Tom Kleinschmidt should be the call at DePaul
The Blue Demons can find a brighter future by looking to their past.
DePaul University finally pulled the plug on Dave Leitao this past Monday, as new athletic director DeWayne Peevy parted ways with the head men’s basketball coach he inherited when he replaced Jean Lenti Ponsetto.
“After evaluating where our men’s basketball program is currently and where we envision it to be moving forward, a decision was made to make a change in the head coaching position,” Peevy said in a statement.
Since 2015, when Leitao began his second stint at DePaul, the Blue Demons have been one of the biggest laughingstocks in the country. They finished last in the Big East each of the past five seasons—2018-19 being the outlier— yet somehow Leitao was given an extension last spring through 2024, though it included no buyout.
Via his statement Monday, Peevy noted the program will conduct a national search for its next head coach. He doesn’t even need to look outside the city limits, though, to find someone capable of building this program back up the right way.
His first phone call should be to Tom Kleinschmidt, who starred for the Blue Demons from 1991-95 and was the program’s first-ever conference player of the year and three-time first-team all-Great Midwest Conference selection.
Kleinschmidt—who was his alma mater’s Director of Basketball Operations for one year under then-head coach Jerry Wainwright—is the current coach at Chicago’s DePaul College Prep High School, where he played when it was known as Gordon Tech. He has held that position since April 2012.
Full disclosure: I attended DePaul for undergraduate and graduate school. I’ve also been lucky enough to cover college athletics over the last decade-plus, starting with football on a full-time basis and adding men’s basketball along the way. If anything, I have been extra critical of my alma mater. Through it all, I’ve had the opportunity to remain close to the program—sometimes over a $2 Coors Light at Halligan Bar on Lincoln or $3 Rolling Rock at McGee’s Tavern & Grille on Webster—but also through covering games in Rosemont and most recently at the beautiful new Wintrust Arena that deserves to house winning basketball.
Hiring a high school coach who has never been the head man at the college level would typically raise eyebrows, but Kleinschmidt—Mr. Blue Demon—is just what DePaul needs after having yet to establish itself as an even mediocre program in the revamped Big East.
Kleinschmidt has shined at one alma mater, and he would have the chance to do it again.
When reached for comment on whether he would entertain the possibility of the gig if Peevy inquired, Kleinschmidt said he would be glad to speak about the opening but declined to comment further. Names such as Porter Moser, Dennis Gates and Kenny Payne have been mentioned at various outlets as potential names that could be involved in this search. Those are credible options, but no one would know the situation he was walking into better than Kleinschmidt.
This is a program that had sustained success from the late 1970s through the 1980s. But since the Demons made the Big Dance in 1992, they have only been able to enjoy the Madness just twice thereafter: in 2000 and 2004. That’s flat-out unacceptable.
On Tuesday, Peevy said he wants someone with experience as a college head coach or assistant. Kleinschmidt, of course, doesn’t check those boxes. But he also said something else.
“If you’re a coach that’s a candidate for this job, you better have connections to Chicago recruiting, period—whether you’re from here or you’ve signed kids from Chicago or not,” Peevy said. “You’re not a high-level recruiter if you’re not recruiting Chicago, in my opinion.”
He’s absolutely right, and Kleinschmidt knows the city of Chicago like the back of his hand.
Quite often a conversation about DePaul basketball turns into one about what Loyola (Chicago)—a fellow private university—has managed to do in recent years in the Missouri Valley, with the Cinderella run to the Final Four being one of the city’s finest sports moments. Its head coach has been able to forge an identity with the Ramblers. It’s been a very long time since DePaul hoops had a calling card.
If DePaul truly wants to become a consistent, above-.500 program in the Big East, it needs to turn back the clock. Available is a coach who has rebuilt a program that had lost 36 Chicago Catholic League games in a row prior to his arrival. Available is a coach who has established relationships with fellow coaches across the Chicagoland high school landscape. Available is a coach whose passion for his alma mater just may be the tonic for a fledgling collegiate program in the middle of a world-class city.
He has proven to be a very good coach whose players love playing for him, and he has a passion for the school that no other viable candidate could match.
The easiest decision of Peevy’s career was moving on from Leitao. Perhaps an equally simple choice is bringing in Kleinschmidt to re-establish the DePaul hoops brand on a national stage.
Follow me on Twitter @Miller_Dave & email me at david.matthew.miller@gmail.com