Sean Jamel McCaw (born Sean Allen; July 26, 1973) is an American-Austrian former professional basketball player and coach. His professional playing career spanned from 1995 to 2008 and his coaching career spanned from 2008 to 2016. McCaw's career took him to Austria, France, Germany, Portugal, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. During his college career in the United States, McCaw was named the 1995 American West Conference Player of the Year. He currently resides in Germany with his family and works as an educator at an international school.

Playing career

High school

McCaw was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

but grew up in

Las Vegas, Nevada Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...

. He attended

Western High School Western High School may refer: Schools in the United States *Western High School (Anaheim, California) – Anaheim, California * Western High School (Illinois) – Barry, Illinois * Western High School (Florida) – Davie, Florida * Western High S ...

from 1987 to 1991 but only played basketball his

senior Senior (shortened as Sr.) means "the elder" in Latin and is often used as a suffix for the elder of two or more people in the same family with the same given name, usually a parent or grandparent. It may also refer to: * Senior (name), a surname ...

season due to academic ineligibility his first three years. In his lone season, McCaw averaged 16.6 points and 11.2 rebounds per game and also set the school single season blocked shots record with 163. The Western High Warriors also won their second of back-to-back Class 3A state titles. McCaw was named first-team all-state.

College

A month after his senior season ended, McCaw signed a

National Letter of Intent National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, ce ...

to play for the University of Arizona Wildcats without having visited the school. He wanted to play for the alma mater of his basketball idol,

Sean Elliott Sean Michael Elliott (born February 2, 1968) is an American former professional basketball player who starred at small forward in both the college and professional ranks. He attended the University of Arizona, where he had a standout career as ...

, and was the "least publicized of the Wildcat recruits." McCaw's

freshman A freshman, fresher, first year, or frosh, is a person in the first year at an educational institution, usually a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of post-secondary educational institutions. Ara ...

season was statistically unremarkable and ended prematurely. After appearing in only 11 games while averaging 2.1 points and 0.8 rebounds per game, McCaw was placed on indefinite suspension in February by coach

Lute Olson Robert Luther "Lute" Olson (September 22, 1934 – August 27, 2020) was an American basketball coach, who was inducted into both the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame. He was the head co ...

for "failure to fulfill the team's academic requirements." His suspension was team-related as he was eligible under both NCAA and Arizona Board of Regents standards. The suspension effectively ended McCaw's time at Arizona; he transferred to

Dixie State University Utah Tech University (UT), formerly known as Dixie State University (DSU) and similar names, is a public university in St. George, Utah. The university offers about 240 programs (4 master's degrees, 53 bachelor's degrees, 18 associate degrees, 45 ...

(which was still a junior college at the time) for his

sophomore In the United States, a sophomore ( or ) is a person in the second year at an educational institution; usually at a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of post-secondary educational institutions. In ...

season. After one successful season at Dixie, McCaw returned to

NCAA Division I NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest level of College athletics, intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major ...

competition as a

junior Junior or Juniors may refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * ''Junior'' (Junior Mance album), 1959 * ''Junior'' (Röyksopp album), 2009 * ''Junior'' (Kaki King album), 2010 * ''Junior'' (LaFontaines album), 2019 Films * ''Junior'' (1994 ...

in 1993–94, this time for

Southern Utah University Southern Utah University (SUU) is a public university in Cedar City, Utah. Founded in 1897 as a normal school, Southern Utah University now graduates over 1,800 students each year with baccalaureate and graduate degrees from its six colleges. ...

to play for the Thunderbirds, who were in their final season as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

. The team finished with a 16–11 record but McCaw saw personal success. He averaged 16.8 points and 6.6 rebounds per game, leading the team in each category. He also recorded 53 blocks, which was a then-school single season record. Heading into his senior season in 1994–95, Southern Utah joined the

American West Conference The American West Conference (AWC) was a college athletic conference in the United States from 1993 to 1996. It consisted of schools in California and Utah. The charter members of the conference were California Polytechnic State University; Cal ...

