College Basketball Coaches Who Have Taken the Longest Paths to Success

There is only one William Francis Ryan Jr.

You may know him better as Bo.

And the Wisconsin head coach won't be around much longer, as he announced his intentions to retire after next season, per Jon Krawczynski of the Associated Press (via Yahoo Sports).

We can already say, without doubt, the college game will miss him—his interview quips, his glimpses of warmth and, of course, his crustiness on the sideline that shouldn't be confused for meanness.

Coming up one game shy of a national championship and losing the national player of the year heading into the 2015-16 season, Ryan will at least help the Badgers navigate a relative rebuilding year—UW should still be quite solid—before finding a new path.

Ryan (who will turn 68 midseason) is 357-125 (.741) as UW's leader and is 14-of-14 on advancing to the NCAA tournament.

He has often made it look so easy. But he took the hard way there.

His first year coaching came at the junior high level in Pennsylvania. Then came a couple of years in high school followed by a 1976-84 journey in Madison as an assistant.

So Ryan bided his time, not becoming a college head coach until age 36 in 1984 at NAIA-member Wisconsin-Platteville. He guided that program 15 years—into the Division III level—and won four national titles and even had the home floor named after him.

A quick trip to Milwaukee was followed by him landing back in Madison, where he's been a perfect fit—and probably could be for 10 more years if he wanted.

But instead of cursing our loss, let's celebrate Bo: by looking at other guys he may have inspired.

These are coaches who paid their dues and found unique paths, like Ryan, to the upper stratosphere of college basketball.

Brown's basically had to become a head coach by living in the fast lane.

He had a three-year apprenticeship as a Division II assistant at Saint Rose in Albany, New York—fans of talk show host Jimmy Fallon will recognize his alma mater—before becoming a head coach at the junior-college level.

His three teams at Sullivan County Community College produced a 90-10 record from 1998-2001.

That landed him an aide's gig at UAlbany, which quickly turned into a top job.

He took over midway through that season, finishing 7-13 (5-11 in league play). Not bad for someone who was 30 as that season finished.

Brown's stuck around and found quite the admirable comfort zone. His Great Danes have won America East championships—thus claimed NCAA tournament bids—each of the past three years.

Now, we're not going to honor every longtime, loyal assistant.

We know programs such as Duke and Michigan State have produced more than a few.

But special commendation should go to Anderson, who created quite the dynamo with Nolan Richardson for about two decades at Tulsa and Arkansas.

Then Arkansas let Richardson go, and Anderson has been more than capable while sliding over a chair.

That includes reaching the NCAA tournament at three schools (UAB, Missouri, Arkansas) and signing a midseason contract extension that will keep him in town until 2020.

Now, if only he could get Bobby Portis back for one more year. Or Michael Qualls.

Never heard of Dambrot?

You've probably at least heard of the best high school basketball player who ever suited up for him.

First, some quick backstory: Dambrot was only 33 when he became the head coach at Central Michigan. The sky was the limit.

Then he used a word he had no right using, even if he had permission.

What became of the racially polarizing incident was a five-year hiatus from coaching basketball, but eventually he landed at a little Ohio high school called St. Vincent-St. Mary.

He spent three years there, even coaching LeBron James for two.

Talk about a wild path.

Dambrot, who was an assistant for three years at Akron, took over in 2004. He's produced three NCAA bids and still has won 21 games each of the past two years.

Leon Rice may have done things his way, but they also seemed like the hard way.

In a way, he worked backward.

Rice, now 51, is reaping the fruits of that path as a highly successful coach at Boise State.

But first, his career started with a three-year apprenticeship at Oregon. He went to Northern Colorado for two then became an assistant at Yakima Valley Community College in his native Washington for two more.

His big break came by landing at Gonzaga in 1998. That first season (March of 1999) was when the Zags made their memorable run to the Elite Eight. Mark Few took over the program the next season from Dan Monson, who went to Minnesota.

It seemed for years—at least many pundits figured—that Few would move on to a bigger, richer program. But he never did. So that forced the decision of Rice to move on. (Few's had a few guys in line to replace him.)

Boise State has to be glad he made the leap to the full-blooded football school. The Broncos are 102-63, including 46-22 the past two years, and won a rare league title in 2015. He was also named the Mountain West's Coach of the Year.

Rose didn't even become a Division I assistant coach until he was 40 years old.

If you want to call that lost time, BYU's boss has more than made up for it.

He spent eight years as a Cougar aide before taking over. Steve Cleveland left for Fresno State right after BYU had just endured a 9-21 season in 2004-05.

It's not often an assistant from a losing team gets promoted, but that's what happened with Rose, who's had a career that spanned being a reserve player and co-captain on Phi Slama Jama. He was a high school coach for four years and then was in the junior college ranks the next decade.

