After a roller coaster start to the offseason, the 2025 men’s college basketball coaching carousel has officially cooled off. Minnesota was one of more than 50 Division I programs to hire a new head coach, and Niko Medved is viewed as one of the best hires of the cycle.
National college basketball podcast, Three Man Weave, does a coaching hire report card episode every year, and they grade every single hire. Minnesota’s decision to hire Medved was one of the few A grades they gave out on the episode.
“A. Niko is great, although Ben (Johnson) was really good too. I maybe, should’ve gone B here, because Minnesota has been pissing me off, how they basically just didn’t give Ben Johnson any support and now they’re going to give all the support to Niko,” Matt Cox said. “Niko is a good coach, and I hope this is kind of a homecoming, a perfect marriage type of reunion here.”
The @3MW_CBB podcast unanimously gave the Gophers an A for the Niko Medved hire in their annual Coaching Hire Report Cards episode. pic.twitter.com/dhyPQMe56l
— Tony Liebert (@TonyLiebert) April 28, 2025
“I did like Ben Johnson, but I think his time ran out,” Ky McKeon said. “This is an obvious hire. An alum. He built Furman up, he built Furman. Solid year at Drake and then three NCAA Tournaments at Colorado State. It’s an A for me as well.”
The podcast does its best to grade on a bell curve scale. They hand out only a certain amount of each letter grade. Another notable hire that they are big fans of is Ben McCollum at Iowa. Nevertheless, Medved was an obvious but needed hire, and it has been well perceived among college basketball circles.
“A for me, straight across the board,” Jim Root said. “I mean, you’ve got an alum, that matters a little bit, I think, when it’s a guy you want to try and retain at a school of this level, and he’s just won like crazy.
Medved has rebuilt Minnesota’s roster through the transfer portal with seven new additions, and he has finalized his first coaching staff. The next step is to prove things on the court, but the national media seems to think the Gophers have hired the right guy for the job.
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