Giacoletti looking forward to game vs. former team

When reached by phone at his office last week, Ray Giacoletti just happened to be looking at film of the University of Utah basketball team.

That was almost a daily occurrence over the previous three seasons, but this time Giacoletti was in Spokane looking at the Utes from an opposing coach's viewpoint.

Giacoletti is an assistant coach at Gonzaga University, which plays host to Utah Monday evening (6 p.m. MST) at the McCarthey Center.

It's a game that Giacoletti helped set up when he was in Utah thanks to his friendship with head coach Mark Few. He didn't foresee that he would be coaching against his former team, for which he recruited every current player. But after being let go last March after three years with the Utes, Giacoletti landed an assistant coaching gig under Few and now will see how his former players have progressed under new coach Jim Boylen.

Although he wasn't happy to be let go after just three years at Utah, Giacoletti shows few signs of bitterness.

"I'm really happy for them, watching the kids mature and have a great year," Giacoletti said. "Jim has done a really good job with them. He's got them playing really well. I'm excited for them. It's fun to see Tyler Kepkay and Carlon Brown, a couple of guys we recruited, starting for them and playing well. It reinforces to me that we were headed in the right direction."

Giacoletti said he is happy in his job and has enjoyed getting back to Washington where he coached for four seasons as the head coach at Eastern Washington and for four years as an assistant at the University of Washington.

"It's been great, it's been an easy transition," Giacoletti said. "Mark and I have known each other for a long time (16 years), so it's been a great fit."

Predictably, Giacoletti preferred not to talk much about the specifics of losing his job at Utah after the third year of a seven-year contract, except to use the term "fired" when talking about it rather than "resign" as he did last March.

"I'm not going to get into any of that," he said. "They made a decision and that's their right. We did the best we could. You can't look back."

Giacoletti did say he felt somewhat restricted his whole time at Utah for NCAA violations committed by his predecessor, Rick Majerus. That limited the Utes on the number of scholarships, recruiting visits and other things.