LONG BEACH, Calif. — Dan Monson swears that the day that he got fired was among the most rewarding of his professional life.
It was only then that the Long Beach State men’s basketball coach discovered how deeply his players care about him.
As Long Beach State suffered loss after loss to end the 2023-24 regular season and plummeted to a distant fifth in the Big West standings, Monson began to question if he could still get through to his players. He wondered if they would be better off with a change in leadership, if they were starting to tune him out.