For Sundance Wicks, a native son of Gillette who has been living the vagabond lifestyle of a coach for two decades, all career paths have led back to his happy place: The Arena-Auditorium.
Wicks, who grew up dreaming of playing for the Brown and Gold in the Dome of Doom, arrives back home in Laramie on Wednesday after being hired as UW’s head coach on Sunday. His boundless energy might be enough fuel for the jet to make the trip from Wisconsin, where he orchestrated a remarkable turnaround at Green Bay last season following three seasons as an assistant with the Cowboys.
“The dream is always different, vastly different than the reality,” Wicks said of taking over the UW program. “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 was part of Jeff Linder’s staff that arrived during a pandemic and took the Pokes to the 2022 NCAA Tournament.
UW was plagued by injuries, most notably to preseason Mountain West player of the year Graham Ike, during a brutal last-place finish a year later. An emotional Wicks coached the Cowboys during the conference tournament when Linder stayed behind to be with his ailing father at the end of the painful campaign.
Linder, who officially left his position at UW to become the top assistant at Texas Tech on Tuesday, isn’t leaving Wicks sifting through the rubble of a massive rebuild.
“I’ve got a lot of love for Coach Linder. I want everybody in the state of Wyoming to understand how much love I have for him,” Wicks said. “He’s the guy that brought me back to Wyoming, he’s the guy that gave me that chance. I texted him this morning and told him I loved him, I’m grateful for him. Because without him, I wouldn’t ever be in this position that I’m in right now. To me, the true art of giving and serving is making something better than when you found it. Let’s not forget where we were two years ago when we were actually in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in a long time. We did that in two years, and we saw the Dome of Doom rocking and it wasn’t that long ago.
“There’s a lot of love from me in how Jeff went about this and what he did for me and my family and the situation that we’re in right now. He did leave his place and in a good situation, a great situation, to be honest with you. Everybody has their own opinions, and they are entitled to that, but I know looking at the guts of what I’m walking into is better than when I was there a couple of years ago.”
Wicks left UW 14 months ago to take over a Green Bay program that won three games the season before. He won the Joe B. Hall Award given to the top rookie head coach in Division I after getting the Phoenix to rise from the ashes with a13-7 record in the Horizon League.
The improvement from 3-29 to 18-14 overall is tied for the ninth-best turnaround in NCAA Division I history.
“A lot of it is proof of concept,” Wicks said of how his season at Green Bay helped prepare him for this challenge at UW. “You get into this profession to sit in that seat and you can talk about all these things when you’re an assistant, but until you go out there and have proof of concept or you prove to others that what you do works … I don’t sit here and claim to be some sort of genius or gifted guy in any sense or fashion, but I know I’ve worked really damn hard.
“When you work hard you can make up for a multitude of mistakes. Then when you care about your guys and you live with your guys and then you care more about how connected and how competitive you are than whether or not that ball goes through the hoop, that’s how you create a little bit of magic.”
Wicks will face a lot of challenges while attempting to turn the Arena-Auditorium back into the Dome of Doom. The era of unlimited transfers and competing against programs with name, image and likeness war chests is the daunting reality of this dream job.
But UW’s new head coach plans to get the entire state behind him.
“It’s not about me, it’s about everyone helping,” Wicks said. “What we’re trying to do is we’re trying to create a brand of basketball that Wyoming has always been proud of where they’re going to show up regardless of circumstances. That takes all of us being on the same page. So, for me, that’s going every single corner of the state and every pocket out there and showing my face and letting you know this is what it looks like. I’m not here to ask you for anything, I’m here to help and that can come in a lot of different ways.”
On May 18, 2018, Wicks received a message from UW athletics director Tom Burman congratulating him on his first head coaching opportunity at Division II Western State after he had served as a young assistant at Colorado, Northern Illinois and San Francisco.
Six years later, Burman hired Wicks to be the 23rd head coach in UW men’s basketball history.
“He said Coach Wicks, from a Wyoming guy congrats, I’m really excited for you,” Wicks recalled. “Here’s a Wyoming guy rooting for another Wyoming guy. It gave me like a sense of pride and peace. … Fast forward and you get a call from Tom a year after you left Wyoming and he’s not saying we wish you the best, he’s (asking) to come ride for the brand.
“It’s at that moment where it just hits you and your whole being is still. That’s when I knew this whole transition was going to be an easy one for me. It’s the most comfort and most ease I’ve felt inside my soul in a move since I started coaching. Very rarely do you ever get to go to a spot where you know it just feels right, it’s where your heart is.”
Sundance Wicks has taken the long road home.
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