CLEVELAND, Ohio – This won’t be easy. That’s what I thought when my sources told me that Daniyal Robinson is leaving Cleveland State to become the head basketball coach at North Texas. Robinson won 65 games in three seasons with the Vikings, winning 21-21-23 games. This past season, Robinson led the Vikings to a 23-13 record, 14-6 in the Horizon League. Furthermore, Robinson’s team had a 3.3 grade point average in the last grading period. They were 3.1 for his three years at the downtown Cleveland school. North Texas is in the American Athletic Conference with schools such as Memphis State, UAB, Temple and Florida Atlantic. North Texas was 27-8 this season, 14-4 in the conference. Head Coach Ross Hodge was hired as the new head coach of West Virginia. Hodge had a $500,000 base salary with $200,000 in media bonuses and other incentives. His contract at West Virginia is supposed to be the $3 million range per season. Odds are Robinson will at least receive a contract in the $750,000 range – if not more. North Texas is considered a good job and also a launching pad to major college opportunities. Before Hodge, the head coach at North Texas was Grant McCasland – now the head coach at Texas Tech. Robinson was making $338,000 in 2024-25 on a new 5-year contract he agreed to last summer. North Texas will pay CSU a $500,000 buyout to hire Robinson. Looking for the next winner My sources tell me that interim athletic director Kelsie Gory Harkey will lead the search. The school also will use a search firm. Like many colleges, CSU is dealing with major money problems. The Vikings recently cut three sports. CSU would be wise to consult with Scott Garrett, the former CSU athletic director who is Senior Deputy Athletic Director at Wake Forest. It was Garrett who hired Dennis Gates to be the head coach in 2019. The program had lost at least 20 games the previous four seasons. Gates had an 11-21 record in his first season (2019-20). Then he was 19-8, winning the regular season Horizon League title and the tournament title. The Vikings then went to the 2021 NCAA tournament. In 2021-22, Gates had a 20-11 record. He took the Vikings to the NIT. Then Gates was hired as the head coach of Missouri, where he has made the NCAA tournament twice in his three seasons with the SEC school. Gates was the first CSU basketball coach in the Division I era to leave for a bigger job. The Robinson impact Garrett then hired Robinson in the spring of 2022. Robinson was a veteran assistant whose last stop was Iowa State. He had a similar professional profile as Gates, who came to CSU after he was being an assistant at Florida State. Both coaches had extensive connections in junior college basketball, along with having recruited high schools for years. But this also is the new era of college sports, it’s about transfers and NIL. Not only did Gates and Robinson win at CSU, they consistently had teams with grade point averages over 3.0 and no major off-court problems. They made a policy of recruiting players who didn’t come with negative off-court baggage. Robinson had to do a pair of quick rebuilding jobs. Two of Gates’ top players (Tre Gomillion and D’Moi Hodge) followed the coach to Missouri. Robinson brought Tristan Enaruna with him from Iowa State. Enaruna was one of the top players in the Horizon in Robinson’s first two seasons. He is now with the Maine Celtics in the G-League. Another top CSU player was Tae Williams, now with Utah’s G-League team. Despite losing 83% of its scoring from the previous season, the Vikings were 23-13 this season. They will lose senior and leading scorer Tevin Smith to graduation. But with the coaching change, who knows how many players will stick around. Robinson’s son is Reece Robinson, a promising freshman forward. The St. Ignatius product will probably follow his father to North Texas. Meanwhile, CSU will now search for the next Gates and Robinson, and that is a major challenge.