but then injuries struck and the team finished with a 33-49 record, just missing a playoff spot. He spent the next three years (2005-07) with the Indiana Pacers, the first two as an assistant as the club made the NBA playoffs both seasons and the third as a consultant.

O’Neill began his coaching career asthe head coach at Central High in Hammon, N.Y. in 1980, then spent the next two years (1981-82) as the head coach at North Country Coummunity College in Saranac Lake, N.Y. Within two seasons the program earned aberth in the Region III junior college playoffs. In 1983 he served as the head coach at the NAIA’s Marycrest College in Davenport, Ia. He then became an assistant coach at Delaware for two seasons (1984-85), Tulsa in 1986 and Arizona (1987-89) before landing the head coaching job at Marquette. The Tulsa team went 23-9, won the 1986 Missouri Valley Conference tournament and made the NCAA Tournament.

O’Neill was a three-year basketball letterman at McGill University in Montreal(1976-79), helping the Redmen to a 52-35(.598) mark in his career. In his 1978 junior season, McGill posted a school-record 28 wins and advanced to the Canadian Interuniversity Sport national championship tournament. He received his bachelor’s degree in education from McGill in 1979 and his master’s degree in secondary education from Marycrest in 1983.

O’Neill was born on Jan. 24, 1957, in Malone, N.Y. His wife’s name is Roberta. He has a son, Sean.