Steve Fisher Position: Head Coach Experience: 10th season at SDSU Alma Mater: Illinois State '67

Steve Fisher has guided the Aztec basketball program to unparalleled heights. In eight seasons, he has taken a program that regularly missed out on the conference postseason tournament, to one which has become one of the best programs on the West Coast and has the Aztecs knocking on the door of the elite teams in the country.

The best news for SDSU fans is that Fisher signed a new five-year contract prior to the 2006-07 campaign that will keep the national championship coach in San Diego for the foreseeable future.

When Fisher arrived on the scene in March of 1999, he found a basketball program that wasn't good enough to be called average. The Aztecs had suffered through 13 losing seasons in 14 years. Members of the school's last NCAA team were in the early stages of middle age. The expectations were set. The Aztecs were expected to lose. The year before Fisher's arrival on campus, San Diego State won just four games.

Now those days are a distant memory. Fisher guided SDSU to the 2002 NCAA Tournament, the postseason NIT in 2003, the 2006 NCAA Tournament and the 2007 NIT last season. In addition, the Aztecs may have their most exciting, most balanced and most experienced team entering the 2007-08 season with nine current Aztecs having been on winning teams that have produced 20 or more victories and advanced to the postseason. Of the nine, seven have been to the NCAA Tournament and eight have won at least one postseason game.

The ingredients for a successful basketball program seemed to have arrived at San Diego State at approximately the same time Fisher did.

Cox Arena is one of the glaring athletic upgrades on the west side of campus, and its opening signified the new-placed emphasis on basketball in the Aztec athletic department. The program moved from the aging San Diego Sports Arena on the west side of the city to an on-campus home located just steps away from fraternities and sororities.

After the arrival of Cox Arena, one important ingredient was lacking.

On March 26, 1999, San Diego State announced its arrival on the basketball scene in a news conference to introduce its new coach, Steve Fisher. Fresh from a stint with the Sacramento Kings and with three appearances in the Final Four and a national championship in his pocket, he rolled up his sleeves and went to work. And work was needed. It looked to be a daunting challenge and yet the man with one of the highest winning percentages in NCAA Tournament history had no reservations.

"We have everything here that we need to be successful at the highest level," Fisher said. "We have a great campus in a great city. Cox Arena is as good of a facility as you can find. Our league is very good and getting better. Who wouldn't want to play here?"

Coming off a 4-22 season, not much was expected of the Aztecs in the new coach's first year. The Aztecs finished 5-23 but never stopped working. The last game of the season was a near upset of UNLV in the first round of the MWC Tournament. The eventual champions bested the Aztecs in the final minutes.

"We worked hard - we just weren't good enough," Fisher said of his first group of Aztecs. "They tried to do everything we wanted, but we spent the year dodging bullets."

It was year two, the 2000-01 campaign, when Fisher and SDSU served notice that better days were ahead and some, in fact, had arrived. The Aztecs were one of the nation's most improved teams, finishing the year at 14-14 and in the process, ending several less-than-flattering streaks, including a long road losing streak, a long conference losing streak and an overall losing streak. Attendance jumped by an astounding 73 percent and by spring, the stars of tomorrow became more receptive when Fisher and his staff came calling to talk about Aztec basketball.

And then came year three. An indifferent start gave way to a downright slow beginning to conference play. But the Aztecs then unveiled a trait that has become synonymous with Steve Fisher teams. They played their best when it mattered most.

The Aztecs roared down the stretch, winning eight of their final 10 games and climbing to .500 in Mountain West play, a major step for San Diego State basketball.

Then came March, a month that has always been magical for Steve Fisher.

The Aztecs headed to Las Vegas and picked up three straight wins to claim their first Mountain West title, including victories over top-seeded Wyoming and home-standing UNLV.

The season ended with a 21-12 record and continued the upward surge of the program. And SDSU was close to so much more. The Aztecs dropped three overtime games, lost a hard-fought battle at Utah and went on the road to push Duke. San Diego State reached 21 wins for the first time since the 1984-85 season and returned to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since that same '84-85 team.

