Keno Davis was brought in on April 2, 2012 by then-Athletic Director David Heeke. He took over the Chippewa program after Ernie Zeigler was fired following six seasons with the program.

"I was sold on Heeke's vision of being competitive on the court with young men that would represent the school in the highest fashion not just on the court, but in the classroom and in the community," Davis said. "That was the direction that I wanted to go as a coach and was fortunate enough to be able to be hired and work here for the last nine years."

According to his initial contract, obtained by Central Michigan Life through a Freedom of Information Act request, Davis signed a five-year deal that would pay him $225,000 annually.

If Davis were terminated without cause, his buyout would have been $600,000 for the 2012-13 season, $500,000 (2013-14), $400,000 (2014-15), $300,000 (2015-16), and $200,000 (2016-17). Had Davis left for another coaching opportunity he would owe the school $600,000 (2012-13), $500,000 (2013-14), $400,000 (2014-15), $300,000 (2015-16) and $200,000 (2016-17).

The reduction of the buy out changed on a yearly basis on April 1.

Davis could receive up to $250,000 in bonuses, including a $2,500 bonus for every home sell out and a $5,000 bonus per season if the Chippewas finished with a winning record, won 20 or more games, at least a share of the MAC West Division title, earned an Annual Progress Rate above 930 in an academic year or if the average attendance was more than 2,500 fans. Davis could also receive $15,000 if CMU won both the MAC Regular Season and Tournament titles and made the Round of 32 in the NCAA Tournament.

Nine years and three days — April 5, 2021 — the university placed itself in a similar situation. Davis was fired after a 142-143 overall record and 62-94 in MAC play. CMU went 7-16 overall and 3-13 in MAC play in 2020-21 — including a loss to Division II Flagler on Dec. 2.

The beginning

Before coming to CMU, Davis served as an assistant coach for the Iowa under his father, Tom Davis, from 1991-95. Davis was then offered a job to coach with his father’s former assistant Bruce Pearl at Southern Indiana.

The relationship between Pearl and Davis dated back to Davis' elementary school years.

"I learned how he was able to have a high level of intensity, but yet be able to go from one play to the next or one game to the next or one day to the next and not let something in the past bother you going into future decisions," Davis said. "A lot of times coaches are emotional and have that type of intensity it can be a detriment, but he uses that as a strength."

After spending two seasons under a coach that best demonstrates intensity on the bench, Davis joined Southeastern Missouri State as an assistant from 1997-2003 before joining his father at Drake for the 2003-04 season.

After Tom’s retirement in 2007, Keno was given his first head coaching opportunity. He led the Bulldogs to their second winning season since 1986-87, finishing 28-5 with a Missouri Valley Conference Tournament title and the program’s first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1971. Drake lost in the first round in a thrilling 101-99 overtime loss to Western Kentucky.

Davis was named the College Basketball Coach of the Year by six organizations including the Associated Press and the United States Basketball Writers Association. He left Drake to follow the bright lights displaying one of the nation's premier conferences — the Big East.

Davis was named the head coach of Providence in April 2008 and led the Friars to a 19-14 overall record in his first season and an appearance in the 2009 Big East Tournament quarterfinals.

He would finish his tenure at Providence with a record of 46-50 before being let go after the 2010-11 season. Davis served as an analyst for the Big Ten Network for the 2011-12 season before accepting the job at CMU.

2012-13

Davis inherited four players — senior guard Finis Craddock, senior forward Olivier Mbaigoto, junior guard Luke Wiest and sophomore guard Austin Keel. Of the four, Mbaigoto was the most prolific offensively, averaging 7.1 points per game.

Davis' first game as head coach at CMU was at his alma mater, a 73-61 loss to Iowa. The Chippewas clashed with then-No. 2-ranked Michigan, an 88-73 loss in Ann Arbor, and won their first MAC game of the season 73-67 over Toledo.

CMU suffered a 74-72 overtime loss to Buffalo in the first round of the MAC Tournament.

