Thomas Vincent Penders (born May 23, 1945) is an American retired college basketball coach, who last coached from 2004 through 2010 at the University of Houston. He is from Stratford, Connecticut and has a 649–437 career record. As a college athlete, Penders played both basketball and baseball for the University of Connecticut, and is one of the few players to have competed in both the NCAA tournament as well as the College World Series.
Prior to his last job as Houston's head coach, Penders was a sports analyst for ESPN and Westwood One Radio. He also has been the head coach for Tufts, Columbia, Fordham, Rhode Island, Texas, and George Washington. Coach Penders developed a reputation as both “Turnaround Tom” and “Tournament Tom” because he proved that he could turn basketball programs into consistent winners and get the most out of his players in March. He is one of three coaches to reach three “Sweet 16s” as a double-digit seed in the NCAA basketball tournament, becoming the first NCAA head basketball coach to accomplish that feat with his 1996–97 Texas Longhorns team.
Coaching career
High school
Penders posted a 59–10 record as a high school coach at Bullard-Havens Tech and Bridgeport Central High School in Connecticut. He led Bullard-Havens to a 14–6 record in his first season as a head coach. The next year, he guided Bridgeport Central to a 23–2 record and a number two ranking in the state. The following year, he was named the New York Daily News Coach of the Year after leading Bridgeport to a 20–1 mark and a number one ranking.
Tufts, Columbia, Fordham
Penders began his collegiate coaching career at Tufts University in 1971, and compiled a 54–18 record in three seasons. On October 6, 2006, Penders and his 1972-73 Tufts team were inducted into the New England Basketball Hall of Fame.
He was appointed to succeed Jack Rohan in a similar capacity at Columbia University on April 18, 1974. He led the Lions to back-to-back winning seasons in the final two of his four years there.
After Columbia, Penders moved to Fordham University where he remained for eight years and compiled a 125–114 record. In 1980–81, Penders was named the New York Metropolitan Area Coach of the Year after leading Fordham to a 19–9 record. On January 26, 2013, Penders was inducted into the Fordham Athletic Hall of Fame.
Rhode Island
Penders took over Rhode Island's program on October 4, 1986, two weeks before the regular season began. He was named the Atlantic 10 Conference Co-Coach of the Year after guiding the Rams to a 20–10 record and a berth into the NIT his first year.
In 1988, Penders led the Rams to the 1988 NCAA Sweet 16 with wins over Missouri and Syracuse before eventually losing to Duke.
Texas
In his 10 seasons at the University of Texas, Penders compiled a 208–110 record. During his time there, he became the winningest basketball coach in school history (although now passed by former Texas and now Tennessee coach Rick Barnes). He led the Longhorns to three Southwest Conference championships and eight NCAA Tournament appearances, including an Elite Eight in 1990, and the Sweet 16 in 1997. His teams at Texas averaged 20.8 wins per season, 87.2 points per game, and forced 19 turnovers per contest.
When Penders was hired in 1988, he inherited a team that won 16 games the year before; the Erwin Center (the Longhorns' home court) averaged 4,028 fans per game (in a 16,231-seat arena). Immediately after his arrival, Penders switched to a more uptempo offense, and called his team the "Runnin' Horns." His first team finished second in the Southwest Conference and earned a bid to the NCAA Tournament. The Longhorns also set 22 school and SWC records while more than doubling their attendance average to 10,011 per game, the largest increase in NCAA Division I.
In his final year at Texas, Penders underwent heart surgery and was unable to coach the first few games of what would end up being a tumultuous season.
Penders resigned as head coach following nearly a month of controversy surrounding the Texas program. On the heels of a 14-17 season and 9th place finish in the conference, three players met with athletic director DeLoss Dodds to voice complaints about Penders and the program. One of those players, Luke Axtell, informed Dodds at the meeting that he intended to transfer. Not long after the meeting, and despite it being the offseason, Axtell was suspended from the team for academic reasons.
