Cal Basketball: Jim Knowlton Encouraged by Debuts of Mark Fox and Charmin Smith

Cal AD sees good things ahead for the men's and women's basketball teams

Photo courtesy of Cal Athletics

Neither the Cal men’s or women’s basketball teams could escape the second division of the Pac-12 Conference this season, but athletic director Jim Knowlton was encouraged by the work of both program’s first-year coaches.

Mark Fox guided the men to a 14-18 record, which represented a six-win improvement over each of the two previous seasons. The Bears tied for eighth place at 7-11 in Pac-12 play, on the heels of consecutive last-place finishes.

“I’m really proud of Mark Fox,” Knowlton said this week. “When I interviewed him, I felt like he was an incredible fit for Cal. He’s a blue collar, carry your lunch box to work guy. He’s leader who has been a successful head coach at multiple locations.

“I knew he would come in and change the culture. I’m so proud of Mark and our student-athletes and our fans who came back and supported them.”

Here's a different way of rating the performance of every Division I men's coach following the 2019-20 season.

Charmin Smith will welcome a top-10 national recruiting class to Cal next fall / Photo courtesy of Cal Athletics

The Cal women were 12-19 and finished last in the Pac-12 at 3-15. But first-year coach Charmin Smith, a former assistant to Lindsay Gottlieb, recruited well, assembling an incoming class that is ranked No. 7 and has four top-100 prospects according to espnW’s HoopGurlz rankings.

“I really really enjoyed Charmin as an assistant coach and I knew she was going to have a disciplined program,” Knowlton said. “I knew we had graduated or lost a lot of talent and other players were going to have to step up. I like the progress they made throughout the year and their recruiting.”

Knowlton said he has been very pleased by how all of Cal’s coaches have responded to the challenges of the campus shutdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I have to tell you this because I feel like a proud papa. I’ve really been impressed with the work our coaches have done to stay connected with their students-athletes,” he said. “Justin (Wilcox) talks with all of his players, just to hear their voice and see how they’re doing. You can imagine what a heavy lift that is.”

Wilcox’s team, coming off back-to-back bowl appearances, is enjoying a season-ticket renewal rate of more than 90 percent, “even with the pandemic,” Knowlton said.

“After the Axe was brought back to Cal (with a win over Stanford in the Big Game) and after the Redbox Bowl win over a Big Ten school, people see we’re moving in a good direction,” he said.

Knowlton refuses to accept that the Bears’ momentum will be halted current circumstances.

“The lights are going to come back on, I guarantee,” he said. “And we’ll be stronger than we were before.”

*** Mark Fox expresses his frustration with listening to so many naysayers about how bad his basketball team would be in 2019-20. He says he never bought it.