# Reggie Witherspoon (basketball)

Phillip Reginald Witherspoon (born February 21, 1961) is an American college basketball coach who is the former men's basketball head coach of the Canisius Golden Griffins and the Buffalo Bulls.
Witherspoon played college basketball at Erie Community College under John Beilein and then at Wheeling Jesuit under Jim O'Brien.
He was the head coach at Erie Community College, and head coach and assistant coach at Sweet Home High School before he was hired as the interim head coach at Buffalo in December 1999. Witherspoon was named full-time head coach on March 10, 2000. He was the first African American named head coach of a varsity sports team in any Western New York suburban school district. He was fired after the 2012–13 season, finishing his 14 season run with a 198–228 record. Witherspoon served one season as an assistant at Alabama under head coach Anthony Grant. In 2015, Witherspoon was let go by Alabama when Grant was replaced by Avery Johnson. He was subsequently named as an assistant on Matt McCall's staff at UT-Chattanooga.
In May 2016, Witherspoon was hired to replace the retiring Jim Baron at Canisius College. In the 2017–18 season, the Golden Griffins finished tied for a share of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference regular-season title and qualified for the 2018 College Basketball Invitational.
On March 16, 2024, Canisius announced that it had parted ways with Witherspoon after eight seasons.

## Head coaching record

Statistics overview :
| Season | Team | Overall | Conference | Standing | Postseason |
| Erie Community College (NJCAA Region III) (1997–1999) ||||||
| 1997–98 | Erie CC | 19–10 | | | |
| 1998–99 | Erie CC | 24–5 | | | |
| Erie CC: | Erie CC: | 43–15 (.741) | | | |
| University at Buffalo (Mid-American Conference) (1999–2013) ||||||
| 1999–00* | Buffalo | 3–20 (5–23) | 1–17 | 12th | |
| 2000–01 | Buffalo | 4–24 | 2–16 | 12th | |
| 2001–02 | Buffalo | 12–18 | 7–11 | 10th | |
| 2002–03 | Buffalo | 5–23 | 2–16 | 13th | |
| 2003–04 | Buffalo | 17–12 | 11–7 | 5th | |
| 2004–05 | Buffalo | 23–10 | 11–7 | T–2nd | NIT First Round |
| 2005–06 | Buffalo | 19–13 | 8–10 | 8th | |
| 2006–07 | Buffalo | 12–19 | 4–12 | T–10th | |
| 2007–08 | Buffalo | 10–20 | 3–13 | 12th | |
| 2008–09 | Buffalo | 21–12 | 11–5 | T–1st | CBI First Round |
| 2009–10 | Buffalo | 18–12 | 9–7 | T–3rd | |
| 2010–11 | Buffalo | 20–14 | 8–8 | T–5th | CIT Quarterfinals |
| 2011–12 | Buffalo | 20–11 | 12–4 | 2nd | CIT Second Round |
| 2012–13 | Buffalo | 14–20 | 7–9 | 8th | |
| Buffalo: | Buffalo: | 198–228 (.465) | 96–142 (.403) | | |
| Canisius College (Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference) (2016–2024) ||||||
| 2016–17 | Canisius | 18–16 | 10–10 | T–6th | CIT First Round |
| 2017–18 | Canisius | 21–12 | 15–3 | T–1st | CBI First Round |
| 2018–19 | Canisius | 15–17 | 11–7 | T–2nd | |
| 2019–20 | Canisius | 12–20 | 7–13 | 10th | |
| 2020–21 | Canisius | 7–6 | 7–5 | 4th | |
| 2021–22 | Canisius | 11–21 | 7–13 | T–10th | |
| 2022–23 | Canisius | 10–20 | 8–12 | T–8th | |
| 2023–24 | Canisius | 14–18 | 8–12 | 9th | |
| Canisius College: | Canisius College: | 108–130 (.454) | 73–75 (.493) | | |
| Total: | Total: | 306–358 (.461) | | | |
| National champion   Postseason invitational champion   Conference regular season champion   Conference regular season and conference tournament champion  Division regular season champion  Division regular season and conference tournament champion  Conference tournament champion ||||||
* Hired as interim coach after Tim Cohane resigned after 5 games