This occasional series will highlight Black coaches at all levels of sport. This week: Minnesota MBB Assistant Coach Armon Gates
It’s been more than a minute since two brothers sat on opposite benches as their respective teams faced each other. The most recent such occurrence took place in Columbia, Missouri when Missouri hosted Minnesota Nov. 12 in men’s basketball.
Dennis Gates’ Tigers defeated his younger brother Armon’s Gophers 83-60. The former has been Missouri HC since 2022, and the latter is in his first season as Minnesota assistant coach who was hired in March 2025.
“We come from a family of two blue collar parents,” said Armon when we first met in his office shortly after his hiring this past spring. “My dad was a truck driver. My mom was a registered nurse.”
But did his parents envision their two sons becoming coaches?
The younger Gates pointed out, “I’m being honest with you, being that stubborn little brother that followed his older brother around all the time. It is what really generated my interest in coaching and also the game of basketball.
“Watching my older brother, he led the way,” stressed Armon. “He always set the tone for everything that we’re done.”
Armon played high school basketball, then attended Kent State where he played on four consecutive 20-win teams and three postseason appearances, finishing his college playing career second in school history with 200 3-point field goals.
“I wasn’t the best player at Kent State University, but my teammates saw value in me … I would be watching [and] learning from the older guys … That’s how I learned from doing and seeing.”
After graduating with a leisure studies degree (2005) and later a master’s in sports administration (2007), both from Kent State, Armon eventually followed his brother’s coaching footsteps. Older brother Dennis, who went to the NBA after his college playing career concluded, helped his younger brother get a summer internship with the L.A. Clippers when Armon was a college sophomore.
“My mind started thinking a little bit like, ‘Man, I could do something with this when I’m done. And that’s what I did,” Armon pointed out.
His coaching journey began first as a Western Kentucky graduate assistant (2007-08), then at his college alma mater as an assistant coach (2008-10), TCU (2010-11), Loyola Chicago (2011-13), Northwestern (2013-18), Nebraska (2019-22), Oregon (2022-23), and Oklahoma (2023-25).
Now in his 19th year as a college coach, Gates returns to the Big Ten for the fourth time in his career and his first season on the home team bench at Williams Arena. He said the offer to come to Minnesota was too much to pass up because it gives him another opportunity to grow and learn as he strives to be a college head coach one day.
“That was one of my prerequisites to joining the new staff,” declared Gates. “I wanted [Gopher Coach Niko Nedved] to understand that I wasn’t interested in just coming to recruit. That’s something that I bring to the table for sure, but [also] coaching the game of basketball and mentoring young men and impacting lives. That’s what I’m about.
“That’s my goal,” to become a head coach. The only thing I could do is continue to move straight … because I do look at myself as a head coach. The decisions I make daily I think are from a head coach’s perspective.
“So, any advice I try to give, or suggestions I may give to the coach or anybody else on staff, or even talk to the players, I try to think from a lens of a head coach.”
Charles Hallman welcomes reader comments to challman@spokesman-recorder.com.