UWGB assistant Barnes leaving for Youngstown State

by Green Bay Press Gazette

Friday, Apr 5, 2013 5:39 am

University of Wisconsin-Green Bay women’s associate head coach John Barnes is expected to be named the Youngstown State coach as early as Friday.

Barnes said Monday that he planned to return for a second season at UWGB, but those plans apparently changed after he interviewed at YSU this week.

According to a source, he will replace Bob Boldon, who was hired at Ohio University after spending the past three seasons with the Penguins.

This will be Barnes’ fifth stop in as many years. He stepped down as head coach at Michigan Tech to be an assistant under Lisa Stone at Wisconsin in 2010-11.

Barnes was hired by Kevin Borseth at Michigan for the 2011-12 season, and then followed Borseth to UWGB last season.

Barnes did not return calls or text messages left on his cell phone Thursday night.

He said this week that he had dreams of running his own Division I program, and that dream apparently was realized quickly.

“It’s definitely the goal,” Barnes said Monday. “When and where that might be, time will tell. Green Bay is a great place to be and a great program, so I am definitely happy.”

He had significant success while at DII Michigan Tech, leading the Huskies to a winning record in all seven of his seasons. He went 156-55 during his tenure and was a three-time coach of the year in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

Barnes will take over a YSU team that made an impressive turnaround under Boldon. Boldon was hired one season after the Penguins went 0-30 in 2009-10 and led it to a 23-10 record this past season.

Barnes, meanwhile, joins Detroit’s Autumn Rademacher as former UWGB assistants who now are head coaches in the Horizon League.

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