{"id":178454,"date":"2026-02-21T18:05:30","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T23:05:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=178454"},"modified":"2026-02-21T18:05:30","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T23:05:30","slug":"leading-miami-redhawks-to-historic-season-travis-steele-eyeing-greener-pastures-where-could-he-land","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2026\/02\/21\/leading-miami-redhawks-to-historic-season-travis-steele-eyeing-greener-pastures-where-could-he-land\/","title":{"rendered":"Leading Miami RedHawks to Historic Season, Travis Steele Eyeing Greener Pastures, Where Could He Land?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Miami (Ohio) RedHawks are the lone remaining unbeaten team in NCAA Division I<\/a>. As a result, Miami head coach Travis Steele<\/a> is expected to be one of the most sought-after coaches this season.<\/p>\n

Leading Miami RedHawks to Historic Season, Is Travis Steele Eyeing Greener Pastures? Where Could He Land?<\/h3>\n

Miami is 27-0 on the season and ranked No. 22 in the Associated Press. The RedHawks are off to their best start in program history and appear to be on the verge of earning their first MAC<\/a> regular-season title in two decades (2004-05) and their first NCAA<\/a> bid since 2006-07. However, neither of those is written in stone yet.<\/p>\n

Miami defeated Bowling Green 91-77 at home last night to run its MAC record to 14-0, marking the first time in program history that the RedHawks have begun the season with 14 straight conference wins. The RedHawks, who are two wins from tying the school conference record of 16 victories (1994-95), have won 16 straight MAC games and 16 of 17 overall. They sit just one game ahead of Akron (22-5, 13-1 MAC) with four conference games left.<\/p>\n

Miami defeated Akron 76-73 at home on Jan. 3, their only matchup this season. The RedHawks are one of the top offensive teams in the nation, ranking third in offensive rating (125.7) and second in points per game (92.3). The RedHawks are also the top shooting team in the country at 53.4% and fourth in 3-point percentage (40.3%), while ranking 18th in 3-pointers per game (10.7). They also do a great job drawing fouls.<\/p>\n

Miami hasn’t been great defensively, but with a well-oiled offensive machine, they haven’t had to. The RedHawks have outscored their MAC opponents by 11.5 points per game, with eight of the victories by double digits, and own a nearly 18-point differential overall. Steele uses a nine-man rotation, with six players averaging 9 points per game.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Albert Cesare\/The Enquirier<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/smartframe-embed><\/p>\n

RedHawks 2025-26 Prospective<\/h3>\n

Steele has done a fabulous job rebuilding the RedHawks program. Steele has improved the RedHawks’ win total in each of his last three seasons, winning 25 games last season. The 27 and 25 wins rank first and second on the program’s all-time ledger.<\/p>\n

Steele, who has the RedHawks in position to earn an NCAA tournament bid even if they get upset in the MAC Tournament, owns a 76-40 record at Miami. He is 53-25 in MAC play, winning 28 of their last 32 regular-season conference contests over the last two years. However, they haven’t been able to get past Akron the last two seasons, losing to the Zips in the Conference championship game last year.<\/p>\n

Prior to Steele landing in Oxford, Miami posted only one winning season since 2010, and that was when they went 12-11 in the Covid-shortened 2020-21 campaign. Steele is projected as a No. 11 seed by On3.com and ESPN’s bracketology. However, the RedHawks have only one Quad II victory and no Quad I wins, and they have just a 33% chance<\/a> of making the NCAA Tournament.<\/p>\n

Miami plays three of its final four regular-season games on the road. Miami travels to Eastern Michigan (10-17) on February 24 and then to Western Michigan (9-17) on February 27. The RedHawks host Toledo (13-13) on March 3 and then close the regular season at Ohio (15-13) on March 6.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/smartframe-embed><\/p>\n

Will Travis Steele Sign an Extension?<\/h3>\n

More importantly, regarding Steele’s future as a coach, the 44-year-old is expected to be one of the hottest coaching names this summer. Steele had a decent four-year run with Xavier, posting a winning record in each season and winning 19 contests three times. He was 70-50 overall with the Muskateers (2018-22). But he did lead them to two NIT berths, going 6-1 in the event, including a win in the 2022 Tournament.<\/p>\n

Steele reportedly has an extension on the table from Miami that would keep him as the RedHawks coach through the 2033-34 season, making him one of the highest-paid coaches in the MAC, per Bradley Truax of ON3<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey gave me a contract extension. I have not signed it yet. Honestly, I haven\u2019t looked at it,\u201d Steele told reporters after Friday\u2019s 91-77 win over Bowling Green. \u201cJust because we\u2019ve been so busy going game to game, but I do think it shows the commitment level that Miami (OH) has.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very happy here. And I think some people will read into things differently, right?” Steele continued. They\u2019re gonna say, \u2018Oh, well, he hasn\u2019t signed. Why don\u2019t you sign it already? We\u2019ve been pretty busy. We\u2019re trying to keep this thing going. And I made that promise to our guys that I wasn\u2019t gonna get distracted. I was gonna keep the main thing, the main thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

What Jobs Are Currently Open And Could Be A Fit For Steele?<\/h4>\n

If Steele doesn’t sign the extension, he is expected to draw plenty of interest this summer. But it is hard to tell by whom at this point, as it is still very early. Currently, Kansas State is probably the main job that would interest Steele, as it stands<\/a>. Steele is likely a candidate and would be a good fit.<\/p>\n

UC San Diego, Tarleton State, Air Force, Cal State Bakersfield, and North Florida also have potential openings. San Diego fired Steve Lavin recently, while Air Force parted ways with Joe Scott<\/a> on Friday.\u00a0 Meanwhile, Billie Gillespie<\/a> is not expected to return<\/a> to Tarleton State.<\/p>\n

Air Force may be attractive to Steele since they play in the Mountain West, but the RedHawks extension is probably more than he will ever earn at Air Force. Air Force has just three wins this year and has not posted a winning record since 2013-14, when the Falcons won 18 games. However, several other big-time jobs could be open with several coaches on the hot seat; there were over 60 coaching changes last season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Miami (Ohio) RedHawks are the lone remaining unbeaten team in NCAA Division I. As a result, Miami head coach Travis Steele is expected to be one of the most sought-after coaches this season. Leading Miami RedHawks to Historic Season, Is Travis Steele Eyeing Greener Pastures? Where Could He Land? Miami is 27-0 on the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3146,"featured_media":178521,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,773,2,3],"tags":[1512,3439,3924,2397,853],"class_list":["post-178454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-college-basketball","category-featured","category-news","tag-kansas-state-wildcats","tag-miami-redhawks","tag-mid-american-conference","tag-travis-steele","tag-xavier-musketeers"],"modified_by":"Daniel Benjamin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178454"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178454\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":178522,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178454\/revisions\/178522"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}