NC State men’s basketball head coach Justin Gainey announced the first five hires to his men’s basketball staff on Friday.
The Pack has added Alvin Brooks III, Riley Collins, Matthew Driscoll and Anthony Goins as assistant coaches and Bill Comar is joining the staff as director of operations.
“I couldn’t be happier to have these five coaches join me at NC State,” said Gainey. “This coaching staff brings championship experience and a mindset towards a relentless commitment to winning. More importantly, they also understand our goal is not only to compete for championships, but to build a program that develops complete student-athletes. We are here to develop our players on and off the court, build strong leaders, and prepare these young men for success in life.”
Assistant Coach Alvin Brooks III
Brooks III comes to the Pack after spending the last two seasons as Associate Head Coach at Kentucky under Mark Pope.
Prior to arriving at Kentucky, Brooks coached eight seasons at Baylor, serving as both an assistant and associate head coach. The Bears went 194-72 during Brooks’ tenure, including a 94-46 record in Big 12 action, 12-5 in NCAA Tournament games and 22-15 against Associated Press top-10 ranked foes.
A Houston native, Brooks began his coaching career at the junior college level. He spent two seasons at Arkansas-Forth Smith, helping the Lions to the 2006 NJCAA Division I championship. He then joined the staff at Midland, where he again was on staff for an NJCAA title team in 2007.
Brooks ascended to the Division I level when he joined the staff for three seasons at Bradley as an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator. From there he also was a part of the Sam Houston State (2010-12) and Kansas State (2012-16) staffs before joining forces with Scott Drew at Baylor in 2016.
At Kansas State, Brooks was a part of one the best stretches in school history with 79 wins and NCAA Tournament appearances in two the four seasons. He also played a major role in K-State’s first-ever Big 12 regular-season title in 2012-13, which included the second-most wins (27) and a tie for the most conference victories (14) in school history.
In the 2020-21 season, Baylor earned a No. 1 seed and captured the program’s first national championship. BU capped the season with a 28-2 overall record and a 13-1 mark in Big 12 action on their way to the school’s first-ever conference title. Baylor captured a program-record 11 victories over ranked foes and was a perfect 7-0 against teams ranked inside of the top 10. Three players earned All-America honors with Jared Butler becoming the first consensus first-team All-American in program history while also earning Final Four Most Outstanding Player honors. Davion Mitchell swept the National Defensive Player of the Year awards.
Capitalizing on Baylor’s success, with Brooks playing the lead role as recruiter, BU hauled in the highest ranked recruiting class in program history in 2021 at No. 4 overall by ESPN. Baylor won the Big 12 Championship again in 2022 to become the third school in Big 12 history to repeat as champions. Brooks was the lead recruiter as the Bears landed top-five player VJ Edgecombe who was selected third overall in the 2025 NBA Draft becoming the highest draft pick in Baylor history.
Baylor had a guard win All-America honors in four-straight seasons (Jared Butler in 2020 and 2021, Davion Mitchell in 2021, MaCio Teague in 2021, James Akinjo in 2022 and Adam Flagler in 2023) and had seven selections in the NBA Draft, including three-consecutive lottery selections (Mitchell, Jeremy Sochan and Keyonte George) with Brooks on staff.
Brooks began his own collegiate playing career at Midland College before transferring to Idaho State. He was an Academic All-Big Sky selection as a senior.
Brooks graduated from Idaho State in 2002 with a degree in finance. He earned a master’s degree in athletics administration in 2023. He and his wife, Tiffany, have two children, Alvin IV (AJ) and Austin.
Assistant Coach Riley Collins
Collins comes to NC State after spending four seasons at the University of Tennessee. He spent the last two seasons as assistant director of player development after spending his first two seasons at UT as a graduate assistant.
Tennessee reached the Sweet 16 all four years he was with the program, including advancing to the Elite Eight in the last three seasons.
In the 2025-26 season, Collins helped Tennessee to 25 wins and its third consecutive appearance in the Elite Eight. He helped Ja’Kobi Gillespie garner First Team All-SEC status while Nate Ament received Second Team All-SEC and SEC All-Freshman Team nods.
During the 2024-25 campaign, his first as a full-time staff member, Collins aided the Volunteers to one of their best seasons ever, as the team logged a 30-8 (12-6 SEC) record and reached the Elite Eight. Tennessee spent the entire year in the top 12 of the AP Poll, including earning 18 consecutive top-eight positions, five No. 1 overall rankings and placing fifth in the final release to tie the program record. Chaz Lanier and Zakai Zeigler both tallied All-American accolades.
