Phoenix Suns assistant coach Kevin Young has been hired as head coach at BYU, sources confirmed to Jake Fischer of Yahoo Sports.
Young fills the vacancy left by Mark Pope, who left BYU to replace John Calipari at Kentucky. Calipari left Kentucky to take the job at Arkansas. A native of Salt Lake City, Young returns to Utah, where he began his U.S. coaching career as an assistant at Utah State in 2007.
According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, Young will continue to coach the Suns through the NBA playoffs. The Suns earned the No. 6 seed in the Western Conference and will begin their first-round matchup against the No. 3 seed Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday. According to the report, Young will immediately begin assembling his BYU staff to kick-start recruiting.
Young, 42, spent eight seasons as an assistant coach in the NBA. He coached five seasons with the Philadelphia 76ers from 2016 to 2021 before joining Monty Williams’ staff in Phoenix as associate head coach in 2021. He retained his role with the Suns when Frank Vogel took over as head coach this season.
Before coaching in Philadelphia, Young spent eight seasons coaching in the NBA G League. He previously worked as an assistant at Oxford College in Atlanta from 2008 to 2009, after a year at Utah State.
Young takes over a BYU program that finished fifth in its first season in the Big 12 and entered the NCAA Tournament as a No. 6 seed. BYU’s tournament bid was the second in the past nine years.
Young was reportedly a candidate for multiple open positions during this hiring cycle. According to Wojnarowski, he also interviewed the Charlotte Hornets and Brooklyn Nets.
