High school basketball: St. Francis names Rodney Tention as its new coach

MOUNTAIN VIEW — Rodney Tention, who has extensive college basketball coaching experience, is taking another swing at the high school level.

He was named the head boys basketball coach at St. Francis on Wednesday, replacing Mike Motil, who stepped down this spring after 15 seasons.

The announcement comes five years after Tention was hired as the head coach at Palo Alto, where he spent one season before returning to the college game as an assistant at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo.

Tention’s move to St. Francis reunites him with the school’s athletic director, Therren Wilburn, who held the same position at Palo Alto when Tention was hired there.

“Doing it all over again, this time for a longer time, for sure,” Tention said

Wilburn said he is thrilled to have Tention on board.

“Having worked with him before, I know the kind of professionalism he’ll bring to our program,” Wilburn said in the school’s news release. “I’m looking forward to the growth our student-athletes will gain on and off the court from his direction.”

Tention, a former head coach at Loyola Marymount and assistant at Stanford, Arizona and San Jose State, said the opportunity to coach at a great school with a rich tradition made the St. Francis job enticing.

“The academic and athletic tradition that they’ve had is high level,” he told the Bay Area News Group on Wednesday night. “It’s in one of the best conferences in the state of California. There are no nights off. The chance to be the guy out in front of it and continuing the winning tradition that they’ve had, that’s what really excites me.

“It’s a small university, with the setting there and the community support. The faculty, the people that I’ve met, they just speak so highly of St. Francis. I told them during my interview — when I was recruiting and I’d come into the area — they might not have had a guy for where I might have been at. But I had to make sure I stopped by because I knew the tradition of players and the quality of the program.”

Tention knows the challenges the West Catholic Athletic League presents, particularly at the top with powerhouses Archbishop Mitty and Archbishop Riordan.

“Let’s be honest, Mitty has done a phenomenal job; Riordan, they have done a phenomenal job,” Tention said. “But a lot of those kids aren’t from their area. Their reputation has gotten people interested in those schools. They’ve done a good job with the younger kids early, getting to their schools and following their programs. That’s what my goal is, to get kids interested in St. Francis that way and we can attract out-of-the-neighborhood players.”

In his one season at Palo Alto, Tention led the Vikings to the Central Coast Section Division I championship and semifinals of the NorCal Division III regional.