It was the smart move for BYU to hang on to Rose. He's won at least 20 games in all 10 of his seasons, achieving eight NCAA tournament bids. The only surprise these days is BYU simply had more success in the Mountain West (at least a share of four regular-season titles plus two second places in six years) compared to the West Coast Conference—a couple of second-place and two third-place seasons in four years.

But BYU did win at Gonzaga last season, so presumably Rose has more in the tank.

McKillop has been at this small North Carolina school for seemingly forever, but he's an obvious addition in honor of the well-traveled Bo Ryan.

That's because McKillop was also a one-time high school history teacher. He was a high school coach for 16 years in New York before he became a head college coach in 1989. At Long Island Lutheran, he won five state titles before returning to Davidson (he was an assistant there for the 1978-79 season) to become the leader.

You may recall that McKillop was Stephen Curry's college coach.

But truth is, McKillop has been much more successful than just producing one player. He's 495-299 with eight NCAA bids (including the famed run with Curry in 2008 to the Elite Eight). He never left, although joining the Atlantic 10 has increased the challenge (a more prestigious conference, certainly, than the Southern Conference).

The media picked Davidson 12th during its first A-10 season. Whoops. It won the regular-season title last year.

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Hayford bounced around in a uniquely good way before landing at Eastern Washington.

He's been a high school coach and a Division II-level assistant. Then he went a little out of order: head coach at D-II level (Sioux Falls) followed by a 10-year run at Whitworth as a D-III-level coach.

The Spokane, Washington, campus isn't far from Gonzaga. But it's also close to EWU, which hired Hayford in 2011 after he achieved a 217-57 record at Whitworth.

Hayford gets mentioned here because he finally got clicking at EWU, producing an NCAA tournament bid. We're still not sure why he was talking so much smack to Georgetown, but it's easy to understand his excitement amid a 26-9 season after three consecutive losing campaigns.

He also had the country's leading scorer, Tyler Harvey, who forfeited his final year of college eligibility for the NBA draft and drafted in the second round by the Orlando Magic.

Paulsen would certainly like his first year at George Mason to fare better than his first year at his previous job, Bucknell. The Bison went 7-23.

But the 50-year-old coach certainly knows how to adapt.

Twenty years ago, he became a head coach for the first time at Division III St. Lawrence. He spent some time at D-II Le Moyne before returning to his alma mater, Williams College, in 2000. He had a good gig back there, even winning a D-III championship in '03.

But Bucknell lured him in 2008, and Paulsen produced a couple of NCAA bids in seven years before opting to replace the fired Paul Hewitt.

At his introductory press conference last April, asked to explain how he could handle the competition-level adjustment, Paulsen said something that would make Bo Ryan nod his head: "Coaching is coaching."

Lonergan has found some solid footing at George Washington after a slow start.

His first two teams went a combined 23-38, but it shouldn't be a surprise that he's figured out how to navigate Washington, D.C.

He attended high school there (Archbishop John Carroll) and coached from 1992-04 at Division III-level Catholic University of America, even winning a national title in 2001.

It was a one-year stint at Maryland under Gary Williams that set up Lonergan for a more prosperous head coaching career. His Vermont teams (2005-11) went 126-68.

His last two GW teams have gone 46-22 and produced two postseason bids (one NCAA).

Cluess didn't have to reach the Division I coaching level to see top talent.

From 1991-2005, he coached at St. Mary's High School in New York. Among his pupils was NBA standout Danny Green.

He spent time as a head coach at the JUCO and Division II levels before getting his shot at Iona in 2010.

There's been some heartbreak with the Gaels despite two NCAA bids.

The 2011-12 season ended with the biggest comeback in NCAA tournament history.

Last year, the Gaels were a top seed at the MAAC tournament—and had the fast-paced makings to be an NCAA tournament bracket-buster—but couldn't get past Manhattan in the championship game.

Still, Cluess has a good gig. Bigger programs have sought him out, but he also has job security.

Dunlap couldn't have made a windier trail to end up back at his alma mater.

He's posted 12 different jobs since 1980, including Division I, Australia and the NBA.

His longest run was at Metro State in Denver, which he turned into a D-II powerhouse from 1997 to 2006, including two national championships.

He was a head coach of the Charlotte Bobcats for a year before returning to Loyola Marymount, where he played and spent his first five years out of school as an assistant.

Just as Bo Ryan is known for creating crisp team-oriented offense, Dunlap is a whiz on the defensive end—often implementing a matchup zone.

Beilein became a head coach at the ripe age of 22 in his native Western New York.

He would bounce around the state for the next 22 years through four different jobs before leaving to take over Richmond in 1997. He had success and moved on to West Virginia and then Michigan.