Year One: 11-20 overall, 4-12 MAC.

2013-14

After a strong 7-5 finish to their non-conference slate, the Chippewas started their MAC schedule with an eight-game losing streak before knocking off Kent State 78-73 in overtime. The Chippewas bowed out for the opening round of the conference tournament once again, losing 72-60 to Eastern Michigan.

Year Two: 11-21 overall, 3-15 MAC

2014-15

CMU finished 10-1 in non-conference action and won the MAC West division for the first time since 2003. During their 75-63 victory over Youngstown State, the Chippewas caught the eye of Penguin guard Marcus Keene.

The guard would later transfer to CMU after the season and sit out the 2015-16 campaign due to NCAA transfer rules.

CMU earned the program's best finish and first winning record since 2002-03. The Chippewas knocked off Toledo, 75-66, in the MAC Tournament semifinals and fell to Buffalo, 89-84, for the MAC title.

CMU lost 89-79 to Louisiana Tech in the first round of the NIT.

Year Three: 23-9 overall, 12-6 MAC

2015-16

Prior to the season’s start, Davis signed a five-year extension with a $50,000 raise annually.

CMU shared the MAC West title with Ball State and earned back-to-back seasons with winning conference records for the first time since the late 1970s.

CMU lost to Bowling Green 62-59 in the MAC Tournament quarterfinals after the Falcons hit a 3-pointer with 13 seconds remaining.

Year Four: 17-16 overall, 10-6 MAC

2016-17

While losing Fowler, Rashawn Simmons, Austin Stewart and John Simons all to graduation and Milos Cabarkapa after transferring to the University of Indianapolis, the Chippewas needed to replace 51 percent of their point production fresh after claiming a share of their second-consecutive MAC West title.

Enter Marcus Keene.

The former Penguin quickly became a focal point of the Chippewa offense, leading the nation in scoring at 30 points per game — becoming the first player to do so since 1996.

Keene finished with seven 40-point games while holding a McGuirk Arena-record 50-point outing against Miami (Ohio) and the MAC record for points in a single season (959).

He was named to the All-MAC First Team and runner-up for MAC Player of the Year to Akron’s Isaiah Johnson.

The Chippewas fell to Kent State 116-106 in overtime at Kent State in the MAC Tournament opening round. The Chippewas finished the season on an eight-game losing skid.

Year Five: 16-16 overall, 6-12 MAC

2017-18

With Rayson’s graduation and Keene taking his talents to the professional level, the Chippewas were left with seniors Cecil Williams, Josh Kazinski and Luke Meyer, sophomores in DiLeo, Kevin McKay and junior Shawn Roundtree Jr., who transferred from Mineral Area College.

After an 11-2 non-conference slate that featured a Great Alaska Shootout Tournament championship, the Chippewas appeared poised to find their footing. After a 25-point blowout win over Ohio, CMU dropped six of its next seven MAC contests to start the 2018 conference schedule at 2-8.

The Chippewas defeated Bowling Green 81-77 in overtime in the first round of the 2018 MAC tournament before falling 89-74 to Buffalo in the tournament quarterfinals. The Chippewas earned a berth into the 2018 CIT, defeating Fort Wayne and Wofford before falling to Liberty in the tournament quarterfinals.

Year Six: 21-15 overall, 7-11 MAC

2018-19

The summer of 2018 was full of turnover. The team lost nine members of their roster from graduation or transferring out of the program. Davis also lost his top assistant Kevin Gamble, who accepted a role with the Toronto Raptors as a scout Sept. 5 2018.

Chris Davis, an assistant under Tom at Drake and Keno at Providence, joined CMU’s staff in Gamble’s place.

"Turnover in a coaching staff is always difficult," Davis said. "Some of the transition takes time because some of recruiting. You don't just recruit for a month or two, you're recruiting kids for two to three years sometimes.