Along the way there were more glaring landmarks. SDSU picked up its first win at New Mexico since 1984 and swept the Colorado State-Wyoming swing, considered one of the toughest in college basketball, for the first time ever.

However, it is what lies ahead and not the past that continues to drive the energetic Fisher.

"I have never said I wanted the program in a certain place by a certain time," he said last year. "You just work hard, prepare well and try to get lucky. We have probably done a little bit of each."

The Aztecs proved that they were more than a one-hit wonder in 2002-03 by returning to the postseason and claiming their first postseason victory in 33 seasons at the Division I level. San Diego State concluded its third straight season with a .500 record by going 16-14 and advancing to the second round of the NIT. Along the way, the Aztecs played before two sellout crowds in Cox Arena en route to shattering the home attendance average (7,172).

Although SDSU struggled the following two seasons, Fisher and the Aztecs enjoyed one the best seasons in school history in 2005-06. Expectations were high from the outset as the conference media picked SDSU as the team to beat in the MWC, something that had never happened in the Scarlet and Black's Division I history. In addition, the league media also bestowed on SDSU the titles of player of the year (Marcus Slaughter), first-team all-conference (Slaughter and Brandon Heath) and newcomer of the year (Mohamed Abukar).

And that was just the beginning. San Diego State won a Division I school-record 24 games, the regular season conference crown and the league tournament title en route to a bid in the NCAA Tournament. At season's end, Brandon Heath had been named an AP honorable mention All-American, the MWC player of the year and a first-team all-league selection, while teammates Marcus Slaughter (MWC tournament MVP, first-team all-MWC) and Mohamed Abukar (second-team all-conference) also garnered attention.

The success from the Aztecs' magical year continued in 2006-07 as SDSU went on to win its first eight games, marking the best start to a season by a Fisher-coached team, and posted its second straight 20-plus win season with a record of 22-11, something that had not been accomplished on Montezuma Mesa during the Aztecs' time as a Division I program. In the process, San Diego State earned a spot in the MasterCard NIT and captured its first Division I postseason road victory before falling in the second round.

The immediate future looks just as bright with all-conference performer Lorrenzo Wade, returning point guard Richie Williams and two-time letterman Kyle Spain returning for their junior seasons. And with the addition of Ryan Amoroso and a strong recruiting class, many feel the program is in great shape.

Steve Fisher arrived in San Diego after spending one season as an assistant coach with the Sacramento Kings. However, he is best known for his efforts at the collegiate level. He became a household name at Michigan, where he transformed a prominent program into a perennial national championship contender and winner. Returning to the college game was returning home.

"I enjoyed the NBA," Fisher said. "It was all basketball all the time. But I always felt I belonged in the college game. If I have a calling, it is as a teacher. I enjoy teaching basketball. I think it is what I do best." That point would be hard to argue.

No head-coaching career, at any level, started quicker than that of Steve Fisher. Six games into his head-coaching career he was undefeated and sporting a national championship ring. And the success didn't stop with the national title.

Fisher spent eight-plus seasons, won an NCAA title and an NIT championship and carved out one of the most glamorous periods in college basketball history during the Fab Five years.

Under Fisher, the Wolverines won at least 20 games four times and finished among the top three in the powerful Big Ten Conference five times. In 1995, Michigan set a league record by holding opponents to just 39.4 percent shooting from the floor.

Fisher and company raised the bar even higher in the postseason. His seven NCAA Tournament teams combined for a 20-6 record on the court for a winning percentage of .769 in the national bracket. Three of his teams advanced to the Final Four.

Just seven head coaches have led schools to the championship of the NIT as well as the NCAA. The others to accomplish that feat are Bobby Knight, Adolph Rupp, Joe B. Hall, Al McGuire, Dean Smith and Jim Calhoun.

