The path Tony Skinn followed to become head basketball coach at George Mason might as well have been traversed in an F1 race car. After completing a half-dozen seasons as a professional player and competing for Nigeria in the London Olympics, he entered coaching and needed only eight years as a Division I assistant before being hired to take over the program at his alma mater.
He reached the 20-win mark in each of his first two years, including a 27-9 second season that included a co-championship in the Atlantic 10 Conference regular season and runner-up finish at the A-10 tournament. At 42, Skinn knows what he’s doing, but the challenges constantly are changing.
“Everybody wants to be a head coach,” Skinn told AllSportsPeople, “but they have no idea what they’re walking into.”
This never has been more true than it is today. Had Skinn begun as a head coach two decades ago, around the time he was the second-leading scorer for Mason’s legendary Final Four squad, the effort to establish himself as a head coach probably would have involved recruiting a core of capable freshmen who would develop into an NCAA Tournament contender over the course of three or four seasons.
That’s how Jay Wright did it at Hofstra before becoming a force at Villanova, or Brad Stevens at Butler on his way to the Celtics, or Shaka Smart at VCU.
Now, a coach in Skinn’s position can’t think a lot about the future. A team’s roster – every team’s roster – is for this season.
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George Mason had five seniors among its top eight scorers on last season’s team, and power forward Jalen Haynes (Cincinnati) and center Giovanni Emejuru (East Carolina) transferred out. Skinn and his staff had to replace 86 percent of their scoring, which meant gathering eight transfers and three high school prospects for the 2025-26 Patriots.
“Even though it’s fairly new in the landscape, I feel like I’m a young enough coach to where, when I got to the high major level, the portal was a thing, and retention was also already was a thing,” Skinn told SN. “I consider myself one of the better recruiters in the country; I’m always up for a recruiting battle.
“I’m very, very biased toward the DMV, and when you build relationships over the years in such a fertile place – that you’re from – it’s a little bit of a cheat code. Just always having access and relationships, it helped us tremendously for year one, year two, not so much this year, but my staff was phenomenal in just understanding what we needed. Which was really everything.
“We know what we have. We try not to focus as much on the NIL issue, because it’s a thing, but you can have all the money in the world and put together a bad team.”
Skinn grew up in Takoma Park, Md., and played at Takoma Academy before spending one juco year at Blinn College in Texas, then transferring closer to home to Hagerstown Community College. After signing at GMU, he became a three-year regular for the Patriots, averaging double-figure scoring in his final two seasons.
He played professionally in multiple European countries, including France and Italy, before entering the college coaching profession at Louisiana Tech. He joined Kevin Willard at Seton Hall and Maryland and, in between, spent a year under Chris Holtmann at Ohio State. Having worked with them and played for Jim Larranaga, Skinn was well-prepared to be a coach. And still it’s so much different than when those guys began, different enough that Larranaga chose to walk away after a dozen games with the Miami Hurricanes last season.
“Having an opportunity in this landscape to transfer three or four times, I don’t think it does any good for anybody,” Skinn told SN. “You don’t built a foundation anymore. A lot of times, you’re probably not welcome back. You’ve been in three or four basketball opportunities that probably didn’t work out for you. So now you’re left with maybe no money, not a real basketball opportunity and definitely not a degree.
“I think guys should be able to transfer at least once, but after that one time, I think there needs to be more responsibility. Because I think long-term, it’s not really helping these guys. You think about me, for example, I had an opportunity to come to George Mason, stay at George Mason, graduate from George Mason. And then I had an opportunity to come back to my alma mater and coach. This doesn’t happen if I transfer. And at that time, I probably would have transferred, because the money is real. But there’s value in staying at a place and maintaining whatever sort of loyalty that still exists in this landscape.”
Skinn and his assistants had to completely rebuild their roster as if sprinting to the tape in the Olympic 200 meters. The Patriots brought wing Masai Troutman of Frederick, Md., closer to home, after he averaged 13.5 points last season at Northeastern. Fatt Hill was honorable mention All-MAC with 15.8 points per game at Ball State. Guard Kory Mincy was a 15-point scorer at Presbyterian, and he’s the true point guard Skinn was hoping could run his ball-screen offense. In the frontcourt, they landed 6-8 Dola Adebayo of Mount St. Mary’s, 6-8 Nick Ellington from Murray State and 6-11 Riley Allenspach off the bench of a 22-win team at Samford.
Building a successful team in this circumstance is a tremendous challenge, but at least now there is so much more time to get that work done. When Skinn played, offseason workouts were severely restricted and all teams weren’t permitted to practice until mid-October.
“Production is everything when you’re trying to replace production. To have the kind of success we did last year, you’re trying to come as close to replacing those guys as possible,” Skinn said. “I’m happy with this crew. We’ve got some really good kids. If you asked me four or five months ago, ‘How do you feel about your crew?’, I would have looked at you and laughed and said, ‘I don’t want to answer that question.’ But I like where we are.
“Xs and Os are one thing, but I think at this level, there’s a different version of Xs and Os. It’s called management. Everyone’s got a clipboard and can use it to draw up a play, but I think we’ve got to add roster management, and the mental health of roster management, as just as important as everything else we’re doing as coaches now.”
It was a tribute to Skinn and the GMU program that the Patriots, with so many new players, were predicted to finish sixth in the A-10 poll of coaches and media personnel who cover the league.
“I take it as a compliment,” he said. “For us to lose that much, it’s fair to put someone at the bottom of the league.”
It helped considerably to imagine another successful season that guard Brayden O’Connor, who averaged 13 points and 3.4 assists, chose to return for his senior season.
“It was easy for me to make that decision,” he told SN. “Obviously, there’s going to be different teams that want to offer you this and that. There’s a saying my grandma always says: The grass is not always greener. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. I’m in an amazing opportunity to come back and be very productive and being able to still learn from great guards like (assistant coach) Louis Hinnant and Coach Skinn. It’s a place that I want to be at, especially with a chance to play professional basketball, play in the NBA.”
This will be a special season for the George Mason program, however the Patriots develop. April 1 will mark the 20th anniversary of the Patriots’ appearance in the 2006 Final Four. Competing then as a member of the Colonial Athletic Association, they compiled a 25-7 record and became an at-large March Madness selection, then upset Michigan State, North Carolina, Wichita State and Connecticut to earn their trip to Indianapolis.
Before GMU, there had been no mid-major program reach the Final Four in 26 years, since Penn and Indiana State joined Michigan State and DePaul at Salt Lake City in 1979, the occasion that launched the Magic Johnson-Larry Bird rivalry.
The Patriots will celebrate their anniversary Dec. 13, during an afternoon game against former CAA rival Old Dominion. At halftime, there will be a ceremony to raise a banner honoring Larranaga.
“For me, how I got here, the things I’ve been through in life, I’ve always been a keep-your-feet-where-your-feet-are guy,” Skinn said. “We all have goals. I’ve always been a firm believer that if you win, and you’re successful, opportunities are going to come.
“We all know how hard winning is, and I try to just focus on the day-to-day. I don’t want to coach the Los Angeles Lakers. I’m in DC. I’m home. I’m at my alma mater. If there was a KenPom score for happiest coach in America, I think I’d be top 10.”