Mike Dunleavy: A college freshman at age 62

First college gig at 62? Having to recruit, schedule, talk to booster clubs?

Mike Dunleavy didn’t hesitate. Just as he did as a hard-nosed guard out of Brooklyn when he signed to play for Frank McGuire, he embraced the challenge.

“Basically, what happened is I spent a bunch of time around Villanova, the AAU circuit in Atlanta, and it kind of inspired me that this is what I wanted to do,” Dunleavy said. “I want to be around kids and around the game, and keep impacting through basketball.”

Dunleavy, an all-star at South Carolina who ended his career with 1,586 points (sixth on the career list), accepted his first college job at Tulane last month. It’s not that he doesn’t have experience – Dunleavy has coached 1,329 games over 17 seasons.

But they were all in the NBA, where he more or less just had to show up for work every day and coach the game. It didn’t involve discovering, recruiting and signing the team, then figuring out a way how to beat the other guy.

“It checked off a lot of the boxes,” Dunleavy said. “Pro sports, great city, great practice facility as good as any pro facility. We’re in an excellent conference, there are amazing coaches in the league and we’re on national TV virtually every night.”

Combine it with family in New Orleans, and it was an easy decision. The former coach of the Lakers, Bucks, Trail Blazers and Clippers looked at it as continuing the role he’s always had – take a basketball team and make it better.

He’s now recruiting for the Green Wave, attending various showcases and getting his name out there. While he coached some of the NBA’s greatest players and took the Lakers to the 1991 NBA Finals, he realizes it’s a new game now – players want to know what you’ve done lately.

Dunleavy is getting help from his name on that one. Son Mike Jr. plays for the Bulls and son Baker Dunleavy just helped Villanova win a national championship as associate head coach. Dunleavy sees a lot of similarities between Tulane and the colleges with which he’s most familiar – Villanova and Duke, where Mike Jr. played.

They’re all small, private schools with undersized on-campus gyms. Nevertheless, they’ve had success.

 

Getting into the college game has been exciting and fretful. He’s used to the hectic schedule, but will be learning his way for a while.

“Really haven’t thought about scheduling yet,” he said. “That’s one of the things I really have to do. And also understand RPI and in and out of conference. My feet hit the ground here and my first priority was to go get players.”

That was one of the things that initially kept him away from college ball. Dunleavy didn’t like some of the recruiting tactics that go on, even when USC reached out to him to gauge his interest.

“I was approached by them a couple of times,” Dunleavy said, referencing the Bobby Cremins switcheroo and then the Dave Odom search. “I just didn’t have any interest in college ball. They called me, just checking in to see if I would be interested, but at that point, the answer was no.”

Thus far, he’s loving the reception from Tulane and the whirlwind of recruiting. It’s something different and he realizes that what the Green Wave do is going to be because of his ability to convince players to play for him. He won’t be handed a roster and told, “This is it.”

Once he gets into the full routine, perhaps a future schedule will come out with a hole that his former school could fill. Gamecocks-Green Wave, a rematch of the old Metro days with one of USC’s finest on the opposite sideline? Who wouldn’t want that?

“I would definitely explore it,” Dunleavy said. “I play North Carolina the opening game next year, I know that. But if it works out in the future, that would be a definite possibility.”

This story was originally published April 30, 2016 at 4:07 PM with the headline "Mike Dunleavy: A college freshman at age 62."