Maybe Long Beach State should have fired Dan Monson sooner.
The longtime college basketball coach was canned Monday, when the school announced he would not be coming back for an 18th season.
Before he leaves, though, Monson is taking Long Beach State back to the NCAA tournament after an unlikely run in the Big West Conference Tournament.
The team had lost five games in a row prior to the start of the conference tourney before its fortunes turned.
Following wins over No. 5 UC Riverside and top-seeded UC Irvine, No. 4 Long Beach State beat second-seeded UC Davis Saturday night, 74-70, to advance to the Big Dance for the first time since 2012.
Long Beach State improved to 21-14
Monson has had considerable success in his career, first at Gonzaga, where he helped make the program into a national powerhouse — including an Elite Eight appearance in 1999.
He then went to Minnesota and got the Golden Gophers to the NCAA Tournament in 2005, but resigned in 2006 and moved to LBSU in 2007.
Monson, who said after Saturday’s game he’s not done coaching, has had mixed results there, but has five 20-win seasons.
On Monday, the school announced it had agreed to a “mutual separation” following a regular season in which LBSU went 10-10 in conference play and closed it out with that five-game losing streak.
Monson, though — LBSU’s all-time winningest coach — has once again proven to be able to find a way to win in March.
