It's Always 'Sunny' in Green Bay
- Kallie Snowtala
- Apr 27, 2023
- 2 min read
Updated: Apr 27, 2023
Written by: Kallie Snowtala
University of Wisconsin-Green Bay announced that they let go of former head coach for the men’s basketball team, Will Ryan, on January 24, 2023. This came as a shock to the city of Green Bay and the players. While the athletics department was on the search for a new head coach, assistant coach Freddie Owens stepped in and became interim head coach for the rest of the 2022-2023 season. When Will Ryan was released, he left with a 15-61 overall record.
Fast forward a few months and it’s time to bring the juice! Sundance Wicks, who came from Wyoming, will now be the ninth head coach that the Phoenix have seen. Some background on Wicks, or Sunny as he is referred to, is that he is a Gilliette, Wyoming native and he graduated from Northern State University in South Dakota. He lettered four times as a student athlete. He then went on to begin his coaching career as the graduate assistant at his alma mater shortly after.
Sunny has an interesting coaching history, starting in 2004. It all started with the graduate assistant position at Northern State University. Sunny then worked his way to the University of Colorado in 2006 where he became an assistant coach for the team. This only lasted for a season, when he made the switch to Northern Illinois University to be an assistant coach for four seasons. There was a break in the coaching career for Sunny in 2011-2015. During this time, he became the skill instructor for the Arizona Power Basketball Academy that he built. For a few months, he also spent training some athletes pre NBA draft in Las Vegas. Wicks got back into coaching collegiately in 2015 with the University of San Francisco, as an assistant coach and then after a season moved back to his alma mater, Northern State University, where he became an associate head coach. In 2018, Sunny was named the head coach of the Missouri Western State University Griffons. Before being named head coach at UWGB, he was the assistant coach for Wyoming from 2020-2023.
A few weeks after Wicks was named the head coach, he announced his assistant coaching staff for the 2023-2024 season. The assistant coaching staff will consist of Pat Monaghan, Zach Malvik, and Nic Renoylds, with Adam Owens being the Director of Basketball Operations.
Pat Monaghan is coming to the team with 17 years of prior coaching experience. The most recent being four years at Southern Illinois. He has also spent two years in the Horizon League, so he knows the conference. Zach Malvik will be bringing around 10 years of coaching experience to the team. Malvik has been selected as an All-American and MVP during his senior season. Nic Renoylds is fairly new to the coaching game. Coach Wicks seems to value his loyalty and how he shows the way for the team. For Adam Owens, he is returning to Green Bay, as he was the Director of Basketball Operations last season.
This upcoming season is set to be a big one with all of the transfers and the hopes that Sunny has for the team.
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