Minutes before new Iowa men’s basketball coach Ben McCollum took the podium for his introductory press conference, an old, familiar face walked into Carver-Hawkeye Arena to join in on the festivities.
After exchanging a few words and handshakes with several of the fans in attendance, Iowa football head coach Kirk Ferentz made his way to the back of the room to watch McCollum’s press conference.
McCollum then spoke for roughly 30 minutes and outlined his plan to rebuild the Hawkeye program.
“I was just talking to — I think I was talking to Beth [Goetz], and I recall, it’s vivid in my mind, and most of you have seen it, I grew up seeing it, and have you ever seen Chris Street play? Like just with the intensity, the energy, the effort, the enthusiasm, the joy, the servant mentality, the toughness,” McCollum said. “Everything that Iowa stands for is what our team is going to look like.”
Those words likely pleased Ferentz, who has used similar philosophies throughout his 26-year tenure as Iowa’s head football coach. Ferentz and McCollum have probably only met a handful of times in the week since McCollum’s hiring, but the similarities between both coaches are hard to ignore.
Both Ferentz and McCollum were hired at age 43, with each replacing a long-tenured coach in the process. Ferentz had the difficult task of following legendary coach Hayden Fry after Fry’s retirement in 1998, while McCollum replaced Fran McCaffery after 15 seasons.
Both Fry and McCaffery left Iowa as the longest-tenured and winningest coaches in their respective program history, but the directions of both the football and men’s basketball programs were far from positive at the times of their departures.
Fry is the man credited with bringing Hawkeye football to national prominence, but a poor 3-8 campaign in 1998 left the cupboard nearly empty for his successor. McCaffery resurrected the basketball program after the disappointing tenures of Steve Alford and Todd Lickliter, but he missed the NCAA tournament in his final two seasons and was fired in March.
The ensuing coaching searches were highly anticipated.
Ironically, Ferentz wasn’t considered the number one option for then-athletics director Bob Bowlsby. Ferentz’s previous nine-season stint as Iowa’s offensive line coach placed him in the running for the job, but many fans wanted one man for the position: Florida defensive coordinator Bob Stoops.
Stoops, a former Iowa player and assistant coach, interviewed with the Hawkeyes, but Bowlsby wanted to wait and interview Ferentz. Oklahoma promptly swooped in and hired Stoops, and Ferentz was ultimately chosen as Iowa’s new coach days later.
The recent basketball coaching search also produced two likely names – West Virginia coach Darian DeVries and McCollum. DeVries was seen as the favorite due to his ties to the state of Iowa and high-major experience, while McCollum, also a native Iowan, was considered as the No. 2 option due to the fact he had only one season of Division I coaching experience.
DeVries bolted for Indiana before the Hawkeyes could pursue him, and they turned their focus to McCollum, who accepted the job on March 24, two days after his Drake team lost in the NCAA tournament.
Only time will tell how McCollum will perform in Iowa City, but the decision to hire Ferentz proved to be a wise one for Bowlsby and Iowa. After two rebuilding seasons, Ferentz has led the Hawkeyes to 204 wins, two Big Ten titles, eight years of 10 wins or more, and 22 bowl games.
Ferentz, who passed Fry as Iowa’s all-time winningest coach in 2018, is known for his consistent winning with Iowa, but it is how he has won that has earned him his flowers.
The Hawkeyes are often undersized and undermatched on paper against a lot of their Big Ten opponents, but Iowa’s hard-nosed, physical style of play has led them to plenty of unexpected victories in the Ferentz era.
“Iowa is the MMA fighter,” ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit told Sports Illustrated in 2021. “Iowa’s the guy that goes in the second round, and both sides are bleeding, and then they get you in that inevitable chokehold, and you’re like ‘Oh, my God. Trying to hold on, I can’t.’ Tap out. That’s Iowa. That’s the style of football. They don’t care. And you might look at them if you’re an SEC or Big 12 [team], whatever, around the country and be like ‘Iowa? Oh, man. They’re overrated.’ Until you get in the ring with them and want no part of ’em.”
That same mindset has also led to plenty of wins on the hardwood for McCollum, who owns an exceptional 426-95 mark in just 16 seasons of college coaching. McCollum’s meticulous game-planning and ability to adjust his style to his personnel parallels Ferentz style, but McCollum’s player development has made him a household name in the profession.
“A lot of his player development is just playing,” Austin Meyer, a former assistant coach under McCollum, said. “They play a lot in practice and scrimmages and things like that and just get better by putting kids in positions to read things and then go back to the film and watch it and break it down with them.”
While McCollum is known for developing athletes at every position on the floor, his specialty is the point guard position, something that can be compared to Ferentz’s history of putting offensive lineman in the NFL. Trevor Hudgins, Justin Kitts, and current Iowa point guard Bennett Stirtz are just a few of the notable point guards to flourish in McCollum’s system.
“He just put them in the best position for their success,” former player Ryan Hawkins said. “They show up every day for skill development, to work hard and, again, have the same high, high energy and a good attitude every single day.”
Hawkins is one of the many examples of under-the-radar talent developed by McCollum. He played for McCollum at Northwest Missouri State from 2016-21, leading the Bearcats to two national championships and 124 victories during his tenure.
His performance led many Division I schools to start inquiring about the 6-foot-7 power forward, forcing Hawkins to make a tough decision and transfer to Creighton for his final season. McCollum was one of the only college coaches to give Hawkins a look out of high school, but the extra year of eligibility granted by the COVID-19 pandemic made the opportunity too hard to pass up.
“It was tough because Northwest was my home, Maryville, the community, the fans, everyone there made it feel like home,” Hawkins said. “Very hard to leave, but, you know, at the end of the day that I had an opportunity because of COVID.”
Hawkins shined in Omaha, starting all 35 games and recording a team-high 13.8 points and 7.8 rebounds per game. The Bluejays advanced to the Big Dance and almost upset eventual national champion Kansas in the second round, falling 79-72.
Hawkins went undrafted in the 2022 NBA Draft but has since carved out a successful playing career overseas. He currently plays for Stade Rochelais Basket, a team based in La Rochelle, France, that competes in the LNB Élite.
Hawkins is thrilled to see McCollum return to the state of Iowa and lead the Hawkeyes. Though Hawkins admits that he grew up a fan of the archrival Iowa State Cyclones, he wishes nothing but success for his old coach.
His message to Iowa fans?
“They’re going to have high energy every single day in practice, and then they’re going to go out and compete on the floor,” Hawkins said. “That’s what every single team I was ever part of [shared], even last year watching Drake. They just go out and compete their tails off every single day.”