A veteran South Dakota college basketball coach is taking over the reins of the men's program at the University of North Dakota.

Former Black Hills State and most recently Northern State head coach Paul Sather takes over for Brian Jones in Grand Forks. After 13 seasons, Jones announced his departure from the Fighting Hawks program May 1 to become the associate head coach position at Illinois State.

Sather, a native of Princeton, Minnesota, has been a college coach for 22 years - 20 of those at South Dakota schools.

He assisted the late Don Meyer at Northern State (Sather's alma mater) for six years before taking the head coaching job at Black Hills State in 2005.

In Spearfish, Sather's teams posted a winning record five times, including a program-best 30 victory season in 2008-09.

The Yellow Jackets won two Dakota Athletic Conference titles and qualified for a pair of NAIA national tournaments during Sather's tenure, reaching the final four in 2009.

In 200, Sather returned to Aberdeen to become head coach at Northern State.

Over the next nine seasons, the Wolves qualified for three Division II national tournaments, losing in the national title game in 2018. Northern won the NSIC regular season and tournament titles in both the 2017-18 and 2018-19 seasons. Sather won coach of the year honors in the league both years.

Overall, Sather's teams are a combined 282-151 (.651).

He inherits a North Dakota program that went 12-18 overall last season and 6-10 in their first season in the Summit League.


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