Steve Lutz was hired Monday as the basketball coach at Oklahoma State after one season at Western Kentucky.
The 51-year-old Lutz has a 69-35 career record and has led his teams to the NCAA Tournament in each of his three seasons as a head coach — this year at Western Kentucky and the previous two at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. Before that, he was an assistant at Purdue and Creighton.
Lutz takes over for Mike Boynton, who had a 119-109 record in seven seasons. The Cowboys reached only one NCAA Tournament under Boynton as he dealt with the fallout from an NCAA investigation.
Oklahoma State has history as an elite program, with Henry Iba and Eddie Sutton — both members of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame — having walked the sideline. The Cowboys have won two national titles and reached six Final Fours, most recently in 2004.
A strong recruiting class gave the Cowboys hope they could be competitive this season. But they finished 12-20, closing the season with six straight losses.
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AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball
