Rick Barnes is adding a veteran coach to his Tennessee basketball staff. Former Illinois-Chicago head coach Steve McClain is joining Barnes staff as an assistant coach, On3’s Joe Tipton first reported and a source confirmed to RTI Saturday.
A 62-year old, McClain is a college basketball veteran who comes to Tennessee after spending the last three years on Rodney Terry’s staff at Texas. McClain spent five seasons as the head coach at Illinois-Chicago from 2015-20, inheriting a poor program and elevating them to the middle of the pack in the Horizon League.
The Iowa native also spent nine years as the head coach at Wyoming from 1998-07. McClain twice won the Mountain West Regular-Season Championship at Wyoming and led the Cowboys to the 2002 NCAA Tournament.
McClain also has assistant coaching experience TCU, Colorado, Indiana and Georgia. He was on Tom Crean’s staff both at Indiana and Georgia.
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Tennessee had an opening on its staff because assistant coach Lucas Campbell is moving into a Director of Player Personnel/Recruiting Coordinator role. Campbell will continue to play a major role in Tennessee’s high school and transfer portal recruiting, particularly in evaluating, while also working in player development alongside Bryan Lentz and Riley Collins.
The move is an additional shakeup to Rick Barnes’ staff this offseason. Assistant coach Rod Clark left for an assistant job at Indiana earlier this offseason with Tennessee tabbing Amorrow Morgan, who spent the last two seasons at Cal, as Clark’s replacement.
Barnes has no previous ties to McClain but Clark worked for him at UIC while McClain worked for former Barnes’ assistant Rodney Terry at Texas.
On the roster side, Tennessee has one scholarship to work with at the moment for the 2025-26 season. If the House Settlement passes Tennessee will then have three scholarships to work with.
