The Seton Hall men’s basketball program took a bit over a week to fill its assistant coaching void, announcing on Thursday evening that Tony Skinn will join head coach Kevin Willard’s staff as an assistant coach.
“We are very excited to welcome Tony, his wife Weyni, and their sons, Isaiah and Liam, to the Seton Hall basketball family,” Willard said in a statement. “Tony has had great success both as a student-athlete and as a coach and, with his work in recruiting and skill development, he will bring a hard-working mentality that meshes well with our team’s identity.”
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Photo via Twitter/CoachTonySkinn[/caption]
Over the last three years, Skinn was an assistant coach in Eric Konkol’s staff at Louisiana Tech. The two trace back to George Mason’s miraculous run to the Final Four in 2006, wherein Konkol coached Skinn in his senior season, a year he averaged 12.6 points, 3.5 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game.
Skinn enjoyed a professional career in Europe, which was fittingly punctuated in London where he helped his native Nigeria defeat the Dominican Republic to earn the final spot in the 2012 Summer Olympics.
After ending his professional playing career, Skinn became the athletic director for Paul International High School in the city he grew up in, Washington, D.C., in addition to serving as an assistant coach for NIKE Team Takeover, one of the top AAU teams in the nation.
Skinn was brought onto the Louisiana Tech staff in 2015, helping the Bulldogs to consecutive 23-win seasons, before a six-win dip this past season.
In a conversation with Gannett New Jersey, Skinn expressed his excitement about returning to the northeast, and specifically, a conference as cemented in college basketball lore as the Big East.
“I’m an East coast kid,” Skinn told Gannett New Jersey. “I’m from D.C., grew up watching Georgetown. You say, ‘Big East’ and I get excited, like I have some eligibility left.”
Skinn helps fill the void of former Seton Hall associate head coach Shaheen Holloway, who was hired as the head coach of Saint Peter’s on April 11. Holloway played an integral part in recruiting during his eight years on the Seton Hall staff, and Skinn will likely be looked to in continuing the program’s momentum in securing dynamic recruits.
James Justice can be reached at james.justice@student.shu.edu or on Twitter @JamesJusticeIII.
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