February 23, 2010

Stubbs was appointed to the head coaching position mid-year after Coach Curt Jensen stepped down. He was Jensen’s assistant. His first game as head coach was a road trip to College of Southern Idaho.

This was my worst memory about coaching at Eastern Utah. We lost to Southern Idaho by 40 points. Joey Johnson was at CSI and had a 44-inch vertical leap. I knew then I had to work harder at recruiting better players."

On the other side of the coin, his best memory was beating Southern Idaho by one point at home a few years later. The best season his team had was posting a 26-5 record. "That was exciting," he smiled.

"I didn’t have an assistant for the first couple of years so Bob Potts helped me coach. Then Athletic Director Bill Peterson found some funding for me to hire a coach and I selected Guy Beach from Weber State," he said.

With Stubbs in the driver’s seat and Beach in the passenger seat, Eastern Utah basketball continued to get better every year with continuous 20-plus wins each season.

"I remember the fire marshal threatened to close down the BDAC because we had too many people in the gymnasium. Every seat in the house was used and there was standing room only for Southern Idaho games," he smiled. "We had 10,000 people in Orem watching us play Utah Valley and 5,000 in St. George watching us play Dixie. It was an incredible run while I was coaching here."

He remembers a lot of four-year college and university coaches in the stands at the games looking at recruiting his players. Milwaukee Buck’s Calvin Sampson was at Washington State, Chicago’s Tim Floyd was at Iowa State as well as Villanova’s Rollie Massimino who was at University of Nevada at Las Vegas, all sat in the BDAC watching Stubbs’ players.

"There was a lot of support from the community because I graduated from CEU and Southern Utah University. I had come back to Price to teach and coach at Notre Dame Jr. High. He remembers when "little" NDJH won the Carbon and Emery championship with Tim Peczuh, Frank Campagni, Frank Kraync, Mark Badovinac, Donavon Dunbar and Mike Beacco on the team. He spent four years there and said he taught a lot of the community’s children during that time.

Still remaining in close contact with Richard and Marsha Lee, Stubbs admitted that Richard was the father figure he never had. Marsha was like my mother. Together they always took care of me and my players. Richard even went on recruiting trips with me. If I needed something, the Lees were always there for me. He also remembers Jerry Carlson always in the background assisting him on numerous fronts.

He says he has a special place in his heart for all of his players throughout the years, but when putting his all-time favorite team together he would bring in Kris Hill at center with Eric Talley and Junsie Cotton as shooting guards. His big guard would be William Allen. Antoine Davidson and Johnny Selvie would be his forwards. On his bench would be Jermaine Haliburton, Jason Martin and Kelvin Lee, all guards.

"Coaching at CEU was the most fun I have ever had in my life. I loved the challenge and especially going against Dixie, Snow and Salt Lake Community College in recruiting players," he said. "It really was a good time in my life."

After leaving CEU, Stubbs coached at Midland Community College, a powerhouse in JC basketball; Loyola Marymount, a D-I school and in Ecuador, a junior national basketball league. He resides in Salt Lake City where he coaches at West High School.