Add to the accolades the fact that Fisher coached perhaps the most famous group of players in modern NCAA history. In 1991, Fisher and Aztec assistant head coach Brian Dutcher inked a recruiting class that would later be known as the "Fab Five." The group included Ray Jackson, Jimmy King and NBA stars Juwan Howard, Jalen Rose and Chris Webber. They were the heart, and indeed the starting five, of two consecutive NCAA runner-up teams in Ann Arbor. For his efforts with that group, Fisher was named the 1992 national coach of the year by Basketball Times.

During his stay in Michigan, Fisher coached seven players that would be taken in the first round of the NBA draft, including the three members of the Fab Five.

His accomplishments may be even greater at SDSU. In 2001-02 he led the Aztecs to the postseason for the first time since 1985 and for just the fourth time ever. The 21 wins were second most for the school as a Division I program and the most since 1985.

That was followed by an appearance in the NIT in 2002-03 and the Aztecs' first Division I postseason victory.

The fact that those numbers came in his first four years at SDSU signifies what is one of the great recent turnarounds in college basketball.

Steve Fisher was born March 24, 1945. He grew up in Herrin, Ill., and played his college basketball at Illinois State University, where he earned two varsity letters. He was a member of the university's Division II Final Four team as a senior. In 1967, he completed work on his bachelor's degree at ISU in physical education and math. The following year he earned a master's degree in physical education.

Fisher began his climb up the coaching ladder in Park Forest, Ill., where he served as an assistant coach and later became head coach at Rich East High School. In eight years at the helm of the program, he built Rich East into one of the top programs in the Chicago area.

"I probably could have stayed in the high school ranks my entire career and been happy," Fisher said. "I coached basketball and taught math and that was fine with me."

In 1979, Fisher moved into the collegiate ranks at Western Michigan. He spent three years as an assistant under Les Wothke, who had hired him at Rich East. He helped build the Bronco program into a conference champion in 1981.

In 1982, he moved across the state to Michigan where he helped Bill Frieder lead the Wolverines to a pair of conference titles. As he was in high school, Fisher was happy sitting in the middle of the bench, removed from the spotlight. A career as an assistant would have worked just fine.

Seven years after his hiring and on the verge of the NCAA Tournament, Frieder accepted the head-coaching job at Arizona State and Michigan athletic director Bo Schembechler quickly moved Fisher to the end of the bench. Fisher then moved himself into the national spotlight.

He assumed the role of interim head coach with no promise of a future. However, he made a strong case for the job when he promptly led a team that finished third in the Big Ten race to the national title. Included in that run was a win over Illinois in the national semifinals. The Illini were considered by many to be the best team in the country. The title was the first and remains the only championship in Michigan history.

The 1991-92 and 1992-93 seasons were the fanatical years of the Fab Five. Not only did the Wolverines achieve cult-like status, but they were the most successful group of underclassmen in the history of college sports.

In the years before the early entries into the NBA and before high school stars spent their lunch hours with agents, Michigan's successes were even more impressive. Two straight trips to the NCAA title game with five freshmen and then five sophomores in the starting lineup marked an incredible accomplishment. Michigan set a school record in 1992-93 by going 31-5.

In all, Steve Fisher carved out the most successful period in Michigan basketball history. His final club in Ann Arbor won the NIT. However, he is now clearly planted in Southern California.

"My family and I are elated to be at San Diego State," he said. "This program has unlimited potential. I have a responsibility to make sure the potential is realized."

Fisher's first full recruiting class was ranked among the nation's top 40. His second group was a consensus top-25 crop and the Aztecs keep moving up the chart. Potential no longer seems like a bad word.

The season-ticket base is rapidly swelling. The community has an interest even in the off-season. Steve Fisher has led the Aztecs from the wasteland to the throne room.

Fisher, the 14th head coach in Aztec history, is married to the former Angie Wilson, another former teacher at Rich East High School. They have two sons. Mark, 29, is a Michigan graduate who is in his first year as an assistant coach and sixth season overall at SDSU. Jay is a senior at the University of Southern California.