Mike Dunlap will be the next head coach of the Charlotte Bobcats, sources told The Post.
Dunlap, 55, spent the past two years working as Steve Lavin’s lead assistant at St. John’s, including running the program’s day-to-day operations this past season while Lavin recovered from a bout with prostate cancer.
He becomes the first NBA head coach that jumps from being an NCAA assistant who has no prior Division I head coaching experience.
“Mike’s selection as the Charlotte Bobcats’ head coach is a well-deserved honor,” Lavin said. “To make the unprecedented jump from college assistant to NBA head coach is testament to both Mike’s abilities as a teacher and our basketball program’s marked improvement over the past 27 months.”
Dunlap’s departure, first reported by the Charlotte Observer, means that St. John’s and Lavin will begin the search for a replacement heading into next season.
Sources said Lavin will not take a cookie-cutter approach to this hire, which means he’s not married to hiring another X’s and O’s expert, which is Dunlap’s forte.
“Naturally after a 25 year association at the highest levels of college basketball I have short list of elite coaching candidates and will now begin the process of replacing Coach Dunlap,” Lavin said.
Since getting his first job as an assistant coach at Loyola Marymount in 1980, Dunlap has spent the vast majority of his time working in the college game. His only previous NBA experience came from a two-year stint with the Denver Nuggets from 2006-08 as an assistant under George Karl.
Dunlap has had three previous head coaching jobs. He was the coach at Division III California Lutheran from 1989-94 before leaving to coach an Australian pro team, the Adelaide 49ers, from 1994-97. He left there to have a lengthy run of success at Division II Metro State in Denver, where he won two national championships and made nine straight NCAA Tournaments from 1997-2006 before joining Karl’s staff with the Nuggets.
Additional reporting by Lenn Robbins
tbontemps@nypost.com