Camp Staff

Ranked among the Top Eight active NCAA Division I Head Coaches, Tom Penders enters his third season at the University of Houston with a 566-385 career record after leading Houston to a combined 39 wins in the last two seasons.


In his first season, Penders guided the Cougars to the nation's fourth-best turnaround year with an 18-14 overall record and a record-setting season in 2004-05. Houston finished that year with a sixth-place finish in the Conference USA regular season standings with a 9-7 record, led the nation in turnover margin and set both team and individual school records for most three-point field goals made in a season.


The Cougars captivated a national television audience on January 5, when ESPN aired the final minutes of their 70-67 upset over 16th-ranked and eventual NCAA Final Four participant Louisville. The next month, ESPN televised the Cougars' 66-53 victory over NIT semifinalist Memphis, Houston's 1,000th win in school history.


Penders also tutored Andre Owens that year when Owens was named All-Conference USA Second Team selection after leading the league in scoring with 18.3 points per game. Last year, Owens was a member of the NBA's Utah Jazz.


In just his second season, Penders led the Cougars to their first 20-win season, first back-to-back winning seasons and first back-to-back postseason tournament appearances since 1992-93. He also led Houston to back-to-back wins over nationally-ranked teams for the first time since the 1984 NCAA Midwest Regional Tournament and their first postseason tournament victory since 1988 in his first two years at the school.


Houston finished the 2005-06 campaign with a 2-2 record against nationally-ranked teams after beating No. 25 LSU on November 29 and 13th-ranked Arizona December 3 in a nationally-televised game on ESPN2. Both of the losses came at Memphis when the Tigers were ranked No. Three on March 4 and No. Five on March 10.


Following the wins over LSU and Arizona, Houston was ranked Number 25 in the December 12, 2005 Associated Press Poll, marking the first time since 1992-93 that the Cougars had been nationally-ranked by the AP poll.


In Conference USA play, Houston set a school record with its highest winning percentage in Conference USA play when the Cougars finished the year with a 9-5 record. The nine C-USA wins also tied a school record.


Houston also finished fourth in the league's regular season standings, the highest C-USA finish in school history, and reached the semifinals of the C-USA Postseason Tournament for just the second time since joining the league in 1996-97.


Houston's postseason tournament victory was against BYU in the first round of the 2006 NIT. It also was Penders' first career victory in the NIT, and marked the first time his team played a home game in the NIT Tournament.


Houston led the nation in steals with a 12.4 average, and the Cougars finished second in turnover margin with an average margin of +7.5.


Both Oliver Lafayette and Ramon Dyer earned All-Conference USA Second Team honors last season, while Lanny Smith was named All-C-USA Third Team and an All-Region selection by the National Association of Basketball Coaches.


Following this two-year success, Houston athletics director Dave Maggard awarded Penders a new five-year contract.


AN EYE ON HOUSTON

Throughout his basketball career as a coach and player, Penders always had an eye on Houston, in one way or another.


"When I was playing in college, Elvin Hayes, Ken Spain and Don Chaney were playing here," Penders said. "Even before that, Jack Thompson, a former player from New York, had led the Cougars to the NIT in 1962."


Later, as a high school coach, he met Houston's legendary coach Guy V. Lewis when he took his high school team to watch the Cougars play Long Island University in New York's Madison Square Garden on February 4, 1971. Over the years, he watched Lewis turn the Cougars into a perennial national power and patterned his teams' style of play after the style the Cougars played under Lewis. Last season, Penders invited Lewis to talk to his team before the Cougars beat Memphis. Following the school's 1,000th victory, he presented the game ball to Lewis, simultaneously honoring the man and his place in Cougar history.


A year after his first meeting with Lewis, Penders began his collegiate coaching career. At each stop, his teams not only won, they captured a national audience with their record-setting styles of play. His teams at Texas and George Washington set school records for most points in a season, and renewed fan interest at each school.


It was at Texas where Penders helped rebuild an intense rivalry between the Longhorns and Houston. Each game between the two schools was important in the Southwest Conference standings and often produced sellout crowds.


"When I coached against the Cougars in the Southwest Conference, I liked the atmosphere when we played here, and enjoyed visiting a major city," Penders said. "When (Houston athletics director Dave Maggard) called, it clicked right away. I said this is the perfect job for me."

In his seventh season at the University of Houston, Melvin Haralson is in his third year as the associate head coach and recruiting coordinator. During the past two seasons, Haralson helped guide the Cougars to 39 wins and consecutive postseason tournaments for the first time since 1993. Last year, the Cougars won back-to-back games over nationally-ranked teams for the first time since 1984 and won 21 games for the first time since 1992-93 as well. Two seasons ago, he helped the Cougars win 18 games and play in a postseason tournament for the first time in three years.


During the last three springs as recruiting director, Houston's recruiting classes have been nationally ranked. The Cougars were ranked 35th nationally in the Spring of 2004, 15th in 2004-05 and 24th last year.


Haralson was a successful recruiter at each of his last two stops before coming to Houston in 2000. He helped North Texas sign one of the nation's top 21 classes and the Southwest Region's best recruiting class in 1998. Haralson was a member of Tom Penders' staff at Texas from 1990-95, when the Longhorns signed two Top 10 nationally-ranked recruiting classes.


Haralson came to Houston as an administrative assistant in 2000, a position he held for one year, and was named the director of men's basketball operations in 2001 before being promoted to assistant coach the following season. Haralson served two seasons as an assistant coach on Houston's staff before Penders was named head coach, after which he was promoted to his current position.


Before he joined Houston's staff, Haralson was an assistant coach at North Texas for five seasons. He also served as the head assistant coach under Penders at Texas from 1990-95. There, the Longhorns won three Southwest Conference championship teams and placed four teams in the NCAA Tournament.


The two Top 10 nationally-ranked recruiting classes at Texas included three of the best players ever to play for the Longhorns, Terrance Rencher, Reggie Freeman and McDonald's All-American Kris Clack. Rencher is the Longhorns' all-time scoring leader and Freeman ranks third on the school's career scoring list.
Haralson began his coaching career as a student coach at his alma mater, Auburn University. He helped the Tigers reach the Sweet 16 in the NCAA Tournament in 1988-89.


Before he began his coaching career, Haralson was an Honorable-Mention All-American high school player at perennial powerhouse Murrah High School in Jackson, Miss.
Haralson began his collegiate career at Lon Morris Junior College in Texas, where he earned Junior College All-American honors in 1984-85. He transferred to Auburn in 1985-86, and was a member of the Tigers' Elite Eight NCAA Tournament team that beat UNLV in the Compaq Center in Houston.


He earned a bachelor's degree in education in 1989 and was invited to the Los Angeles Clippers' training camp before beginning his coaching career. He and his wife, Tonia, have a son, Isaiah.