Dennis Cutts was named head coach of the UC Riverside Men's Basketball Team in April of 2014 after serving as the team's interim head coach for the 2013-14 season. He accepted the position as interim head coach on July 10, 2013, when Jim Wooldridge stepped down to become the interim athletics director for the Highlanders.
During the 2013-14 campaign, the Highlanders nearly doubled their win total from the previous year earning the eight seed in the Big West Conference Tournament. UC Riverside averaged 70.9 points per game that season in conference play—the highest average since the Highlanders joined the Big West, and 11.1 points more per game than the team averaged the year prior. UC Riverside also saw its home attendance increase by 20 percent in 2013-14.
In the 2014-15 campaign, the Highlanders won the second most games in the Division I history of the program, and the second most conference games as well. Coach Cutts was named one of ten finalists for the 2015 Joe B. Hall National Coach of the Year award. They earned the sixth seed in the Big West Conference Tournament.
UC Riverside had a first team All-Conference player in Taylor Johns as well as Newcomer of the Year and second team All-Conference player in Jaylen Bland. Johns and Bland were the highest scoring duo in UC Riverside's Division I history. After the season, Coach Cutts earned an extension through the 2019-20 season.
In 2015-16, UC Riverside continued to build upon its success by yet again posting the second most wins in the program's Division I, while recording the most road wins and non-conference wins during that time. The Highlanders also earned the sixth seed in the Big West Conference Tournament for the second year in a row.
UCR broke several school Division I-era records during the year including highest scoring average, most assists, most three pointers made and most rebounds. A number of those marks are the highest in the program in more than a quarter century including the most assists and most three pointers since the 1988-89 campaign. UC Riverside's rebound figure was the highest since the 1994-95 season.
The Highlanders also won at Hawaii for the first time in their Big West history. Jaylen Bland finished third in the entire country in made three pointers (118) and earned Second Team All-Conference honors, while Secean Johnson earned Honorable Mention All-Conference accolades.
Cutts returns all nine scholarship players from the 2015-16 season, one of the only schools in the entire country to retain all of their players.
The 2016-17 season saw the debut of freshman Dikymbe Martin, who became the first freshman on the squad to earn All-Conference accolades since Rickey Porter earned Second Team honors in 2005-06.
Cutts originally joined the men’s basketball staff as an assistant coach in May of 2007, rejoining Wooldridge, with whom he worked at Kansas State as the team’s director of basketball operations. Cutts brings over 20 years of coaching experience to the Highlanders bench.
As the director of basketball operations with the Wildcats, Cutts assisted in coordinating recruiting activities for the program, running the Jim Wooldridge Basketball Camp, organizing K-State coaching clinics and overseeing the Wildcat Faculty/Staff Club. In addition, he coordinated all team travel and oversaw special projects for the basketball office.
Cutts was an associate head coach and recruiting coordinator for Phil Johnson at San Jose State from 2002 to 2005. He assisted in the development and recruitment of several all-conference players, including Marquin Chandler, a Second-Team All-Western Athletic Conference (WAC) forward. In addition to his on-the-floor coaching duties, Cutts was in charge of the team’s scheduling of opponents and facilities as well as academic monitoring.
Cutts was a four-year letter winner at State University of New York at Albany, helping his team to four consecutive winning seasons, including three 20-win campaigns. As a senior, Cutts was team captain and most valuable player of a Great Dane squad that reached the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Division III Tournament. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in sociology with a minor in business administration in 1990.
Following graduation, the Massapequa, NY native began his coaching career in Killarney, Ireland in 1990 as a player-coach for the St. Paul’s Basketball Club senior men’s “A” team. He also coached the men’s “B” team, the senior women’s “A” team and boys’ teams ranging in ages up to 19-years-old. In addition, he was an instructor at the Institute for International Sport in Killarney.
He returned to the United States in 1991 and spent three seasons as an assistant coach at Pima Community College (1991-94) in Tucson, AZ and two as an assistant coach at Northland Pioneer College (1994-96) in Holbrook, AZ.
Cutts reached the Division I level in 1996 when he joined the staff at Stephen F. Austin, spending three years as the program’s recruiting coordinator and overseeing the development of the Lumberjacks’ offense. He then moved on to Northern Arizona and worked under Mike Adras, where he was assistant coach and recruiting coordinator from 1999 through 2002. In 2000 he helped the Lumberjacks to a 20-11 mark, the Big Sky Tournament Championship and a trip to the NCAA Tournament. He coordinated the team’s offensive schemes and worked in the development of the perimeter players. Cutts also had duties in scouting opponents and academic supervision.
Cutts is a member of the National Association of Basketball Coaches. He and his wife Evon reside in Riverside.