After Roundtree’s transition from the JUCO level to Division I, the Chippewas added four more JUCO players: Romelo Burrell (John A. Logan College), Dallas Morgan (Moberly Area Community College), Kevin Hamlet (Mineral Area), and Rob Montgomery (Indian Hills Community College).

"It was weird for me to think how much turnover there was," DiLeo said. "In my four years, I had so many new teammates year-in and year-out. Guys were coming in and two years later they were gone."

The Chippewas cruised to an 11-2 non-conference record and won their first four MAC games to start the conference slate at 10-5. CMU dropped two of its last three games to fall out of the top four seeds and a first-round bye in the tournament.

CMU defeated rival Western Michigan for the third time that season 81-67 in the tournament opener and knocked off Kent State 89-81 to earn an appearance in the semifinal for the first time since 2015. The Chippewas lost 85-81 to Buffalo, which finished 32-4 and lost to eventual national runner-up Texas Tech in the Round of 32 of the NCAA Tournament.

Year Seven: 23-12 overall, 10-8 MAC

2019-20

Shortly before the start of the season, Davis signed a five-year contract extension, raising his annual salary to $319,923 while keeping him in Mount Pleasant until April 2024. In the contract, obtained by CM Life via a Freedom of Information Act request, if Davis was fired without cause, CMU's buy-out was $1 million (2019-20), $500,000 (2020-21), $400,000 (2021-22), $300,000 (2022-23) and $200,000 (2023-24).

With his new contract, the university agreed the team’s win-loss record was not permitted to be a factor in any termination of his contract.

After finishing 7-6 in non-conference action, CMU started 6-2 in MAC play. With 10 games remaining, CMU dropped nine, knocking off Western Michigan 85-68 to win the final game of the regular season.

The Chippewas fell 85-65 in the opening round of the MAC Tournament to Ohio to drop 10 of 11 games.

Year Eight: 14-18 overall, 7-11 MAC

2020-21

With more turnover hitting the team, CMU welcomed Ra’Shad Weekly-McDaniels from Trinity Catholic High School in St. Louis, Aundre Polk from Spire Institute, Tyler Hankins from the CMU baseball team and four more JUCO players: Ralph Bissainthe (Florida SouthWestern State), Caleb Huffman (Iowa Western), Meikkel Murray (Coffeyville Community College) and Malik Muhammad (East Los Angeles College).

CMU returned six players from the previous season.

The Chippewas started their off-season slate 0-3, capped by a 92-73 loss to Flagler, a Division II school. CMU bounced back to win its next three games before dropping the MAC opener to the Broncos 76-61 in Kalamazoo.

The Chippewas dropped 11 of their next 13 conference games and played their final five games with no more than nine players thanks to injuries and COVID-related issues while suffering their worst conference loss in the Keno Davis-era, a 96-54 loss to Miami in McGuirk Arena.

The Chippewas upset eventual MAC regular-season champion Toledo 81-79 and fell to Northern Illinois 79-74 in the final week of the season.

Year Nine: 7-16 overall, 3-13 MAC

April 5th, 2021

CMU parted ways with Davis after nine seasons.

"I am extremely grateful to Keno for the impact he has made on our student-athletes and the greater CMU community," Athletic Director Amy Folan said. "Decisions like this are always difficult. However, after spending the last few months evaluating all aspects of our program, I believe it is necessary and appropriate to make a change in leadership at this time to achieve the goals we have for men's basketball."

Davis said he hopes to be remembered as a coach who did things the right way over his nine-year tenure.

"I've always tried to make sure that we've done things the right way, that we didn't take any shortcuts with the type of student-athletes that we bring in," Davis said. "We try and treat them with respect, we expect them to treat other with respect and that they do things the right way.

"I hope people will look back and realize that we weren't shortcutting to try and win games, but that we were trying to take that mission and follow through with it, not just talk the talk about about having a winning attitude and winning culture."

FINAL: 142-143 overall, 62-94 MAC