Clemson basketball: 2nd assistant departs, questions remain

Clemson basketball lost it’s second assistant coach in two weeks over the weekend. This time it’s Kareem Richardson, who after just one year on Brad Brownell’s staff, is leaving for North Carolina State and Kevin Keatts’ program.

Keatts and Richardson were on the same staff at Louisville before each became a head coach at other institutions, so there is a pre-existing connection between the two.

Dick Bender is Brownell’s lone remaining assistant coach and Brownell appears to be in no hurry to replace the departed assistants.

It’s been a turbulent offseason as Brownell has lost two players to the transfer portal and two coaches to other programs.

In a 43 minute video last week Brownell defended the state of his program and their accomplishments in his tenure, at one point pointing out how many seasons the team has ended with a winning record.

While it’s factually true that Brownell has had 11 winning records in 12 years with the Tigers, it should be noted that five of those seasons were winning records by exactly one game, meaning one game going the other way would result in a losing record for that year.

Yet with all the winning seasons and defense of the program, the fact remains that 12 years in this is a program in flux and one that has has lost two veteran guards and two assistant coaches in the last couple of weeks..

Perhaps the player transfers can be explained away by the Tigers attempting to get bigger at the guard position and a recent transfer in lends credence to that theory.

There is an attempt to explain Antonio Reynolds Dean departure as “going home”, “a promotion” and a great opportunity, which is hard to disagree with on the surface.

I predicted, and have already heard, the Richardson move is along the lines of familiarity and history with Keatts’ from their time together at Louisville.

That all could very well be true, but I also can’t help but wonder if there’s some underlying concern about the longevity of the Brownell regime at Clemson that at least played a part in these decisions.

To be clear, assistant coaches move often at the college level, but to lose two assistants within a week when you are publicly defending your program isn’t exactly the look of a program on steady ground.

These are not coaches leaving to take head coaching jobs or coaches being asked to leave to my knowledge.  These coaches are opting to leave prior to what amounts to a critical season in the Brownell era at Clemson.

Whether it’s stated or implied, that speaks volumes.