Mark Slessinger resigns as New Orleans head coach, will take associate HC job at Indiana State

Mark Slessinger has resigned after eleven seasons as the head coach at New Orleans and will become the associate head coach for newly-hired Matthew Graves at Indiana State. Slessinger went 171-222 overall at UNO and took the Privateers to the NCAA Tournament in 2017, but has struggled recently with a combined 22-43 record over the last two years.

“I’d like to thank Coach Sless for taking over the program during a tumultuous time and leading the Privateers to the NCAA Tournament,” said UNO AD Tim Duncan. “He is a pillar in the community, recruited great young men who represented our University tremendously, and most importantly, he graduated 97% of his senior student-athletes. He is an Indiana native, so this is a great opportunity for him, Toni and their kids to move back to his home state to be closer to his parents and extended family.”

Slessinger, 49, is originally from Bloomington, IN and was a star player at Ellettsville HS (IN). This will be his first collegiate coaching job in his home state after spending the last 24 years in Louisiana, including eleven years on staff at Northwestern State.

The Sycamores are coming off their second-ever 30+ win season and first since the days of Larry Bird. Former head coach Josh Schertz left for Saint Louis after the team’s NIT final loss earlier this month and Graves was elevated to head coach after serving in the associate head coach role for the previous three seasons.

credit to New Orleans Athletics for the image