Crim: Hawkins remains passionate about coaching and committed to helping steer basketball in right direction

KALAMAZOO, Mich. — When Steve Hawkins answered a phone call from a number he didn’t recognize in September, he wasn’t surprised the caller wanted to know if he would be interested in a basketball coaching opening.

After all, he had fielded numerous inquiries since Western Michigan University administrators decided not to renew his contract in March 2020, ending his 20-year association with the NCAA Division I school, the last 17 as the head men’s basketball coach.

What he didn’t expect, however, was for the caller, Principal Jim French of nearby Portage Northern High School, to ask if Hawkins would meet to discuss becoming the Huskies’ new varsity boys coach.

“I miss coaching, so I said, ‘Sure,’ ” Hawkins said. “I came over that afternoon and they laid out the situation of the program. It’s a big high school (1,227 students) that is good in baseball and has a solid football program but has never been good in basketball. They won three games last year and graduated their best player.

“I came back the next day and said the biggest issue is whether I can still run my (consulting) business and do this at the same time. They made me an office on campus so I could make Zoom calls from there. I can walk the halls if I want to, sit down and have lunch with students, and be there for practice afterward.

“I don’t know how long I will do it. This year, at least. If I can help kids in life, not just in basketball, it will be worth it. It’s fun to be around the kids, to be there on game night.”

Even so, Hawkins remains a college basketball coach at heart. It was his life for more than three decades at various schools, including Quincy University.

At 59, he still believes he has a lot to offer the college game, which made his forced divorce from Western Michigan so painful.

Hawkins left Quincy University in 2000 after nine seasons as head coach and three NCAA Division II tournament appearances to join Robert McCullum’s Western Michigan staff as an assistant. 

He took over for McCullum in 2003 and spent the next 17 seasons leading the Broncos’ program, compiling a 291-262 record, reaching the NCAA Tournament in 2004 and 2014 and winning eight Mid-America Conference West Division titles.

Then, coming off two injury-plagued seasons and days before the country was forced to shut down because of the coronavirus, Western Michigan chose not to renew his contract.

“You know what that means — that’s being fired,” Hawkins said. “The AD said it was time to go in a different direction and then they hired my assistant (Clayton Bates), and that’s brought its own pain. They kept the staff, so last year everybody was there but me. I was the only direction change.

“I spent a third of my life and more than half of my professional life there. We built a program from nothing. We graduated all our guys. We had over 20 percent of all the academic All-MAC selections during that time. I felt like we did all the right things.

“It wasn’t about losing. (The depleted Broncos went 21-43 over his final two seasons.) The athletic department was $2.5 million in the hole, so I became a cost-cutting measure. It was miserable to go through. I don’t think I’ll ever get over it.”

With coaching options limited due to the pandemic, he stayed close to the game last season by serving as a TV analyst for ESPN and recording 50 episodes of his “Next Possession” podcast with some of the most recognizable names in college coaching.

He also provided individualized training for players and helped parents of high school athletes navigate the recruiting process, to “cut through the BS and tell them what they really need to know, the questions they should be asking.”

He also started a corporate coaching and consulting business, Next Possession LLC. He provides leadership and mindset training to help corporations – Kellogg’s, Stryker Corporation, Merrill Lynch, Pfizer, to name a few – build their teams. And he does motivational speaking.

“Bosses need help, too,” Hawkins said. “They don’t have anybody to talk to.”

He has assisted “a couple of universities” maximize Name, Image and Likeness opportunities, as well as help others find coaches to fill jobs. He helps run AAU tournaments in the spring and summer, as well as some basketball camps.

“It’s a pretty big umbrella,” he said. “Several people said there was a place for me in consulting. It’s a matter of building your client base, to get put on a retainer so you pick up 25 grand here, 40 grand there, 10 grand here. We’re still in that process.

“Families are paying $250 an hour to help people through the recruiting process. You can get $75 to $125 for a regular workout. Instead of one paycheck and one W-2, you can bring in multiple incomes.

“And I get to make my own schedule. If I want to take my kids to the beach on a Tuesday, I can do it.”

Hawkins also is collaborating with Lansing State Journal columnist Graham Couch on a book, “Stuck in the Middle,” which he hopes to publish later this year.

It will take a behind-the-scenes look at mid-major college basketball through the lens of his career, from the time he accepted his first coaching position at South Alabama nearly 40 years ago through Western Michigan.

It also will be autobiographical as Hawkins delves into his career path and discusses the influences in his life, notably legendary UCLA coach John Wooden.

“I’ve been stuck in the middle forever,” he explained. “Even in Quincy. Things were going well and they take away an assistant. Then (former President) Father Eugene (Kole) took away the ability to compete.”

Hawkins walked into Western Michigan’s Read Fieldhouse with his family to watch a Broncos’ game on New Year’s Day, his first visit in nearly 22 months to the facility he called home for two decades.

“I had reservations about it,” he admitted. “When I walked in, I got a round of applause and a lot of people came up to me to say ‘hi.’ So, to a degree, it was therapeutic.

“At the same time, I couldn’t help but think, ‘Damn, I should still be coaching there. There was no need for this to happen.’ We had a good squad coming back. It was devastating then, and it remains that way now.”

Some of Western Michigan’s top players transferred when Hawkins was let go. The Broncos went 5-16 last season and are 4-12 and riding a six-game losing streak this year.

“It doesn’t make me happy,” Hawkins said. “It angers me. Twenty years of my life were spent toward building that program. To see where it is now is maddening.”

Meanwhile, Portage Northern High School lost two games last week to fall to 2-6. Hawkins is still trying to find a balance between coaching college kids who saw basketball as their life and high school kids who view it as something neat to do in the winter.

“Some of the best advice I got before the season was to keep in mind that a lot of kids out here just want to have fun,” he said. “I had forgotten about that. Everybody I have been coaching for the better part of 30 years would not have been in school had it not been for basketball.

“This isn’t Quincy High, where kids grow up dreaming of being a Blue Devil. I had two kids tell me they would miss games in December because they had to play in a youth soccer tournament in Florida. Families take off for a week for Christmas vacation.

“I’m learning some things from them. They’re great kids. I’m having fun with it.”

Hawkins can see himself continuing to build his consulting business and remain as a coach on the high school level. His wife, Kelly, is from Kalamazoo and their three kids were born and raised here. Uprooting them would be hard.

Yet, there’s part of him that would like another shot at running a college program. He turned down opportunities to become an assistant last year and applied for positions that went to other candidates.

“At the end of the day, it’s still really, really difficult after well over 30 years to get away from being an NCAA coach,” he said. “It would be really, really hard to pass up an NCAA job. That’s still where my heart really is.

“I’m not ruling anything out at this point. Whichever way we go, we’re going to make sure it works. That’s my mentality.”