Air Force hires a coach and Saint Louis fires one; USC's Young going pro

Air Force turned to a familiar face to fill its coaching vacancy and Saint Louis fired its coach after five seasons without an NCAA tournament bid.

The Falcons promoted Reynolds, an assistant the last two seasons, to head coach on Tuesday. He replaces good friend Jeff Bzdelik, who left for Colorado in early April.

The 50-year old Reynolds was all set to follow Bzdelik to Boulder as an assistant. Reynolds had already cleaned out his desk at Air Force, said his goodbyes and moved all his personal belongings into his new confines at Colorado. He'd even been given a new wardrobe of Colorado clothing.

But then Falcons athletic director Hans Mueh called Sunday morning to make him the seventh basketball coach in program history.

So now he's trying to find time to sneak back up to Boulder and clean out his Colorado office.

"We knew we had a gem in our backyard," said Mueh, who interviewed close to a dozen applicants, including assistants Larry Mangino and A.J. Kuhle.

Saint Louis coach Brad Soderberg was fired after five seasons, a move tied to the school's new $80.5 million arena under construction and his failure to produce an NCAA tournament bid.

The school announced the move in a statement, saying the success of the Chaifetz Arena, scheduled to open for the 2008-09 season, was contingent on a program that could contend for conference championships.

Later Tuesday, Angres Thorpe was made interim coach. Thorpe has been an assistant at Saint Louis since 2002 and was Soderberg's lead assistant in 2006-07.

Saint Louis was 20-13 last season, Soderberg's first 20-win season and the school's first 20-win season since 1997-98, and finished in the middle of the pack in the Atlantic-10 Conference. But the Billikens haven't made it to the NCAA tournament since 2000.

Also on the college coaching front, Oral Roberts coach Scott Sutton agreed to a seven-year contract extension, less than a week after he withdrew from consideration for the Wichita State job.

Sutton is the second-winningest coach in school history with a 144-102 record in eight seasons.

"We believe Scott Sutton is one of the finest coaches in the country, and we want him as part of the ORU family for a long time," athletic director Mike Carter said.