By SuperWest Sports Staff
In this series of updates on the history of the top men’s basketball programs from the West, we provide a brief coaching summary and a list of the current coaches, along with postseason results, regular-season conference titles, award winners, and all-time coaching records.
Oregon won the first NCAA Men’s Basketball National Championship in 1939 and has made the NCAA tournament 19 times since, winning eight conference championships, and producing 18 All-Americans.
Howard Hobson, a former Duck player, was hired in 1935 and led Oregon to the inaugural National Championship with a team known as the “Tall Firs.”
He was also the first coach to win major college championships on both coasts (at Oregon and Yale).
Hobson pioneered intersectional play, with the Ducks becoming the first West Coast team to travel East for games.
He was named president of the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) in 1947.
After 24 years of less-than-stellar basketball under John Warren, Bill Borcher, and Steve Belko, Oregon hired Dick Harter away from Penn, where he went 50-3 in his final two years.
Harter brought a tough and unique brand of basketball to Eugene. His teams were known as the “Kamikaze Kids” for their scrappy play and swarming defense.
He led the Ducks to the Final Four of the NIT two straight years, in 1976 and 1977, and was named Pac-8 Coach of the Year in 1977, compiling an overall record of 112–82, and producing a two-time AP All-America player in Ronnie Lee.
When Harter left in 1978, the Ducks suffered through five consecutive losing seasons under former assistant Jim Haney, and five more over the next nine years under Don Monson.
Oregon’s only notable highlight after the departure of Harter came in 1995 when the Ducks made an NCAA tournament under head coach Jerry Green.
Former Harter player Ernie Kent took the reins in 1997 after a successful six-year stint at Saint Mary’s, becoming the first black head coach in the history of Oregon athletics.
Kent won more games in his 14 years in Eugene than any other Duck coach before him, taking the Ducks to the NCAA Tournament five times.
His teams reached the Elite Eight in 2002 and 2007, marking Oregon’s deepest run in the NCAA Tournament in 42 years.
Kent remains the second-winningest coach in program history with an overall record of 235-173.
The hiring of Dana Altman coincided with the construction of Matthew Knight Arena, and he has made it an exceptionally difficult place to play, becoming the winningest coach in the history of Oregon basketball.
Altman has led the Ducks to four conference titles and seven NCAA Tournament appearances, including the Elite Eight in 2016 as a No. 1 seed, and the Final Four in 2017.
He has been named the Pac-12 Coach of the Year three times, in 2013, 2015, and 2016, and the Jim Phelan National Coach of the Year in 2013, while compiling a record of 300-124.
Altman signed a three-year extension in 2019, worth $3.5 million annually, and a one-year extension in 2021 that will pay him $4 million in the 2026-27 season.
Altman pulled off another late-season turnaround in 2023-24, taking the Ducks to his fourth Pac-12 Tournament Championship, and advancing to the Round of 32 in Altman’s ninth NCAA Tournament appearance.
In 2024-25, Altlman extended his streak of consecutive 20+ win seasons in Eugene to 15, going 25-10 in the program’s first season in the Big Ten, and leading the Ducks to the Second Round of the NCAA Tournament.
University of Oregon (Eugene, OR)
Matthew Knight Arena
Current Coaching Staff
Current head coach: Dana Altman (2010-present)
Assistant: Tony Stubblefield (2014-2022, 2024-present)
Assistant: Mike Mennenga (2014-present)
Assistant: Louis Rowe (2023-present)
Assistant: Brian Fish (2010-2014, 2022-present)
Director of Player Development: Kevin McKenna (2010-present)
Postseason Results
National Championships: 1 (1939)
Final Four Appearances: 2 (1939, 2017)
Elite Eight Appearances: 7 (1939, 1945, 1960, 2002, 2007, 2016, 20170
Sweet Sixteen Appearances: 8 (1960, 2002, 2007, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2021)
NCAA Tournament Appearances: 19 (1939, 1945, 1960, 1961, 1995, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007, 2008, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2021, 2024, 2025)
NCAA Tournament Overall Record: 28-18
NIT Championships: 0
NIT Appearances: 13 (1975, 1976, 1977, 1984, 1988, 1990, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2012, 2018, 2022, 2023)
NIT Overall Record: 17-14
CBI Championships: 1 (2011)
CBI Appearances: 1 (2011)
CBI Overall Record: 5-1
Conference Titles (PCC through Pac-12)
Big Ten Regular-Season Championships: 0
Big Ten Tournament Championships: 0
Pac-12 Regular-Season Championships: 8 (1919, 1939, 1945, 2002, 2016, 2017, 2020, 2021)
Pac-12 Tournament Championships: 6 (2003, 2007, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2024)
Award Winners
Naismith Player of the Year: 0
John R. Wooden Award: 0
Oscar Robertson Trophy: 0
AP All-Americans: 7 (Chris Duarte, 2021; Payton Pritchard, 2020; Dillon Brooks, 2017; Aaron Brooks, 2007; Luke Jackson, 2004; Ronnie Lee, 1975 & 1976 )
Pac-12 Players of the Year: 6 (Payton Pritchard, 2020; Dillon Brooks, 2017; Joe Young, 2015; Luke Ridnour, 2003; Terrell Brandon, 1991; Ronnie Lee, 1976)
Big Ten Players of the Year: None
Oregon Head Coaching Records
| Coach | Tenure | Record | Conf Titles |
NCAA Trips |
NCAA Titles |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dana Altman | 2010-Present | 370-162 | 4 | 10 | 0 |
| Ernie Kent | 1997-2010 | 235-173 | 1 | 5 | 0 |
| Jerry Green | 1992-1997 | 73-69 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Don Monson | 1983-1992 | 116-145 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Jim Haney | 1978-1983 | 53-82 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Dick Harter | 1971-1978 | 112-82 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Steve Belko | 1956-1971 | 179-211 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Bill Borcher | 1951-1956 | 69-68 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| John Warren | 1944-1945. 1947-1951 | 87-76 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Howard Hobson | 1935-1944, 1945-1947 | 212-124 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| William Reinhart | 1923-1935 | 180-101 | 0 | — | — |
| George Bohler | 1920-1923 | 37-39 | 0 | — | — |
| Shy Huntington | 1919-1920 | 8-9 | 0 | — | — |
| Dean Walker | 1918-1919 | 13-4 | 1 | — | — |
| Bill Hayward | 1909-1913 | 34-29 | 0 | — | — |
| Charles Murphy | 1907-1908 | 8-9 | — | — | — |
| Hugo Bezdek | 1906-1907, 1913-1917 | 17-35 | 0 | — | — |
| Walter Winslow | 1905-1906 | 0-5 | — | — | — |
| Charles Burden | 1902-1904 | 0-6 | — | — | — |
