Stanford fires coach Johnny Dawkins after a disappointing finish in his eighth season

Johnny Dawkins was fired Monday after eight seasons as Stanford coach.

Dawkins took the Cardinal to the Sweet 16 of the 2014 NCAA tournament and won the NIT championship after the 2012 and 2015 seasons, but Stanford went 15-15 this season and finished ninth in the Pac-12 Conference at 8-10. Dawkins was 156-115 during his Stanford tenure.

Dawkins came to Stanford after working as a top assistant at alma mater Duke under coaching mentor Mike Krzyzewski. Stanford Athletic Director Bernard Muir said he has begun a national search for a new coach.

TCU fires Johnson

Trent Johnson was fired as Texas Christian basketball coach after the Horned Frogs won only eight conference games in his four seasons, the team’s first four in the Big 12. TCU finished 12-21 overall this season, 2-16 in Big 12 play. Johnson, who coached Stanford from 2004-08 and Louisiana State from 2008-12 before moving to Fort Worth, was 50-79 with the Frogs and 8-64 in regular-season conference play, with the losses coming by an average margin of more than 15 points.

Player to sue Yale

Former Yale basketball captain Jack Montague was expelled over a sexual assault allegation and plans to sue the school, his lawyer said. Attorney Max Stern issued a statement saying Montague had a relationship with the woman. He said the dispute is about the last of four sexual encounters, occurring in October 2014. The lawyer said the woman claims she didn’t consent to the sex but Montague said she did and also asserts she later came back to his room to spend the night.

Stern said a Title IX official filed a complaint on the woman’s behalf on Nov. 18, a university panel ruled against Montague and the provost upheld that ruling. Montague, who participated in the hearing process, was expelled on Feb. 10, a decision Stern called “arbitrary and excessive by any rational measure.”

49ers to face Huskies

Long Beach State will play at Washington on Tuesday in the first round of the NIT, a game that will televised on ESPN2 starting at 6 p.m. The 49ers (20-14) lost in the closing seconds to Hawaii in the Big West tournament championship game. Washington (18-14) was the early-season leader in the Pac-12 Conference, but dropped six of its last eight league games and fell in a conference tournament quarterfinal to champion Oregon.

Also Tuesday, Pepperdine faces Eastern Washington in the College Basketball Invitational, starting at 6 p.m. in Cheney, Wash.

Play-in games

Florida Gulf Coast returns Tuesday to the NCAA tournament for the first time since it became a national sensation with an improbable Sweet 16 run as a No. 15 seed in 2013 under coach Andy Enfield, now USC’s coach. The Eagles (20-13), who won the Atlantic Sun Conference tournament, play Northeast Conference champion Fairleigh Dickinson (18-14) in a First Four game in Dayton, Ohio., at 3:40 p.m. PDT on truTV, with the winner advancing to face top-seeded North Carolina on Thursday in the first round of East Regional.

In the other First Four “play-in” game at Dayton, Wichita State (24-8), in the NCAA tournament for the fifth year in a row, faces Vanderbilt (19-13) starting at 6:10 p.m. PDT, also on truTV. The winner will be sixth-seeded Arizona’s first-round opponent in the East Regional.

Etc.

Matt Brady is out as coach at James Madison after eight seasons in which he compiled a 139-127 record, including an NCAA tournament berth in 2013. . . . The University of Denver hired Colorado assistant Rodney Billups as head coach, replacing Joe Scott, who was fired after nine years, including a 16-15 record this season. Billups is a former Pioneers point guard spent and the younger brother of Chauncey Billups, who played for the Clippers, the Denver Nuggets and five other teams in a 17-year NBA career. . . . Tulane parted ways with coach Ed Conroy , who went 92-103 in six seasons, including 12-22 this season. . . . Suspended Illinois player Jaylon Tate pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor domestic battery and was free on bond after a weekend arrest in which police alleged he hit his girlfriend. . . . New Mexico senior guard Cullen Neal, son of Lobos Coach Craig Neal, said he will transfer to another program to complete his playing eligibility while pursuing a graduate degree.