Overview:
Ben Howland’s basketball journey took him from the Goleta Boys Club to UCSB’s first forays into March Madness to three straight Final Fours with UCLA
Ben Howland would’ve given his eye tooth to coach basketball.
He actually did once.
During his salad days as a UC Santa Barbara assistant, a stray elbow from a raw-boned, freshman center named Greg Trygstad dislodged one of Howland’s chompers during a rebounding drill.
“That didn’t slow Ben down one bit,” head coach Jerry Pimm recalled later. “He got right back into the drill.
“There was no way he was going to leave practice just for a chipped tooth.”
That was actually a good day in the life of Benjamin Clark Howland.
“I had to wear braces after that,” he said, “but we beat San Diego State that night.”
It was the second game of the 1986-1987 season — the breakout year for a UCSB program that had suffered a losing record in each of the previous 10 seasons.
Howland, a dogged recruiter and drill master, helped the Gauchos earn at-large berths to the NCAA Division I tournament in 1988 and 1990.
They also went to the National Invitation Tournament in 1989, 1992 and 1993.
He then embarked on a 26-season career as a head coach, beginning at Northern Arizona in 1994.
He wound up crisscrossing the college basketball world with additional stints at Pittsburgh, UCLA and finally Mississippi State.
By the time Howland retired in 2022, he had guided all four of those schools to the NCAA tournament — a fete eclipsed only by Rick Pitino.
No coach has taken his team to three consecutive Final Fours since Howland turned that trick with the Bruins from 2006 to 2008.
But like a true homing pigeon, the former gym rat of the then-Goleta Boys Club returned to Santa Barbara as soon as it was over.
He got to spend two quality years with his mother, Mary, before her death at age 91 two years ago.
Howland’s son, Adam, a Santa Barbara County senior deputy district attorney, lives in town with wife Brittney and their five children.
He and wife Kim also have a daughter, Meredith, who works as an oncology nurse and lives not far away in Santa Clarita.
“Believe me, I was always coming back to Santa Barbara if I could afford it,” Howland told Noozhawk last week. “We bought our house here in 2011 and then we remodeled it.
“It was a huge project, but it turned out great.
“We’re very blessed to live where we do on the Mesa. It’s a good spot.”
Mad for March
Howland’s passion for college basketball remains as fervent in retirement as it was during the years he scoured gyms near and far for some of the best talent to ever play at the Thunderdome.
Howland and Gar Forman, his former Big West Conference counterpart at New Mexico State, will comprise a dynamic duo of speakers to address the bizarre new world of college basketball when the Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table holds its “Prelude to March Madness” on Monday, March 16.
Forman, now a special adviser for the NBA’s New Orleans Pelicans, is best known for his decade (2009-2020) as general manager of the Chicago Bulls.
But he also spent his first 16 years in college basketball.
“Gar coached with Neil McCarthy and was his lead recruiter during their hey days at New Mexico State,” Howland said. “He ended up working for Tim Floyd at Iowa State and then went with Tim to Chicago.
“He was their GM when they signed Joakim Noah and Derrick Rose, and some of their other great players.
“His whole thing was watching college basketball and its players, so he’ll have an interesting perspective that’s a little different than what they’ve had previously (for the Round Table’s Prelude to March Madness).”
The event, which includes a reception at 5:30 p.m. and the main program at 6:30 p.m., will be held at the Cabrillo Pavilion Event Center at 1118 E. Cabrillo Blvd. in Santa Barbara. Click here for more information.
Howland counts himself among the hundreds of thousands of student-athletes who’ve been honored at the Round Table’s weekly press luncheons the last 56 years.
He moved from Goleta to Cerritos with his family after his freshman year at Dos Pueblos High School, but he returned to lead Santa Barbara City College to the 1977 State Community College Basketball Finals.
“Going to the Round Table was a big deal when I was at City College, and it’s a really nice thing they do for kids in all sports,” Howland said. “They really emphasize good students and those who are well-rounded.
“I’ve always appreciated that, making that a priority.
“The Phil Womble (Ethics in Sports) Award that Dave Pintard sponsors is especially great. There are a lot of real good people involved with the Round Table, and it’s a real positive thing for the youth in our community.”
Still Bouncing Around
College basketball — especially the games played at UCLA and UCSB — remains a big deal, too.
Howland attended games at both schools last week, beginning Tuesday with the unranked Bruins’ 72-52 romp over No. 9 Nebraska.