, which was in its first year offering basketball. Before the season, the media projected McCaw as one of the conference's best players. He lived up to the billing by averaging team-leading 15.2 points and 5.9 rebounds per game, and surpassed Southern Utah's then-school record for blocks in a career (61). He led the Thunderbirds to win the American West regular season championship with a 6–0 conference record (17–11 overall) as well as the conference tournament championship. Southern Utah was not awarded a bid to the NCAA tournament, however, due to the NCAA rule where there must be six member institutions in a conference to qualify (it only had five). For his effort, McCaw was named to the all-conference first-team and won the first ever American West Conference Player of the Year award. During his three-year NCAA Division I career, McCaw recorded 886 points, 345 rebounds, and 116 blocks. In 2017, Southern Utah University inducted him into their athletics hall of fame despite having only played for the school for two years.

NCAA Division I statistics

, - , style="text-align:left;", 1991–92 , style="text-align:left;",

Arizona Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...

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Professional

McCaw went undrafted in the ensuing

1995 NBA draft The 1995 NBA draft took place on June 28, 1995, at SkyDome in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It marked the first NBA draft to be held outside the United States and was the first draft for the two Canadian expansion teams, Toronto Raptors and Vancouve ...

. He decided to pursue his professional career in the European market due to the 1995 NBA season lockout. Between 1995 and 2008, McCaw played professionally in six different countries, won multiple titles, and became a

naturalized Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-citizen of a country may acquire citizenship or nationality of that country. It may be done automatically by a statute, i.e., without any effort on the part of the in ...

Austrian citizen so he could compete for their national team. He never returned to the United States to attempt a career in the NBA.

Coaching career

In February 2008, McCaw took over as player-coach of

Science City Jena Medipolis SC Jena is a basketball club based in Jena, Germany that plays in the ProA. Their home court is the Sparkassen Arena, which seats 3,000. Their current head coach is Dominik Reinboth. The team was known as Erdgas Baskets Jena through ...

Jena, Germany Jena () is a German city and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a popu ...

. He retired from playing at the end of the 2007–08 season and remained as head coach for the 2008–09 season. He parted ways with Jena in December 2008. In 2009, he took over as the head coach for

Medi Bayreuth Medi Bayreuth, official stylized as medi bayreuth, is a German professional basketball club that is based in Bayreuth, Germany. It was re-founded as BBC Bayreuth in 1999. The team plays in the Basketball Bundesliga (BBL), the highest division o ...

's youth team, a position he stayed in for three seasons. McCaw left Medi in 2012 and spent four more years as a coach for two different teams before retiring from coaching as well.

Personal life

McCaw stayed in Germany after his playing and coaching career days ended. He and his family live in

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony (german: Niedersachsen ; nds, Neddersassen; stq, Läichsaksen) is a German state (') in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ...

where Sean works as an educator at an international school. He is also an author, having written ''Same Name Different Game: Your Guide For A Successful European Rookie Season''.

References

External links

College statistics
@ sports-reference.com
Sean J. McCaw official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:McCaw, Sean 1973 births Living people American expatriate basketball people in Austria American expatriate basketball people in France American expatriate basketball people in Germany American expatriate basketball people in Portugal American expatriate basketball people in Switzerland American expatriate basketball people in the United Kingdom American men's basketball coaches American men's basketball players Arizona Wildcats men's basketball players Basketball coaches from Nevada Basketball Löwen Braunschweig coaches Basketball players from Las Vegas Basketball players from Queens, New York CAB Madeira players Centers (basketball) EWE Baskets Oldenburg players Kapfenberg Bulls players Leicester Riders players Lions de Genève players Medi Bayreuth coaches Player-coaches Power forwards (basketball) Science City Jena coaches Science City Jena players Southern Utah Thunderbirds men's basketball players Sportspeople from Lower Saxony Traiskirchen Lions players Utah Tech Trailblazers men's basketball players Western High School (Nevada) alumni