By MARK NELKE
Sports editor
Don Monson, North Idaho College men’s basketball coach?
In 2004, when NIC coach Hugh Watson left in September to take a job in Tennessee, NIC athletic director Al Willams said his first call went to Don Monson.
Williams had played for Monson at Idaho for two seasons, from 1979-81.
They had kept in touch since.
NIC already had its team in place for the upcoming season. The Cardinals just needed a head coach.
So Williams dialed up his former college coach.
“You want me to coach that rag-tag team?” Monson replied.
“As a matter of fact, I do,” Williams said.
“Big Al” told Monson that Jud Heathcote, who Monson coached under at Michigan State and was retired living in Spokane, and former Gonzaga coach Dan Fitzgerald could be his assistant coaches.
“We’d be on ESPN,” Williams told Monson.
Monson politely declined, mentioning something about players today not being able to handle his coaching style. Plus, he wanted to watch his son Dan, who was head coach at Long Beach State at the time.
Don Monson, the Coeur d’Alene High grad who coached the Idaho Vandals to their only NCAA tournament Sweet 16 appearance in 1982, died Wednesday night.
He was 92.
His son, Dan, the Eastern Washington University men’s basketball coach, announced his passing on social media Thursday.
“Last night, holding Mom’s hand, Dad passed away peacefully after 92 years of serving the Lord.” Dan posted. “I’ve lost a great father, my idol, role model, mentor, and, as he would say, Partner.”
Monson guided the Vandals to the NCAA tourney in 1981.
The next season, Idaho started 16-0 and reached as high as No. 6 in The Associated Press poll. The Vandals finished the regular season 26-2, and after a first-round bye, took down Lute Olson’s Iowa squad in the second round of the NCAA tournament in a 69-67 thriller at Pullman. Idaho lost to Oregon State in the Sweet 16.
Monson was named the Kodak Division I National Coach of the Year in the 1981-82 season.
Monson was inducted into the North Idaho Athletic Hall of Fame in 1989, and the Idaho Athletics Hall of Fame in 2007.
Williams, who grew up in Chicago, played at NIC for two seasons before transferring to Idaho. He said one of the reasons he picked NIC was because he wanted to move on to a four-year school in the area whose team he thought he could make.
And Idaho, before Monson’s arrival, had seven straight losing seasons, the last two being 5-21 and 4-22.
When Williams was a sophomore at NIC, Monson was recruiting his teammate, Gordie Herbert. After the season, Williams, who was being recruited by Lewis-Clark State college, met with Monson and said he wanted to walk on at Idaho.
Only four players were returning from Monson’s first team at Idaho, which had gone 11-15.
“He said I can’t guarantee anything, but I’ll give you a shot,” Williams recalled.
After walk-on tryouts at the beginning of the next school year Williams, a point guard, was the only walk-on to make the team. He would back up Don Newman his junior year, then played behind Kenny Owens, a transfer from Treasure Valley Community College, as a senior.
In 1979-80, Williams’ first year at Idaho, the Vandals, with Newman, Herbert as a junior and freshmen Brian Kellerman and Phil Hopson on the roster, finished 17-10, losing to Montana in the Big Sky Conference semifinals.
The following year, Williams earned a scholarship as a senior, and the Vandals went 25-4 and qualified for the NCAA tournament for the first time, narrowly losing to Pittsburgh in the first round.
Back then, the Vandals played basketball in the Kibbie Dome, though with no locker rooms at the Dome for basketball, they had to dress at nearby Memorial Gym and either walk or take a shuttle over to the Dome (the visiting team dressed at the hotel).
Pregame and halftime talks were held upstairs at the Kibbie Dome, in a concession stand, Williams said.
“It was a long walk up the stairs if you were losing at halftime,” Williams recalled.
Williams graduated after that season, but most of the other players returned in 1981-82 and, well … you know the rest.
“He created a family environment,” Williams said of Monson in Moscow. “We knew he cared about us, but he was just hard on you. It was kind of a tough love. I liked him a lot more after I was done playing for him. People were appreciative of the effect he had on their lives.”
Monson was born in Menahga, Minn., and his family moved to Coeur d’Alene when he was in the second grade.
As a sophomore, he played on a Coeur d’Alene High boys basketball team coached by Elmer Jordan that won a state title in 1949, defeating Burley in the title game in Pocatello.
Monson played basketball at the University of Idaho.
Before coaching at Idaho, Monson was an assistant coach at Michigan State under Heathcote, and was credited for the recruitment of Earvin “Magic” Johnson to the Spartans in 1977.
Before that, Monson coached at Cheney and Pasco high schools.
After guiding Idaho to an appearance in the National Invitation Tournament in 1983, his fifth season in Moscow, Monson left to coach at Oregon, where he coached the Ducks for nine seasons, including three appearances in the NIT.
In 14 seasons as a college basketball coach, Monson was 216-186, including 100-41 at Idaho.
“That’s an era that will be hard to be duplicated,” Williams said of Monson’s time at Idaho.