Who will replace Rick Pitino as Iona basketball coach? Here are 6 candidates to watch

With Rick Pitino leaving Iona for St. John's, there will be a high standard to uphold as the Gaels search for their new head basketball coach.

Iona has made eight NCAA Tournament appearances since 2012. During that same stretch, the Gaels have won seven MAAC Tournament championships and six MAAC regular-season titles.

Here are six potential Iona coaching candidates to keep an eye on:

Tobin Anderson, Fairleigh Dickinson

Resume:

• In his first year with the Knights, the Knights went 21-16 and reached the NEC finals.

• He took his team to the second round of the 2023 NCAA Tournament after pulling off a historic upset as the 16-seed over top-seeded Purdue.

• Anderson went 209-62 overall in nine seasons at Division II St. Thomas Aquinas from 2013-22, where he and the Spartans won six East Coast Conference tournament titles and five regular season titles

• Went a combined 185-129 as a Division III head coach at Clarkson and Hamilton from 1999 to 2011.

Anderson has had success with building up small programs into winners at every school he's been to from the Division III to Division I level.

He'll likely have plenty of Division I schools giving him a call after turning Fairleigh Dickinson around from a four-win season in 2021-22 to March Madness darlings with their massive upset of Purdue. The Knights were the second 16-seed in NCAA Tournament history to upset a No. 1 seed.

Anderson previously interviewed for the Iona job before Pitino was hired in 2020.

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Anderson: How Anderson went from Division III to topping Purdue

Jared Grasso, Bryant

Resume:

• 79-67 record as the head coach of Bryant for five seasons, won NEC regular season and tournament titles in 2022

• 2022 NEC coach of the year

• Former assistant and associate head coach at Iona from 2010-18 under Tim Cluess and was a part of four MAAC Tournament championship-winning teams

Like Anderson, Grasso was another candidate Iona considered back in 2020, before ultimately hiring Pitino. He's familiar with the winning recipe at Iona, after being a part of the program for eight strong years and has plenty of familiarity with the MAAC.

At Bryant, the Bulldogs' steadily improved with each year and enjoyed a program-best season in 2022, when they finished 22-10 and made it to the NCAA Division I tournament for the first time ever.

They weren't able to follow up on that success this season, but still finished above-.500 for the third straight year at 17-13.

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Rob Jones, Norfolk State

Resume:

• 188-136 overall and 113-39 in conference play across nine seasons at Norfolk State

• Won two MEAC regular season and tournament titles and is responsible for two out of the three NCAA Tournament appearances in program history

• Two-time MEAC Coach of the Year in 2019 and 2022

• 2019 Skip Prosser Man of the Year Award, annual award given to Division I coach that exhibits high moral character

• 2022 Hugh Durham Award winner, award given to the most outstanding mid-major coach of the year

A native of Queens, Jones has plenty of ties to New York, playing collegiately at New Paltz and serving as an Division III assistant in upstate New York for various colleges, before coming down to coach at St. Mary's High School in Manhasset, New York.

In 2007, he made the steep jump from high school to Division I coaching and found immediate success with Norfolk State, rising up the ranks as an assistant to head coach in 2014. Under Jones, Norfolk State finished in the top three of the MEAC in all nine seasons.

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Steve Masiello, Iona

Resume:

• 162-177 overall and 105-111 in conference play through 11 seasons as Manhattan head coach from 2011-22.

• Won MAAC Tournament in 2014 and 2015 at Manhattan

• Former assistant at Louisville and Manhattan, also played at Kentucky from 1996-00 and was a part of the Wildcats' 1998 national championship team

Could Masiello be making a head coaching comeback?

After getting abruptly let go by Manhattan less than two weeks before the 2022-23 college basketball season began, Masiello found his way to Iona as the director of basketball operations under Pitino.

Masiello previously said that he'll follow Pitino wherever he goes next season, which makes him an unlikely hire if he sticks to his word, but his years of experience within the MAAC would make him an interesting candidate if he's interested.

Masiello: Pitino, Masiello team up as Iona defeats Penn in season opener

Bob Walsh, Iona

Resume:

• Went 204-63 at Rhode Island College from 2005-14, where he built the Anchormen into a Division III powerhouse, earning five Little East regular season and conference tournament titles.

• Reached the NCAA Tournament Division III Sweet 16 three times and Elite Eight once.

• Coached Division I at Maine for four seasons and went a combined 24-100 from 2014-18

• Current assistant at Iona, but also a previous assistant at San Diego and Providence

If not Masiello, Iona could also potentially look to hire from within and promote Walsh. Walsh has plenty of ties to the university, where he got his master's degree and his father, Don, is in the Iona Athletics Hall of Fame.

Walsh got to make his Division I coaching debut as an assistant at Iona in 1994 and eventually found his way back to New Rochelle before the start of this season after spending three years on Providence's coaching staff.

With more coaching experience under his belt, is Walsh looking to make a return to a head coaching position?

Kimani Young, UConn

Resume:

• Current assistant coach at UConn for five years, responsible for recruiting and developing backcourt players.

• Helped UConn land three consecutive top 20 nationally-ranked recruiting classes and five All-Big East guards.

• Previously served as an assistant at Minnesota, when the Golden Gophers won the NIT in 2014, and Florida International

He's widely considered as one of the top up-and-coming coaching prospects in college basketball and Iona could be an ideal spot to make his head coaching debut.

A Queens native, Young has plenty of ties to the New York metropolitan area from his recruiting duties and his days on the AAU circuit as a program director for New Heights.

After completing his college basketball career at Texas-El Paso, he spent a year at St. John's as a video coordinator, before landing assistant coaching roles under Richard Pitino at Florida International and Minnesota.

Follow Eugene Rapay on Twitter at @erapay5 and on Instagram at @byeugenerapay.

This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Iona basketball coaching candidates as Rick Pitino leaves for St. John's