When Beilein completes the 2015-16 season in Ann Arbor, it'll tie his tenure at Le Moyne (1983-91) for the longest time he's spent in one place.

Practice made perfect at the lower levels, and Beilein has made a name for himself through his offense—a Princeton-style strategy that requires motion and a ton of backdoor cuts and teamwork.

Talk about climbing.

Don't let the anguished look on Miles' face above fool you. He's still a happy-go-lucky guy who is a terrific recruiter, motivator and tweeter.

He moved around unknown basketball lands such as Northern State, Mayville State, Southwest Minnesota State and North Dakota State (where he went 99-71) before getting a big break at Colorado State in 2007.

He looks like he should be selling annuities but can flat-out coach—and handle tough times.

CSU lost all 16 regular-season Mountain West games his first year (7-25 overall), but he became a master of recruiting the D-I transfer during the next four seasons and went to the NCAA tournament in 2012 before leaping for Nebraska, another relatively low hoops-history program.

The Huskers folded to a 13-18 mark last year despite returning all five seniors coming off an NCAA bid.

Somehow, Miles continually seems to find a way to create expectations at places that don't exactly demand them.

How could one not be successful with this kind of mantra?

"Between the black lines, it's about players being players," Driscoll said in a halftime interview at last year's NCAA tournament. "Ballers make plays; dudes are dudes. That's the way life works."

Driscoll has the experience to know. He's moved around the high school, Division I, II and III levels. The longest he had settled down was a 2003-09 apprenticeship at Baylor under Scott Drew, though he'll surpass that this season by staying at North Florida.

Was last year a huge breakthrough or simply an odd break in pattern? Driscoll's previous five years produced three losing records and a couple of .500 endings.

UNF went 23-12 and advanced to the First Four. Robert Morris rallied from a 14-point deficit in the second half.

What's it mean to Driscoll and the Ospreys?

Simply, he needs more dudes.

Martin doesn't have the most diverse portfolio among the Bo Ryan all-stars.

But consider that he became a high school assistant at age 19 and remained one in the Miami area for a decade. He spent five more years in South Florida as a high school head coach before opting to move to Boston for a recruiting-coordinator position at Northeastern.

It was when he left there, finding Bob Huggins at Cincinnati, that his career really took off.

For a Miami-raised guy, he sure found ways to evolve outside of the area.

He thrived at Kansas State after taking over for Huggins, even going to the Elite Eight in 2010. He produced an impressive 50-32 mark in Big 12 play before going closer to home at South Carolina, where he's on the upswing after a 17-16 mark last year.

It has not always been a smooth ride to the top. He's been accused of cheating and bullying along the way. But he's a tough guy, a former bouncer, who has a knack for getting the most out of himself and his players.

“Frank is a special guy,” Huggins told the New York Times' Thayer Evans back in 2010. “To come as far as where he’s come, he’s a really, really good basketball coach.”

Underwood was 43 years old, seemingly living the grand life in Daytona Beach, when Frank Martin urged him to leave the community college ranks in Florida to join him at Kansas State.

The move from Martin's native state to Underwood's own (he grew up in McPherson) started a considerable upswing.

Underwood spent six years at K-State and followed Martin to South Carolina briefly before getting his own D-I chance at Stephen F. Austin.

All Underwood's done is win 61 of his 69 games (a 35-1 mark in Southland Conference regular-season play) and advance to a couple of NCAA tournaments.

CBSSports.com's Gary Parrish (h/t AL.com's Creg Stephenson) reported Southern Miss was interested in him last year, and Underwood also told the Kansas City Star (h/t KTRE) he would be open to the Missouri job. Even though he has been linked to a few jobs in the past, he may just wait until a Big 12 gig opens up. Bruce Weber at Kansas State is most certainly on the ropes after last year's 15-17 mark that included a lot of postseason turmoil.

Underwood played at Kansas State as well and has already proved once you can go home again.

Turner started with a prime path. He was an assistant coach at Wake Forest when Tim Duncan played there.

But he soon found a route that not many coaches—even Bo Ryan—might dare to examine.

Turner gave it all up at age 30 in 2000 to trek across the country after his wife was accepted into a medical residency program in San Francisco.

Turner spent three months with the San Francisco (Dons) women's program before landing as a volunteer assistant at Stanford under Mike Montgomery. What he didn't make in salary, he made up for in experience and connections. The two also paired up with the Golden State Warriors.

UC Irvine stepped forward in 2010, and the team took its biggest leap yet with Turner, going 21-13 and making the NCAA tournament.

And any future moves would have to be a package deal. Elizabeth Turner is the director of the intensive care unit at Irvine.