Ex-UH coach Taylor steps down at SE Missouri State
KAT WADE / OCTOBER 2014
Former Hawaii interim head coach Benjy Taylor resigned from his assistant position at Southeast Missouri State.
Benjy Taylor resigned as assistant men’s basketball coach at Southeast Missouri State.
Taylor, the interim head coach at Hawaii in 2014-15, was hired by Southeast Missouri State head coach Rick Ray in January. A release from the school said Taylor wished to move closer to his family in Hawaii. He has three sons, Tyler, Otto III and Ostin, and a daughter, Olive. SMSU finished the year 5-24.
“I would like to thank Coach Ray and the rest of the Southeast Missouri State family for welcoming me with open arms,” Taylor said in Thursday’s release. “I was blessed to have the opportunity to work for one of the brightest coaches in college basketball in Coach Ray. For family reasons I have decided to move on so that I can be closer to my kids. I am confident that Southeast basketball is trending in the right direction with the returning players and the new influx of players. I wish the Redhawks all the best.”
Hawaii was 22-13 and reached the Big West tournament championship game under Taylor. He took over before the 2014-15 season when Gib Arnold was fired.
“Benjy replaced me when I left Indiana State to go to Northern Illinois, so I have known him for a long time,” Ray said. “When someone in any industry is making a career decision to enrich their family life, I applaud that choice. Benjy did a terrific job for us in his time here and our program is better because of his involvement.”
41 responses to “Ex-UH coach Taylor steps down at SE Missouri State”
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Even the great Benji couldn’t fix the Redhawks.
What’s your point?? Don’t like your sarcasm as Benji did an admirable job when he coached the UH basketball team esp. when it was handed to him on short reins such that he was limited in time to produce….do you think Eran Ganot would have done a better job at SE Missour or if he didn’t have the returning players that Benji and Arnold recruited here at UH???
agree..I like Coach Taylor. He is a man of integrity. I wish him well.
Being turned down the one year deal. And Arnold recruited those players. Benji may have had a hand it though. I will stick with Ganot over Benji!
Agree for once with you
🙂
Point is, Ganot is/will always be a better coach than slick willy BJ no matter where, who’s on the team or what sports. Could be tiddly winks and Ganot will outcoach BJ every minute of every day.
Point is if you don’t have the players you ain’t going to win big. Good players make good coaches.
According to this article Benji’s children are still in Hawaii. There are coaches who come to Hawaii and find a new home. Some use it as a stepping stone to find better paying coaching positions. Benji apparently wants his children to grow up in Hawaii. Be nice if there were other opportunities to have people like him find other coaching positions that pay enough to raise a family here, we know there is very little. Transcending into another field is problematic due to their background experience.
HPU.
I applaud anyone who puts family before self…..
With a 5-24 record, I don’t think his family was the primary reason for his exit.
Agree!
Applause.
What a joke of a coach
My mama used to always say if you have nothing good or intelligent to say than stuff it.
You broke your mama’s rule with that useless comment…
Actually, he was decent but ha little or no control of the players, on or off the court. Probably be a strong assistant or recruiter.
Hey, Bdpapa…..Ganot had NO CONTROL over the players also….even Ferd Lewis wrote a column about the players walking off the court during practice and not listening to Ganot etc….Ganot’s assistant or was it Ganot himself said that next year it will be different etc…etc….hey, if you’re going to est. a discipline system, you start now…..not wait till the following year…..by the way, the article by Ferd Lewis or one of the sportswriters is public knowledge ……i think it came out in February or March…Ganot had no control over the players and was very lucky to have had these returning players in his first year…….Now that the players are gone, let’s really see Ganot’s recruiting and coaching skills……………don’t get me wrong, I really like Ganot but let’s set the record straight and not make generalizations about Benji because Benji did a great job considering he was working under a timeline and was told to keep winning and that he would have the job but Matlin gave him the shaft….plez don’t tell me that Benji was offered a 1 yr. contract….did you see what that contract entailed……who would have signed that contract………..anyways, have to move on…..since i have or will have season tickets for Football, men’s basketball, wahine volleyball…….ok…i already paid for two football season tickets and wahine volleyball tickets……..expecting big things from the wahine volleyball and improvements in football……certainly anything is better than what we had in chow fun………cheers.
You are correct. But, Ganot got it under control.
Ganot also did it with Gib’s players. I’d like to be more optimistic because Ganot is a likeable guy. But I think we are about to enter the Bob Nash era redux.
Ganot had FULL control of the team and that’s why crybaby Fleming, who had his way under BJ, couldn’t make a go and ended up on the losing end of a historic year. You don’t achieve what UH achieved this year if the coach doesn’t have control or has the respect of your key players. Bobbitt publicly stated he liked Ganot’s system better. As for Ferd’s article, it was proven that old f….t had no clue as to what he was writing about and he had an ax to grind against Ganot (for whatever reason). In fact, anyone who believe anything Ferd writes is in the lalaland with him.
Don’t agree with you at all tarheelnation; Benjy Taylor did extremely well given the resources and circumstances he had to work with. And he is a good person, who has not violated any laws and the rights of others. I don’t even think Coach Roy Williams would approve of your comment.
He couldn’t coach when the team needed him the most had no offense sets all they did was play on talent alone if you really watch his teams all they did was play street ball.
And he was such a good coach that season why did he not get any other offers to be a head coach somewhere else? THINK ABOUT IT
I bet they also weren’t paying him enough. I guess he can go back to working at Audi Hawaii.
If he had the HC job maybe we wouldn’t be hearing/reading about his departure.
He turn down the 1 year offer what a dummy
I’m glad he was so d…b because that’s how we got Ganot. Lot of dodos here also don’t realize that we got a championship coach at less cost than what BJ wanted.
Although I wanted Benjy, I thought Ganot turned out to be a good choice too – only time will tell. Both men are way better than Gib Arnold – no more Arnolds or ex-Punahou alumni like Chow. We need more Benjy’s and Ganot’s.
Good comment!
How about the ex-Punahou alumni who is our president?
I’d take Gib over him!
Be careful what you wish for, LoL!
My concerns are for his kids.
What future do they have?
Without rail they have no future.
lol
“Family” is now the overwhelming reason for departure from an athletic program. His leaving voluntarily speaks to something he could not tolerate (or conversely, something the HC could not tolerate). Sometimes being pals with everybody makes a coach’s job harder.
MET MR. TAYLOR AT A NEAR-BY DRIVE-IN. HE WAS VERY GRACIOUS REGARDING THE WAY HE WAS TREATED BY U.H. VERY POLITE. HOPE HE FINDS A WAY TO STAY IN HAWAII.
no question he is personable and polite. I think his strength is in recruiting.
Bull, there is no evidence what so ever from his entire coaching career that he can recruit. But there is mounting evidence that he can’t coach (and please, don’t use his one lucky year here with all the talent he inherited as an example of his coaching prowess).
Would EG consider hiring BT?