Report: Joe Dooley is coming back to Kansas men’s basketball as its recruiting coordinator

LAWRENCE — Joe Dooley spent 10 seasons on the Kansas men’s basketball coaching staff from 2003-13, and he reportedly will return to the Jayhawks for this upcoming season as its recruiting coordinator.

The Kansas City Star reported Friday that Dooley will come back to Lawrence after spending the past four seasons as the head coach at East Carolina, which chose not to bring him back for the 2022-23 campaign. This most recent stint with ECU, 2018-22, was his second as a head coach there after first running the program from 1995-99. And with five seasons as Florida Gulf Coast’s head coach from 2013-18, he’ll bring 13 seasons of head coaching experience to Kansas.

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Dooley’s first run as an assistant with the Jayhawks under head coach Bill Self saw the team capture Self’s first national championship with the program in 2008. Dooley will have the opportunity to help Self and company attempt to repeat as national champions. It would only add to the success the two have enjoyed together, as the other nine NCAA tournaments they reached with the Jayhawks saw multiple deep runs that included the 2012 Final Four.

Dooley never reached the NCAA tournament in his eight seasons guiding East Carolina, but he did do so twice with FGCU. Florida Gulf Coast won a First Four game in 2016 as a No. 16 seed before being eliminated in the round of 64, and lost its round of 64 game in 2017 as a No. 14 seed. At FGCU, he captured a pair of ASUN Conference tournament titles and three regular season conference crowns.

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On the recruiting trail, the Jayhawks had a high-profile 2022 class that could help them repeat as Big 12 regular-season and tournament champions. And the 2023 class already has a commit in 247Sports Composite four-star combo guard Chris Johnson, with other prospects being targeted.

Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Report: Joe Dooley to be Kansas basketball recruiting coordinator