Stew Morrill

Stew Morrill

Stewart "Stew" Morrill (born July 25, 1952) is an American college basketball coach and the current head coach of the Utah State University men's basketball team. Morrill was an All-American at Ricks College and a two-time All-Big Sky selection for Gonzaga University. He started his coaching career in 1974 as an assistant at Gonzaga and later for the University of Montana under Mike Montgomery. In 1987, he became the head coach of the Grizzlies and led them to an NCAA berth in 1991. Morrill coached at Colorado State University from 1992 to 1998 before resigning and taking his current coaching job at Utah State University.

Morrill and Utah State gained national attention in March 2001 for their upset overtime victory over Ohio State 77–68 in the NCAA Tournament.

On January 17, 2008, in an 82–78 victory over Boise State University, Morrill logged his 226th Aggie victory, passing E. Lowell Romney to become the winningest coach in Utah State basketball history.

Morrill has a record of 542–241 overall (.692), and 324–103 (.759) with Utah State. His 500th win came in a victory in Moscow, Idaho, on January 23, 2010 over Idaho, which is coached by his former assistant, Don Verlin. He has also racked up an incredible home record of 193–13 (.937) in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum as coach of the Aggies. Following a March 8, 2009 victory over San Jose State University, Stew Morrill became the only coach in Utah State history to have back-to-back undefeated seasons at home, extending the streak to 34 straight home wins. He is also the only Utah State coach to win thirty games in one season, a feat he accomplished in the 2008–09 season, and the 2010-11 season. During the 2009–10 season, he became the only Utah State basketball coach to win three straight regular season conference championships. The next year, he won his fourth straight regular season conference championship. Although he has a very impressive regular season record, he has the second worst tournament record in NCAA history 1-9 (.111) for any coach that has made the NCAA tournament five or more times. He also has a record of 0-6 in the NIT tournament.

With Morrill at the helm, the Aggies are one of only three Division I teams to have won at least 23 games in each of the last twelve seasons. The other schools are Gonzaga and Kansas. Over the past eleven years, Utah State (.764) has the fourth-best winning percentage in the nation behind Duke (.831), Kansas (.809) and Gonzaga (.799).

Utah State head coach Stew Morrill currently has five former assistants who are head coaches at the Division I level, which ranks tied for the fourth-most by any current Division I coach in college basketball.

Blaine Taylor, an assistant to Morrill for 5 seasons at Montana is the current head coach at Old Dominion University.
Randy Rahe, an assistant to Morrill for 13 seasons at USU and Colorado State is the current head coach at Weber State University.
Don Verlin, another assistant is the current University of Idaho head coach.
Jeff Jackson, also an assistant at Colorado State is the current head coach at Furman University.
Dave Rice, an assistant for Morrill for one season at USU, now at the UNLV

All of his former assistants have had immediate success at their respective schools.

Morrill is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

When the PA announcer says his name the fans chant, "Stew!"