The university will announce that coach Fran Dunphy will step down after the 2018-19 season and be replaced by assistant coach Aaron McKie, The Athletic reported on Friday.
BREAKING: Temple University will soon announce that basketball coach Fran Dunphy will step aside after next season and be succeeded by current assistant Aaron McKie, The Fieldhouse has learned. @TheAthleticCBB @TUMBBHoops
— Seth Davis (@SethDavisHoops) March 30, 2018
A group made a website calling for the athletic department to fire Dunphy toward the end of the 2017-18 season.
McKie has been an assistant at Temple since the 2014-15 season. He played for the Owls from 1991-94 and helped lead Temple to an Elite Eight appearance in the NCAA Tournament before playing in the NBA from 1994-2007.
Before returning to Temple as an assistant coach, McKie served as an assistant for the Philadelphia 76ers.
Through his 12-year tenure at Temple, Dunphy has a 247-152 record. He has an overall record of 557-315 after coaching at Penn for 17 seasons. He is one of only five coaches to win 200 games at two Division I programs and lead each school to six or more NCAA Tournaments.
Last season, the Owls finished 17-16 overall and 8-10 in the American Athletic Conference. Temple’s season ended with a 63-57 loss to Penn State on March 14 in the first round of the National Invitation Tournament at the Bryce Jordan Center in University Park, Pennsylvania.
The Owls haven’t made the NCAA Tournament in Dunphy’s past two seasons and have missed the field of 68 in four of the past five seasons. In 2014-15, the Owls competed in the National Invitational Tournament. They made it to the semifinals, where they lost, 60-57, to the University of Miami.
Temple’s last hope of making the NCAA Tournament in the 2017-18 season was to win The American’s conference tournament. The Owls knocked off Tulane in the first round, but they fell to Wichita State in the semifinals.
After finishing the 2006-07 season 12-18 overall and 6-10 in the Atlantic 10 Conference, Dunphy helped the Owls qualify for the NCAA Tournament in six straight seasons. He also helped lead Temple to the NCAA Tournament during the 2015-16 season.
Dunphy had a 2-7 record in the NCAA Tournament in his tenure at Temple. Overall, Dunphy has a 3-16 record during March Madness. He has only reached the second round of the tournament twice.
In 2011, the Owls beat Penn State 66-64 and lost to San Diego State University, 71-64, in the second round. Two years later, Temple beat North Carolina State University, 76-72, before it lost to Indiana University 58-52 in the round of 32.
In eight of Dunphy’s 12 seasons at Temple, he won at least 20 games. His highest win total came during the 2009-10 season when Temple finished with a 29-6 record, won the Atlantic 10 Conference regular-season title and postseason tournament.
Dunphy won three conference tournaments in his 12 years at Temple, including the 2009-10 season. He helped Temple win its regular-season conference title three times. Dunphy last won the regular-season title during the 2015-16 season.
Temple has finished in the middle of the conference in the past two seasons. The Owls have a combined 33 wins in the past two years, which is one game above .500 and ties the worst two-year win total in the Dunphy era.
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