Central Michigan Head Men’s Basketball Coach Tony Barbee was named one of 25 finalists for the 2023-24 Ben Jobe National Coach of the Year Award. The award is presented annually to the top minority head coach in NCAA Division I college basketball.
Prior to the Mid-American Conference Tournament, Barbee became the fifth coach in school history to earn the MAC Coach of the Year Award after guiding the Chippewas to an 18-14 overall record and fourth place finish in the league with a 12-6 record. CMU’s 12 league victories were the most since the 2014-15 season. In the offseason, Barbee rebuilt CMU’s roster with only four players returning as he added 12 new players and blended them into a team that challenged for the MAC regular season title. In the preseason coaches’ poll, Central Michigan was picked to finish in 12th place out of 12 teams. Barbee joins Dick Parfitt (1975), Charlie Coles (1987), Jay Smith (2001 and 2003), and Keno Davis (2015) as MAC Coach of the Year honorees.
The Ben Jobe award is named in honor of one the most iconic coaches in the history of basketball at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. He is best known as the head coach of Southern University, a position he held for 12 seasons. He was also head coach at Alabama A&M, Alabama State, Talladega, Tuskegee, and South Carolina State.
His record at Southern was 209-141 and included four NCAA Tournament appearances. He also coached the Jaguars to one NIT appearance, five SIAC championships, 11 SWAC titles and two NAIA Tournament Championships. Perhaps his most memorable moment as a coach was leading No. 15 seed Southern to a 93-78 win over No. 2 Georgia Tech in the first round of the 1993 NCAA Tournament. It stands as one of the great upsets in the history of the event.
Coach Jobe passed away on March 10, 2017.
The recipient of the annual award is determined by a 10-member voting committee, which consists of current and former head coaches, as well as two senior staff members of collegeinsider.com.
The 2024 award will be announced in Phoenix, Ariz., site of the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship.
