Arizona great Mike Bibby mentioned that embarking on his college coaching career at Sacramento State is “like having my start in basketball again,” while a guest Tuesday during the “Eye on the Ball” sports-talk radio show on Fox Sports 1450-AM.
“I love it. I mean, I waited so long. Everything is God’s timing, and I had to wait for that time to come. I’m glad it’s here,” said Bibby, who turned 47 on May 13, about six weeks after Sacramento State hired him.
The “Eye on the Ball” show, hosted by longtime local sportswriter and Arizona basketball book writer Steve Rivera, included Bibby answering questions from Rivera and guest host Dave Silver (a former television sports news broadcaster in Tucson) mostly about his hire at Sacramento State and the mutual respect in that community for the former Sacramento Kings star.
Since his 14-year NBA career ended in 2012, Bibby got into coaching within the AAU circuit and at his alma mater Phoenix Shadow Mountain High School. He also coached briefly at Hillcrest Prep in Phoenix. For the last couple of years, he has served as a television analyst for the Kings’ live gameday shows, and he has taken part in the Straight Game Podcast with former Arizona State player Eddie House and Las Vegas Aces assistant Ty Ellis.
Bibby also had recent assistant coaching stops with the Puerto Rican National Team, the Cleveland Cavaliers and Memphis Grizzlies summer league teams, and the NBA G-League Ignite.
A freshman point guard for Lute Olson when Arizona earned the national championship in 1996-97, Bibby was also asked about:
— the potential of “The Coach O Classic” taking shape involving Arizona and the schools where Olson’s former players are coaching — Bibby at Sacramento State, Josh Pastner at UNLV and Damon Stoudamire at Georgia Teach:
“We’re working on it. Hopefully, we can get that done sometime in the future. I think we name it after Coach O. You have Arizona and three other guys who played under Coach O who are head coaches right now. Have them come back and call it the Coach O Classic. We’ve been talking about hopefully getting something like that done in the future.”
— the rebuild he is undertaking at Sacramento State (7-25 last season under interim head coach Michael Czepil):
“We have everybody (players and coaches who are) new. I’m just teaching these guys the basic stuff that I want to see and to make them better if any of them go on to that next level, maybe overseas or the NBA. Just have them ahead of the eight ball for when they come out there to play, so coaches would be, ‘Okay, they’ve learned something.’ … They may give them the benefit of the doubt. We’re just trying on and off the court to give them a sense of kind of what I had coming out of college.
“I’m looking at everything. I mean, I go as far as after Lute, just giving these guys the confidence and letting them play, letting them do what I recruit them for. You’ve got a lot of these college coaches that will bring a kid in, watch him all his high school time or wherever he’s playing at, and recruit him, and then when he comes to play there, he’s doing the stuff that you saw him doing and you stop him from doing it. I’m just giving them the confidence. Coach O used to just let us play to our strengths and that’s what made us so good.
“I’m just doing it how I see fit. I got my coaches and myself. We’re a big hand on what the team was picked. I give a lot of credit to my assistant coaches. I’ve gotten so much film on kids. I can’t look at 400 things of film, so I pass them to my guys, and they’ve come through. We’ve got the best of the best (players) that we’ve looked through.”
Bibby’s father, Henry Bibby, was a coach at USC following his storied playing career with UCLA and the Philadelphia 76ers. Well-documented to be closer to his mother, Virginia, who raised him, Mike Bibby spoke in reverence of Olson and his development as a player and coach throughout the interview with Rivera and Silver.
“(Olson) was great. He gave us the confidence we needed to be successful. We got in the (NCAA) tournament (in 1997) and we almost lose the first two games. He pulled me in front of the team and said, ‘Mike, I need you to play like we need you to play — like you.’ Ever since he said that, you can see how things opened up starting at the Kansas (Sweet 16) game for me. I just got better as time went on.”
