ON THE BLUFF SPORTS
Introducing Shantay Legans AFTER MOVING TO Portland this fall to resurrect the UP men’s basketball program, Shantay Legans and his wife Tatjana came to a quick realization about North Portland and the neighborhood blanketing The Bluff. They adored it and decided they had to live near campus. There was just one problem: The cutthroat Portland housing market. “Everyone was saying it was going to take six months, a year—maybe even two years—to find a house,” Legans, the Pilots’ first-year head coach, says. “But we went out and drove around to look at houses, and on the first day found a place. We made an offer, sold our old house, and everything was done in 48 hours. It was unbelievable.” And, in hindsight, it was also an omen. Legans has only been on The Bluff for a few months, but already he has transformed the culture and trajectory of the men’s basketball program, instilling hope, energy, and positivity into a program in desperate need of all three. Along the way, while endearing himself to faculty and staff and impressing alumni and former players, Legans has very quickly become a part of the fabric of the community. Any lingering doubts about leaving Eastern Washington to rebuild the Pilots vanished the moment he set foot on campus. “This place is very, very special and I love being here,” he says. “It just feels like home.” Legans doesn’t bring an NBA pedigree like former coach Terry Porter. Or a Pac-12 Conference coaching background like former coach Eric Reveno. But he does bring a winning reputation, recruiting chops, and successful head coaching experience, having led Eastern Washington to a 74-59 record, Big Sky conference and tournament championships, and a trip to the NCAA Tournament in four seasons. In 2020, Legans was ranked No. 11 on ESPN’s “40 Under 40” list of the top 40 college basketball coaches under the age of 40. Legans is not a naturally patient man, but make no mistake, his patience will be tested like never before as he works his magic at UP. The Pilots have finished with a winning record just five times in the last quarter-century, including once in the last decade, and have not reached the NCAA Tournament since 1996. In the three seasons before Legans arrived, UP earned just one West Coast Conference victory. But Legans is not one to shy away from a challenge. He grew up in Santa Barbara in a one-bedroom apartment with his mother, the late Susan Legans. While she worked to keep them out of housing shelters, he gravitated toward the game he loved to play—basketball—and the Boys & Girls Club in Santa Barbara practically became his second home. Legans was a short and scrawny kid, but what he lacked in size he made up for with oversized bravado and attitude. He was so competitive and possessed such a thirst to win, he talked trash constantly and started fights frequently. Legans was, in his own words, “a punk.” But he also had talent, and by the time he reached high school, Legans had learned—with the help of youth
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PORTLAND
UP ATHLETICS
UP’s new men’s basketball coach has high hopes
basketball coaches like his mentor Ray Lopes—to harness his fierce competitiveness for good. When he graduated from Dos Pueblos High School, Legans had matured into a respected leader who owned school records in scoring, assists, and steals, while earning a scholarship to play point guard at the University of California, Berkley. He led the Bears to two NCAA Tournament berths and went on to a brief professional playing career that included stops in the Netherlands and the International Basketball League. Along the way, he decided he wanted to follow in Lopes’s footsteps and become a coach, which led him to remote Cheney, Washington, and an entry-level assistant job at Eastern Washington. It paid $16,000. But he worked tirelessly and prospered, and by 2017, Legans had ascended to head coach, eventually steering the school to unprecedented success. And he aspires for even more at UP, where he has brought an audacious ambition to a place that for years has languished in the cellar of the WCC. “I want it to become the best program in the WCC,” Legans says of a conference that features perennial national power Gonzaga. “I know it’s possible because I used to live near where (Gonzaga) is located. Portland is a better city. The education here is amazing. The campus is beautiful. This is a great place. You have to have a vision, you have to believe in that vision, and you have to go after it. I want my guys, my staff, my players to have the same mindset. Gonzaga didn’t start out where it is now. It grew to where it is. And we can too. That’s what we’re pushing and striving for.” It will take time, of course. But Legans already has over-
