Here's how NMSU basketball coach Jason Hooten is approaching the challenge of rebuilding a program from scratch

Nov. 5—Jason Hooten loves his job.

Really, he does.

Sure, he has an interesting way of showing it — choosing to open his New Mexico State University coaching tenure with a brand new roster playing a road game at No. 16 Kentucky on Monday night inside historic Rupp Arena trends more toward his being a glutton for punishment than a guy who enjoys coaching basketball.

Heck, even taking on the complete rebuild of an NMSU program that suffered the black eye of all black eyes over the past year makes one wonder why anyone who loves coaching and competing would even take the job.

But, despite the highly intense, sometimes angry look Aggie fans will soon grow accustomed to seeing from Hooten while he's coaching, the 54-year-old Texas native who left a 19-year coaching career at Sam Houston State to embark, with his family, on a daunting rebuild in a city and state none of them had ever lived in before actually is enjoying it all.

"I don't have a job," Hooten said during a recent podcast conversation with the Journal. "This is this is what I love to do. And I think when you really truly love something, it doesn't really feel like work to me."

It may not feel like work, but the task ahead of him and his staff is going to take patience, and a whole lot of effort.

While it's all been well-documented, the CliffsNotes version of the rebuild of the proud NMSU Aggies basketball program that Hooten is taking on after a historically tumultuous past year is this:

A brawl during an NMSU football game last October involved Aggie basketball players and UNM students that witnesses would later cite as the genesis for a revenge plot.The revenge plot ended in a player-involved shooting (an Aggie player was shot in the leg by a UNM student in Albuquerque and the player shot and killed that UNM student in self-defense, all in the early morning hours before a rivalry game that was later cancelled),Two Aggie players accused older teammates of hazing and sexual assault,The school's administration stepped in to cancel the season before it was done,Head coach Greg Heiar was fired less than one year after he was hired,The state of New Mexico agreed to pay $8 million to settle a lawsuit filed by the two players who said they weren't only hazed by older teammates, but that they tried to get their coaches to make it stop, to no avail.

NMSU said they needed a man like Hooten to help clean it all up and instill a new culture in the locker room.

But "culture" has become a buzzword newly hired coaches throw around during introductory press conferences and at public speaking engagements.

And Hooten knows the proof of his success — on the court and off — will come in time, not in words and speeches.

So, what then, does the word "culture" mean to the new Aggies coach?

"To me, culture is what you're about as a human being. And how I was raised by my family," Hooten said. "I think culture is what do we believe? And it doesn't always necessarily mean just how my family raised me. I just think it's what are our morals and our values and what's important to us on a daily basis? To me, that's what culture is, right?

"As a coach, whatever you demand is what your guys are going to stand for. And, when we brought these guys in, we told them from the beginning, 'Hey, look. We're following probably one of the toughest years a college basketball team (has) had, right?' And so when we came in here, we want to build a totally different culture. Our culture's of substance. Our culture's of guys that are going to go to class every day. I think last year, the whole team was on online classes. If you're in a total schedule of online classes, how can you go and sit in there and get to know your professor and how can you get to know the students on campus? ... You have to be a part of them if they're going to going to appreciate you and they're going to want to come to your games and support you."

Of course, that support, Hooten said, has not been lacking in the slightest since the day he and his family got to town.

"The people here in Las Cruces, I can't talk enough about how friendly everyone is and how warm and welcoming everyone is," Hooten said.

"The comments that have been made to us about how they appreciate us taking the job, and just the fact that they feel really good about our staff and the kids that we've brought in and the fact that we're going to try to get this back up on its feet."

About the basketball

NMSU's entire roster is comprised of new players.

And as of Saturday, they were still waiting for the NCAA to rule on two waiver requests that could have a huge impact on the season.

One is for 6-foot-6 guard Femi Odukale, who played two years at Pitt and last season at Seton Hall and would be an all-league caliber, potential season changer if he can play without sitting out a year.

The other is for 7-foot center Davion Bradford, who played at Wake Forest and Kansas State.

As for what the team knows it has, 6-10 forward Kaosi Ezeagu followed Hooten to Las Cruces from Sam Houston State and is an anchor in the post as much as in the locker room.

Guards Brandon Suggs (6-6 from Central Florida), Jordan Rawls (6-2 from Western Kentucky) and Jaylin Jackson-Posey (6-2 from Stephen F. Austin) will likely be starters and spearhead a defense-first scheme that has been Hooten's calling card.

Of course, the expectations are low from outside the program. NMSU was picked eighth in the nine-team Conference USA — a spot some would say is understandable considering the entire rebuild.

"I think you'd be lying if you said that it didn't eat at you," Hooten admitted of the preseason poll position, before offering a slightly different perspective.

"... But I've never been a person that needed a motivating factor. My motivating factor is just every day I wake up because my father was a big sports person. But my father was a construction worker for the same man for 40 years. ... Sports has always been in our family, but nothing has ever been given to me in sports. ... To me, it's just a motivating factor the fact that I'm blessed to be sitting where I am on a daily basis."