WSU Basketball: Ken Bone and Bill Moos to Meet Soon, Coach Staying or Going?

Mar 3, 2013, Seattle, WA, USA; Washington State Cougars head coach Ken Bone watches game play against the Washington Huskies during the second half at Alaska Airlines Arena. Mandatory Credit: Joe Nicholson-USA TODAY Sports

It’s been a long conversation going into the offseason of Washington State Cougar basketball, will the current head coach be able to retain his job. Even more pressing, if Bill Moos wanted to let him go and change coaches, could Washington State afford it? Either way Bill Moos meets with each of his coaches at the end of the season, and he said it could happen with Ken Bone as soon as today, but more likely sometime at the end of this week or early next week.

The guaranteed contract conversation has been a hot topic, but Moos said recently that’s not necessarily a piece that will be reviewed all that much when considering the move one way or another. Also he said last month that he hasn’t decided yet whether he will retain Bone. However Moos definitely put into play that the after-season meeting is a big part of the process, so Bone could win him or lose him during the meeting theoretically.

Of course Ken Bone has 3 years remaining on his guaranteed contract, worth around $850,000 per year. After this 13-19 season, the pot has boiled over within the Cougar community on the retention of the basketball coach. The Cougars are now 26-46 in conference play under Bone, while he’s compiled a 70-65 record overall.

Personally, I’ve had a cold, colder, warmer relationship with my thoughts on keeping Bone. I really hated what was happening through the season, but after the UCLA/USC weekend, I changed my view. Part of that was the fact I didn’t see him going anywhere at the time, but the other part was that I saw a change in the way the Cougars approached a basketball game. They didn’t play any harder or anything like that, but the entire offense changed, which intrigued me.

Even during the loss to Washington during the first round of the Pac-12 tournament, I saw flashes of a fun, team oriented offense. In turn it began to be a defensive fire-starter and they played well at times. If that stayed I would be an advocate for his retention, but if it’s going to revert back to old Bone basketball with his new athletes coming in, I would like to move on if it was an option. There’s no way to know unless I was in that meeting between Bone and Moos, but we know Moos wants to win now. We’ll see how he decides will be the best way to accomplish that.

Go Cougs!