“They played really good defense and did a lot of good things,” Howland said. “They looked as good as they’ve looked all year, so hopefully that’s a good sign.”
He had special incentive to attend Saturday’s Senior Night Game at UCSB’s Thunderdome.
“They arranged a little thing for the guys on the 1990 NCAA team that played for Jerry,” he said earlier in the week. “Gary Gray is going to be at my house for two nights, and Lucius Davis and Idris Jones and a bunch of other players from that team will be here, too.
“It’ll be really fun for Jerry.”
UCLA fired Howland after the 2013 season even though his team had won 25 games as well as the Pac-12’s regular-season championship.
Things unraveled for the Bruins, however, after star guard Jordan Adams broke a bone in his foot on the final play of UCLA’s 66-64 win over Arizona in the Pac-12 tournament semifinals.
Oregon beat UCLA the next night, 78-69. The Bruins also lost to Minnesota 83-63 in their first-round game of the NCAA Tournament.
Howland got his pink slip the next day.
He knows how UCSB coach Joe Pasternack must feel this season. The Gauchos lost their own star guard, Miro Little, for six games to a foot ailment, and then another eight with a hand injury.
The Gauchos (18-12 overall) are 13-3 with Little and 5-9 without him.
A season-ending hip injury also has kept preseason all-leaguer Jason Fontenet II sidelined since the fifth game in late November.
“They would’ve been the best team in the league, hands down, if they’d had Miro and Jason,” Howland said.
Howland is greeted warmly by the fans when he attends games at Pauley Pavilion, 13 seasons after his last game there.
“They still know who I am, even though I have less hair,” he said with a laugh.
“My years look better and better now, especially with what’s happened there since then.”
The Bruins have won just one league championship in the 13 years since Howland was fired.
He does hold current UCLA coach Mick Cronin in high regard despite his meltdown both during and after an 82-59 loss at Michigan State on Feb. 17.
Cronin ejected his own player, Steven Jamerson II, from the game after he committed a flagrant foul, although he apologized that night.
He turned belligerent at the post-game news conference, describing one reporter’s question as being “the worst” he’d ever been asked.
That’s a pretty high bar, Mick, considering some of the news conferences I’ve attended.
“People haven’t liked his behavior, but he’s a good guy, and he’s a good coach,” Howland said. “I sit there at the games and people bitch at me about it, but what am I going to say?”
Game Changers
The travel demands since UCLA joined the Big 10 Conference in 2024 can fray on a coach’s nerves, he pointed out.
“It’s such a brutal league when you consider their previous game last Saturday was at Minnesota,” Howland said. “You fly all the way from L.A. to Minnesota on just a one-game trip … It’s crazy.
“You’re living in a plane, and your time zone changes.
“That makes it really hard for the West Coast teams. All the research has shown that it’s harder to go from West to East than East to West.”
The college game has changed mightily for all coaches since Howland returned to Santa Barbara in 2022.
“Neither the transfer portal, where you can transfer anywhere, year after year, nor NIL (name, image and likeness payouts) were in place when I was coaching,” he said. “It’s so much more difficult because you’re now putting together a brand-new team every year.
“You’re not building for the future. It’s just one year at a time.
“As soon as the year ends, you’re not looking to play in the NIT, you’re looking to start your recruiting effort because there’s a timeline on it. It’s just crazy.”
And yet, Howland said he’d coach basketball under any rules or conditions.
Teaching is at the core of the job. When Howland was gaining a reputation as a top-flight recruiter, Pimm made sure to educate the college basketball world that it wasn’t his only strength.
“Ben became a very good teacher,” he said. “Players respect him because he puts his heart and soul into it.”
He came from a family of educators.
“My two brothers are both English teachers,” he said. “My sister was in education, as well, and did development at Johns Hopkins (University in Baltimore).
“My mom was an English teacher and my dad was a pastor. It runs big throughout our family.”
Mary Howland was already the mother of four children when she went back to graduate school to get a master’s degree in English. She taught everything from basic composition to Shakespeare at Golden West College in Huntington Beach when they lived in Cerritos.
“Education is so important, and I think we’ve really lost that idea in college basketball,” Howland said.
“Now, in the current era of the transfer portal, rules inherent to graduation requirements have been just thrown out the door.”
You can bet the subject will come up when class gets back in session at the Round Table’s Prelude to March Madness.