@mikebibbycom pic.twitter.com/PMSD36CMRr
— Arizona Athletics (@AZATHLETICS) November 23, 2024
— the Hornets’ move from the Big Sky to the Big West in the 2026-27 school year:
“It’s going to be good. It’s going to help us out a lot with travel. We won’t have to travel as far. It will give us a lot of California teams to play. This is my first season, so I don’t really know traveling to Utah games or Colorado games that we have (in the Big Sky) and so on and so on. But I’m just ready to play. I don’t care if they send us overseas. As long as we don’t have to boat overseas, I’m okay with wherever we’ve got to play. I’m just ready to play this thing.”
— the program’s facility enhancements:
“We’ve got a new arena (The Well, a 3,200-seat events center). We’re doing the practice locker room, the training room, the weight room … just to give these guys a sense of a high-profile college. We don’t have as much money as these other schools that spend $8 million on their stuff, but we’re doing what we’ve got to do. It’s going to help with recruiting. It’s going to help us all the way around. (Sacramento State president) Dr. Luke Wood and (athletic director) Mark Orr are coming through big time to help us on that.”
— the addition of Shaquille O’Neal as general manager:
“We’re working. Shaq’s done a lot for us. It was an easy goal for Shaq. A couple of weeks in, a month or so in (following Bibby’s hire as head coach), I just called him and said, ‘Hey, what do you think about becoming the general manager?’ He was like, ‘I like that. Just let me know what it entails and what you want me to do.’ I mean, it was that simple. I’m always asked, ‘Hey, what does Shaq do?’ I always tell them, ‘You’ve got to let Shaq be Shaq.’ You can’t tell Shaq what to do. He’ll do what he wants to do. You just have to be glad he’s there. … He’s super silly. He’s a kid at heart. He’s the best center to play the game. Just to have him be around the kids and me to be around the kids, just to show these kids what success is and try to lead them in the right direction (is beneficial). A lot of these kids are coddled today. I said to my team today, ‘That’s not something I’m gonna do.’ I’m going to be a father figure to them, help them grow as a person, help them grow as a young man and help them grow as a player. That’s what I’m here to do.”
O’Neal’s son Shaqir is a senior forward from Florida A&M who transferred to Sacramento State after Bibby’s hire.
#StingersUp pic.twitter.com/c8n5Qhcjsi
— Sacramento State Men's Basketball (@SacHornetsMBB) April 1, 2025
— his son Michael’s role as associate head coach:
“He’s doing great. That means a lot to me. He always wanted to play basketball. He figured out it was time. He was having problems with his back. He’s a great coach. He runs the practice and stuff when I’m gone. I give him like three or four years and I could see him being a head coach himself.”
— Sacramento’s love for him:
“The community is great. The community has been always great here. You would think I got done playing here last year the way everybody shows me love out here. That was one of the reasons why I wanted to get traded here and come play here. That was one of the biggest reasons, the fans. It was the fans and the style of play that Sacramento played. Every city likes to see a winner. Once we get this thing going and get this thing on the winning side, it’s going to be ours to lose.”
— finally getting his break to be a head coach of a college program:
“I’m blessed. I’m very happy and I’m blessed. Coming here, it was God’s timing. I tried to get this job four years or maybe five years ago, I don’t know how long it was when it first opened up and it didn’t happen. I was at the press conference and just standing there and was like, ‘Ok.’ I remember processing a lot of people getting jobs and wondering why I couldn’t. God was holding this spot for me. This is a perfect spot for me. It’s a second home to me. I played here for 6 1/2 years. It was half of my NBA career. I’m comfortable here. I have to feel comfortable in a comfortable situation in order to be successful. I have a lot of family and friends who are still here. The fans are great here. They treat me great. It’s good to be here. I’m glad to have my start here. It’s kind of like having my start in basketball again. Playing in Vancouver for three years, people forgot I played because people never really saw us play. Coming here rejuvenated my NBA career so it’s great to have a start here.”
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator in 2016 and is presently a special education teacher at Sunnyside High School in the Sunnyside Unified School District.
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