Last week, USD\u2019s basketball team parted ways with its leading scorer.<\/p>\n
Now its coach is gone, too.<\/p>\n
Several sources close to the program told the Union-Tribune that Steve Lavin was fired Wednesday with three games left in the regular season plus at least one in the West Coast Conference tournament. Players were being summoned to a meeting with athletic director Kimya Massey at 2 p.m.<\/p>\n
The eventuality isn\u2019t a surprise but the timing is, given that athletic directors typically wait until the end of the season to make a move.<\/p>\n
This is a different era in college sports, however, and dismissing Lavin now gives Massey more time to install a replacement ahead of the impending transfer portal and an expected mass overhaul of the roster.<\/p>\n
Lavin is in his fourth season of what is believed to be a six-year contract that pays him roughly $1 million per year. Massey is known to have considered firing Lavin after last season, but it proved too expensive with the massive contract that previous AD Bill McGillis gave him.<\/p>\n
The coach best known for his seven seasons at UCLA had one winning record in his four years at USD, 18-15 in 2023-24. He finished ninth, fifth and 11th in the WCC, and the Toreros (11-17) are 10th this season at 5-10 following Sunday\u2019s 92-79 home loss against USF.<\/p>\n
Lavin reached the NCAA Tournament in eight of 11 seasons as a head coach at UCLA and St. John\u2019s. He had no postseason appearances with USD, a job he took after seven years as a television analyst.<\/p>\n
Lavin\u2019s tenure at Alcala Park was marked by different approaches to roster construction. In his early years, he tried to collect veteran transfers with a single year of eligibility left. Then he went young with an influx of freshmen. This year, he had some NIL money and brought in transfers plus a pair of European pros.<\/p>\n