A multitude of reasons contributed to the firing of South Florida basketball head coach Orlando Antigua.

Two games into AAC play, South Florida has already opted to fire their head coach Orlando Antigua.

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“After a thorough and deliberate review of our men’s basketball program, a decision has been made to make a head coaching change,” USF Athletic Director Mark Harlan wrote in a letter via ESPN. “I met with Coach Antigua earlier today to inform him of this and to thank him for his service to USF. We wish Coach Antigua and his family the very best.”

With Antigua fired, assistant Murry Bartow will serve as the team’s interim head coach before the school moves forward with a full coaching search this offseason.

So why was Antigua fired less than three years into his tenure with USF? There are a multitude of reasons why South Florida not only decided to move forward without Antigua, but why the timing of the move makes sense.

• First, Antigua was not successful in the win column. The former Kentucky assistant won 17 combined games in his first two years, didn’t finish with more than nine wins in any given season and was on pace to bottom out in 2016-17 with just a 6-7 record (0-2 in AAC) so far. The lack of progress wasn’t getting it done.
• In addition to the lack of wins, South Florida lost two important pieces in the last few months. First, the Bulls’ top 2016 recruit, Troy Baxter, opted out of his National Letter of Intent four months ago and committed to UNLV. More recently, the team’s leading scorer Jahmal McMurray decided to transfer and has taken a visit to St. John’s already.