Sean Woods is out as Southern men’s basketball coach: ‘We felt it was necessary’

Southern has lost 11 of the past 14 meetings against its archrival.

Woods’ five up-and-down years at SU were a contrast from his first job in the SWAC, when he took on a struggling, underfunded program at Mississippi Valley and turned it into a champion.

The Delta Devils went 7-25 in their first season under Woods but improved each year, culminating with a dominant showing in 2011-12. They went 17-1 in SWAC play, winning the regular-season and tournament championships.

Woods parlayed his success into a job at Morehead State. He reached the 20-win mark twice in four-plus seasons, but his teams never reached the NCAA tournament, and Woods’ tenure came to an ugly end.

He was suspended in November 2016 as result of an investigation into player mistreatment, then was charged with misdemeanor battery after two players accused him of assaulting them during a game, prompting Morehead to fire him.

The matter was resolved when Woods pleaded guilty and completed a six-month diversion program.

Woods spent one season as an assistant at Stetson, then got the job at Southern, saying at the time that he had lived and learned.

Now, after five years, Banks — himself a former Southern basketball coach — is searching for someone who can bring consistency to a program that hasn’t had much of it lately.

The Jaguars have won just two SWAC regular-season titles since 1990, and they’ve made the NCAA tournament just three times since their historic first-round upset of Georgia Tech in 1993.

Since Southern rehired Ben Jobe in 2001 (Jobe lasted two seasons in his second stint there), the program has gone through five coaches — Michael Grant, Rob Spivery, Banks, Morris Scott and Woods.

Grant finished eighth and sixth in the SWAC in two seasons.

Spivery, hired away from Alabama State, won the SWAC title in his first season in 2006, but his program took a nosedive from there, going 38-114 over his final five seasons.

Banks came in and had immediate success in 2011-12, taking the Jaguars from last place to second in his first year (they were ineligible for the postseason because of penalties related to their NCAA Academic Progress Rate).