Alex Taylor: Taylor Wicks was the perfect hire for UW hoops

May 14—No one knows how to fire up a group of Wyomingites better than a fellow Wyomingite.

Sundance Wicks said all the right things after being hired as the 23rd men's basketball coach in University of Wyoming history Sunday afternoon. The Gillette native replaces Jeff Linder, who left UW for an assistant coaching job at Texas Tech after four seasons with the Cowboys.

"If there is one thing I learned growing up in Wyoming, it's that when you honor the brown and gold, you are honoring so much more than just the University of Wyoming," Wicks said in a news release. "You are honoring every single hardhat that woke up before the sun to work the coal mines. It means paying your respects to all the rough-and-rowdy ranchers that chose 'The Cowboy Way' and rode for the brand before it became a popular phrase.

"Honoring the brown and gold is the understanding that a tip of the cap, a steering wheel wave, a hard handshake or a big hug is how you lift your people up in support of a hard day's work."

Wicks is coming off an 18-14 season and a 13-7 mark in the Horizon League during his first season as a Division I head coach at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

Wicks won the Horizon League coach of the year award and was also named the Joe B. Hall national coach of the year, which honors the best first-year head coach in Division I basketball.

In Wicks' first season at the helm, the Phoenix saw an improvement of 15 wins from the previous season.

Born in Gillette, Wicks won two Class 4A state titles at Campbell County and won the Milward Simpson athlete of the year award in 1999.

He left a head coaching job at Missouri Western to join Linder's staff as an assistant at UW in 2020. He spent three seasons as an assistant in Laramie before being hired at Green Bay.

"You cannot put into words what it means for a kid from the country roads outside of Gillette to represent the state of Wyoming and the Cowboys as their new head basketball coach," Wicks said.

Wicks seemed to be the consensus choice among UW fans following Linder's departure. I asked Cowboys fans who they wanted athletics director Tom Burman to hire as the program's next head coach last week.

Out of 365 votes, Wicks garnered 56%. Ken DeWeese, Linder's associate head coach at UW, earned 21%, followed by "other" at 18% and University of Northern Colorado's Steve Smiley at 5%.

In another poll following the hiring of Wicks on Sunday, I asked UW fans how they felt about the Cowboys' newest head coach. Out of 438 votes, a resounding 83.8% voted "positive." Another 7.3% were "undecided," 5.7% were "indifferent" and only 3.2% were "negative."

Safe to say, the Wicks hire was satisfactory for the majority of Cowboys fans.

The hire seems to be the best of both worlds, as being the head man in Laramie is something Wicks has been chasing throughout his two-decade coaching career.

"The dream is always different, vastly different than the reality," Wicks told Ryan Thorburn of UW's Pokes Insider on Tuesday. "Why people actually dream is they think of all these grandiose things and all these ideas. But the reality is, once you get it, there's work to be done.

"I think what's going to make it so special is we're going to be grounded in the reality of work. Every single day for us is going to be the Wyoming way; just getting up and going to work and doing your job. Show up with great energy, enthusiasm, juice and do the right work.

"I think in Wyoming, it's important to do the right work. You can't spin your wheels. That's the reality is there's a lot of stuff that we have to do right now to get us on the right path to, one, unite the state and, two, connect our program more to the community and the culture that is honoring the brown and gold."

Wicks has plenty of work ahead of him between putting a staff together and simultaneously hitting the recruiting trail.

UW lost five commitments following the news of Linder's departure last week, including incoming transfers Yuto Yamanouchi-Williams (University of Portland), Tyree Ihenacho (North Dakota) and Obi Agbim (Fort Lewis College), as well as incoming freshmen Olver Faubert (Ottawa, Ontario) and Dominic Pangonis (Burlington, Ontario).

The Cowboys now have six open scholarships, with only three scholarship players set to return from last year's roster. The returners include guards Kobe Newton and Nigle Cook and forward Oleg Kojenets.

Wicks' deep roots in the state of Wyoming could play a big part in UW's continuous battle for relevance in the name, image and likeness era. His passion on the bench and willingness to connect with people in the community could also be a big factor when it comes to home attendance.

UW was eighth in the Mountain West in average attendance last year at 3,987, including an often-barren student section behind the west basket.

While Wicks will be judged by wins and losses, the timing of his reunion with the Cowboys couldn't be better. UW's men's basketball program has been deprived of energy since its NCAA Tournament appearance two seasons ago, and if anybody is qualified to bring the juice back to the Arena-Auditorium, it's Wicks.

"Whether you were raised in Evanston, Worland or Wheatland, the Big Horns in Buffalo, the blue-collar town of Gillette, Casper, Cody or Cheyenne, Jackson Hole, Rock Springs or Riverton, Shoshoni, Lander or Laradise: Raise a glass, this one's for you; we got work to do, Wyoming," Wicks said.

Alex Taylor is the assistant editor for WyoSports and covers University of Wyoming athletics. He can be reached at ataylor@wyosports.net. Follow him on X at @alex_m_taylor22.