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The Top 5 Notre Dame Basketball Coaches of All-Time

By Corbin Whitney

INDIANAPOLIS, IN - DECEMBER 16: Head coach Mike Brey of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish reacts against the Indiana Hoosiers during the Crossroads Classic at Bankers Life Fieldhouse on December 16, 2017 in Indianapolis, Indiana. Indiana won 80-77 in overtime. (Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images)
INDIANAPOLIS, IN - DECEMBER 16: Head coach Mike Brey of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish reacts against the Indiana Hoosiers during the Crossroads Classic at Bankers Life Fieldhouse on December 16, 2017 in Indianapolis, Indiana. Indiana won 80-77 in overtime. (Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images) /
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Legendary football coaches are part of the historical fabric of South Bend, but the Notre Dame basketball program has had its share of great leaders over the years as well.

Sure it doesn’t have 13 national championships to show off — or any for that matter — but that doesn’t mean the Notre Dame basketball program hasn’t had any success.

We’ll get into the specifics later on, but for now, here are the categories that determined the coaching ranking.

  1. Win Percentage
  2. Conference Titles
  3. All-Americans
  4. NCAA Tournament Appearances
  5. Regular Season Titles

Each of the coaches listed in the top five were ranked based on worst to best. To put it in simpler terms, the coach with the highest average score would be put in last place (5) and the coach with the lowest average score would be at number one.

While Notre Dame Men’s Basketball doesn’t compare to the likes of basketball powerhouses such as Duke, North Carolina, Kentucky, and so on, they still are able to compete with them, especially in recent years. But I don’t want to get ahead of myself, so lets go ahead and get into it.

5. Johnny Dee (1964 – 1971)

Overall Record: 116 – 80

Win Percentage: .592

Conference Titles: 0

All Americans: 1

NCAA Tournament Appearances: 4

Regular Season Titles: 0

While Dee’s record might not be the most impressive, he did win over 100 games and make the NCAA tournament four out of the seven seasons he coached the Irish. As you might have guessed, his win percentage earned him the last spot in that category.

Dee’s career at Notre Dame was also the shortest out of any coach on this list. One thing that hurt Dee’s overall score was his rank in the “Regular Season Titles” and “Conference Titles” categories, where he was apart of a four-way tie for the number two spot.

He couldn’t do anything about either of those categories, due to the fact that Notre Dame was not in a conference while he coached there.

Composite Score: 3.2