Iowa’s next men’s basketball coach doesn’t have to move too far.
The Hawkeyes are set to hire Drake coach Ben McCollum to replace Fran McCaffery, according to ESPN’s Pete Thamel and Jeff Borzello.
Sources: Iowa has agreed to a deal to make Drake coach Ben McCollum the school’s next coach, per me and @jeffborzello. He won four Division II national titles at Northwest Missouri State prior to leading Drake (31-4) to the NCAA Tournament in his lone season there. pic.twitter.com/UPjLeiQ8Um
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) March 24, 2025
McCollum spent just one season at Drake as the Bulldogs won the Missouri Valley Conference and upset Missouri in the NCAA tournament before losing to Texas Tech in the second round on Saturday.
Drake went 31-4 in 2024-25 as McCollum replaced Darian DeVries following the new Indiana coach’s departure to West Virginia. After DeVries left, much of the roster at Drake turned over and McCollum relied on many of his former players from Division II Northwest Missouri State.
Four of the team’s starters played for McCollum at NWMSU, including MVC player of the year Bennett Stirtz. The junior averaged over 19 points and nearly six assists a game.
Before going to Drake, McCollum, 43, was the head coach at Northwest for 15 seasons. After the Bearcats went 22-31 in his first two seasons, the school didn’t have a losing record in any of McCollum’s succeeding 13 seasons and became the dominant team at the Division II level. NWMSU won national titles in 2017, 2019, 2021 and 2022 and made the tournament in every year from 2014 through 2024.
In 2024-25, Drake was one of the stingiest defensive teams in the country and also one of the slowest teams. The Bulldogs ranked last in KenPom.com’s adjusted tempo rankings and allowed 58.4 points per game. Only Houston, a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament and the Big 12 champs, allowed fewer points per game.
McCaffery had been Iowa’s coach for the past 15 seasons. The Hawkeyes went to seven NCAA tournaments in that span but never made it past the first weekend of the tournament in any of them and failed to win 20 games in each of McCaffery’s last three seasons.
