Will Wade, LSU Basketball Hires Elite Assistant Coach in Massive Move for the Staff

BATON ROUGE –– Damon Stoudamire, who played 13 seasons in the NBA and served as head coach at two universities, will serve as part of Coach Will Wade’s staff at LSU for the 2026-27 season.

Most recently, Stoudamire was the head coach of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets for three seasons (2023-26).

Stoudamire also was the head coach at Pacific (2016-21) and in 2020 was honored as the Ben Jobe National Coach of the Year, given annually to the top minority coach at the Division I level.

“We are happy to welcome Damon Stoudamire to the LSU Basketball family,” said Coach Wade. “His NBA success and his years of college basketball coaching experience brings a perspective to our coaching staff that will be very useful as we move forward.”

Stoudamire played at Arizona from 1991-95, winning 101 games for the Wildcats. The team won the 1994 and 1995 Pac-10 Conference championships and made a 1994 NCAA Final Four appearance. He was a consensus All-American First Team pick in 1994. The following year he was finalist for the John Wooden Award and was named Pac-10 Player of the Year.

Stoudamire finished his collegiate career ranked fifth on the Arizona career scoring list with 1,849 points and his 663 career assists were the second-most in the Lute Olson era. He was the first player in Arizona history to score 40 points in a single game twice and at the time one of only three Wildcats to score more than 600 points in a season twice.

Mighty Mouse. Mighty Hire.

Welcome to The Boot, Damon Stoudamire! pic.twitter.com/fzHdQvLXpv
— LSU Basketball (@LSUBasketball) April 13, 2026

He finished his career as the program record-holder with 272 three-point field goals. He still ranks in the top 10 on eight different program career charts.

Stoudamire was the seventh overall selection in the 1995 NBA Draft by the Toronto Raptors. In his 13 years he played for Toronto, Portland, Memphis and San Antonio, averaging a career 13.4 points, 6.1 assists and 3.4 rebounds in 879 contests.

In the 1995-96 season, Stoudamire averaged 19.0 points, a career-best 9.3 assists and 4.0 rebounds as he earned NBA Rookie of the Year honors. He also claimed the NBA Rookie All-Star Game MVP trophy that season. In his second NBA season, he averaged a career-high 20.2 points and also posted averages of 8.8 assists and 4.1 rebounds.

In his NBA career, Stoudamire played on six playoff teams, including five in his hometown of Portland. He led the 1999-2000 Blazers to the Western Conference finals, where they were defeated by the Los Angeles Lakers in seven games.

Stoudamire began his coaching career after his retirement, at Rice as director of player development in the 2008-09 season. He returned to the NBA for two years as an assistant coach for the Memphis Grizzlies. He then returned to college at the University of Memphis (2011-13), before a two-year stint at his alma mater, Arizona (2013-15).

During his time as an Arizona assistant, the Wildcats had back-to-back 30-win seasons, two Pac-12 regular-season titles, one Pac-12 tournament crown and back-to-back NCAA Elite Eight appearances.

Stoudamire would return to Memphis as an assistant for one year (2015-16) before his first head coaching assignment at Pacific at the start of the 2016-17 season.

His best season at Pacific was in 2020, when his team won 23 games and was 11-5 in the West Coast Conference, finishing in a tie for third.

After his Pacific stint, he came back to the NBA as an assistant for the Boston Celtics (2021-23) before being named head coach at Georgia Tech where in 2025, the Yellow Jackets made postseason in the NIT.

The Stoudamire College Coaching File
Year at LSU: First
Birthdate: September 3, 1973
City: Portland, Oregon
College: Arizona (played 1991-95, graduated 2008)
Family: Daughter – Kemeco; Sons – Damon, Brandon

College Coaching Experience
2008-09: Director of Player Development, Rice
2011-13: Assistant Coach, Memphis
2013-15: Assistant Coach, Arizona
2015-16: Assistant Coach, Memphis
2016-21: Head Coach, Pacific
2023-26: Head Coach, Georgia Tech
April 2026: Assistant Coach, LSU

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