After 26 years on the sidelines that were highlighted by four trips to the NCAA Tournament and two NIT berths, Fairleigh Dickinson University unceremoniously fired basketball coach Tom Green last Friday.
“For 26 years I was the coach of this team and an ambassador for this university,” Green said. “I called this place home. For them to treat me this way shows a complete lack of respect for me as a person, as a coach and as a loyal employee.”
Green is 407-351 in 26 seasons at FDU, making him the all-time winningest coach in school history. He is 263-129 in Northeast Conference games, giving him the most NEC victories.
When reached by phone this week, FDU athletic director David Langford said, “How do you hear that,” when asked why the university was making a change.
Langford said he would have not a comment for the next day or so, and refused to confirm or deny the firing. When told it seemed odd for a coach with 26 years of employment to be fired this late after the season Langford said: “That’s an interesting supposition. I appreciate that. I’m not commenting.”
Green described a bizarre series of events last Friday that sounded more like the kind of corporate termination one would expect in a John Grisham novel than the firing of a basketball coach.
“Last Friday, May 29th at 2:30, my athletic director David Langford asked me to meet with him in the human resources office at 4:30,” Green told The Post in an exclusive interview. “He pulled out a release saying he had the support of the president, Dr. [Michael] Adams and he provost, Dr. [Joe] Kiernan to move in another direction and I had been relieved of my coaching duties.
“I had no knowledge, no inkling of this whatsoever,” Green said. “I went to lunch with David three weeks ago and we talked about nothing but the upcoming season. Then they fire me on the last Friday afternoon in May and here we are on June 3rd and there’s not a head coaching job out there.”
The Knights struggled last season, going 7-23 overall and 3-15 in the league. As recently as 2004-05, Green led FDU to the NCAA Tournament where it trailed Illinois by one at halftime before losing by 12. Illinois lost in the championship game.
Green said the university had agreed to pay him the full amount of the remainder of his contract. Green said he did not know who the university was considering for his replacement.