STANFORD – Kyle Smith remembers an argument he had in a bar in 2004, after someone said Mike Montgomery had just made a great move by leaving Stanford to coach the Golden State Warriors.
Smith disagreed, saying Montgomery already had the best job in the country.
Twenty years later, that “best job” now belongs to Smith, who was formally introduced as the men’s basketball coach at a press conference on Stanford’s campus Wednesday.
“I’ve been saying that this is the best job, period, and I meant that sincerely, and that was before Coach Montgomery got (Stanford) to No. 1 in the country,” Smith said. “You don’t understand, those people are elite. They’re workers. They’re achievers.”
Washington State head coach Kyle Smith watches the first half of an NCAA college basketball game against Washington, Thursday, March 7, 2024, in Pullman, Wash. (AP Photo/Young Kwak)
Smith arrived from Washington State, where he was named Pac-12 Coach of the Year after a 25-10 season that ended in the second round of the NCAA Tournament – an event Stanford hasn’t appeared in since 2014.
Washington State had experienced seven straight losing seasons before Smith’s arrival, but the Cougars went .500 or better in each of their first four seasons under Smith.
Now Stanford is hoping for a similar turnaround. The Cardinal finished 14-19 (7-13 Pac-12) and have already lost their three top expected returners to the transfer portal – leading scorer and rebounder Maxime Raynaud, and top freshmen Andrej Stojakovic and Kanaan Carlyle.
Unless Smith can convince one of them to come back, Stanford’s entire starting five will be new next season.
“There’s guys in the portal?” Smith said. “I’m like, great, who cares? This is Stanford. We’re going to be OK. Things are going to be OK. We’re going to get people that want to be here. Worry more about the ones we have, not the ones we don’t, has been the mantra.”
The Cougars were picked to finish 10th in the Pac-12 this past season, but a team with nine new players ended up in second place.
Still, Smith will have more obstacles at Stanford than most other coaches at power conference schools when it comes to rebuilding, including restrictive transfer policies. He had already spoken with women’s coach Tara VanDerveer, who asked him to point out how the programs could benefit if more graduate transfers were admitted.
USC women’s basketball had transfers from Columbia, Penn and Harvard on their Pac-12 tournament title team this year, who were unavailable to VanDerveer.
“I do believe kids that are graduating from Ivy League schools would probably be good graduate school candidates (at Stanford),” Smith said. “I don’t know. Are we that hard? We might be.”
Athletic director Bernard Muir told the Bay Area News Group Wednesday that the issue of grad transfers is still something “we have to figure out as an institution,” but that adjustments are possible.
Smith acknowledged that Stanford also won’t be able to offer as much NIL money as other schools, but hopes Stanford’s unique qualities will make up for it.
“The reason I’m attracted to this place is people are going to be at Stanford not for the dollars they can earn in NIL,” Smith said. “Hopefully it’s for the degree, for the experience, for lifetime relationships, and we’ve got to keep selling that to the players in the program, or the people in the portal.”
Smith hopes another selling point is his use of analytics in order to improve performance, which he thinks will appeal to players with a growth mindset. In practice he tracks about 60 different stats in order to compute a player’s HPPP (hustle points per possession).
“That’s how we measure how hard you’re competing, and it’s quantifying the intangible things that help us win,” Smith said. “I imagine the players here would like it. They’d want to know, ‘what do I have to do to get better?’ ”
Smith must also navigate Stanford’s first season in the Atlantic Coast Conference and all the cross-country travel and unfamiliar opponents that will come with it. He admits his opinion on Stanford’s move to the ACC changed this week.
“When I was at Washington State I thought it was silly, and then when I got the job, I’m like, that’s awesome,” Smith said. “I mean that. I was like, man, Cameron Indoor Arena? Syracuse is in that league, too. I’m not looking forward to going to the Carrier Dome in the middle of winter, but it’s awesome, to be honest. They care about basketball. This is Tobacco Road. It’s a big-time deal. It’s awesome.”
While Smith cracked jokes through the press conference, he choked up when discussing having the Stanford Autism Center as a resource for his son, Bo, who is on the autism spectrum.
It was yet another reason he said it only took one conversation with Muir – and a call from Condoleeza Rice – to accept the job after the Cougars were eliminated on Saturday night.