Collins worked as a graduate assistant for the Volunteers during the 2022-23 and 2023-24 seasons. The Volunteers won 25-plus games and reached the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament during each of those campaigns, including winning the SEC regular season title and making the Elite Eight in 2023-24.
A native of Lacey, N.J., Collins spent two years, 2020-22, as a graduate assistant at Division III Marymount University in Arlington, Va. He assisted with skill development and a wide range of the program’s logistical operations.
Collins earned a business degree from Drew in 2020 and went on to receive a master’s degree in human resource management from Marymount in 2022.
Assistant Coach Matthew Driscoll
Driscoll comes to the Pack after spending last season as an associate head coach at Kansas State. Prior to his one season with the Wildcats, Driscoll was head coach at North Florida for 16 seasons.
He left UNF as the all-time winningest coach in program and Atlantic Sun conference history.
A head coach for 20 seasons counting a four-year stint at Division III La Roche College in the mid-1990s, Driscoll has 274 career victories, including a school-record 248 at North Florida. In addition to being the winningest coach in Ospreys’ history, he has the most wins (144) of any head coach in Atlantic Sun Conference (ASUN) history, boasting a career .550 winning percentage in league play. He won 15 or more games 10 times at UNF, while he finished .500 or better in ASUN play on 12 occasions. He owns the program’s only three 20-win seasons, which includes 23 in 2014-15, 22 in 2015-16 and 21 in 2019-20.
Driscoll led the Ospreys to three regular-season Atlantic Sun Conference championships (2015, 2016, 2020), while winning the league’s tournament championship in 2015. He guided the school to three postseason appearances, including the school’s first-ever trip to the NCAA Tournament in 2015 where they lost to Robert Morris in the First Four. The team went to NIT the following year in 2015-16, while they earned a bid to the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) before it was canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Driscoll was three times selected as the Atlantic Sun (ASUN) Coach of the Year following his regular season championships in 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2019-20. He was also the 2015 NABC District 3 Coach of the Year following the Ospreys’ historic 23-win campaign, in which, they won both the regular season and tournament titles before advancing to the school’s first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance.
The longest tenured head coach in UNF history, Driscoll’s teams own every single season program record except for steals, while they produced 27 of the 50 all-time triple-digit scoring outputs. His teams led the nation in 3-point field goals/game (12.0 in 2023-24 and 12.8 in 2024-25) and 3-point attempts/game (33.2 in 2023-24 and 25.8 in 2024-25) in each of the last two seasons at UNF, while they ranked in the top-10 in each of the last three seasons (fifth in makes/game (10.4) and sixth in attempts/game (28.4) in 2022-23).
Individually, Driscoll mentored two ASUN Players of the Year (Dallas Moore [2015-16, 2016-17), three ASUN Defensive Players of the Year (Demarcus Daniels [2014-15, 2015-16] and Wajid Aminu [2018-19]), one ASUN Newcomer of the Year (Noah Horchler [2017-18]), two ASUN Freshmen of the Year (Dallas Moore [2013-14], Wajid Aminu [2016-17]) and three ASUN Scholar-Athletes of the Year (Trent Mackey [2015-16], JT Escobar [2018-19], Carter Hendricksen [2020-21]). He also had seven NABC All-District honorees, including First Teamers Dallas Moore (2015-16, 2016-17) and Chaz Lanier (2023-24).
Overall, Driscoll coached 19 ASUN all-conference selections, including 10 on the First Team, to go along with 11 All-Tournament and nine All-Freshmen picks.
Driscoll earned his bachelor’s degree in Education from Slippery Rock (Slippery Rock, Pa.) in 1992.
A native of Pittsburgh, Pa., Driscoll and his wife, Carrie, are the parents of two sons: Chase and Paxton.
Assistant Coach Anthony Goins
Goins comes to NC State after spending the last two seasons at Georgia where he helped lead the Bulldogs to the NCAA Tournament in each season.
Goins helped lead a Georgia offense that averaged 89.4 points per game last season, ranking fifth nationally among NCAA Division I teams in scoring. The Bulldogs’ up-tempo attack also led all Division I programs in fast-break production, averaging 19.8 transition points per game.
In the 2024-25 season, Georgia faced one of the nation’s most challenging schedules as the Bulldogs played nearly 60 percent of its game against teams that qualified for the NCAA Tournament, including a nation-best eight top-10 matchups in the regular season. Despite facing the tough schedule, Georgia won 20 games to advance to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2015.
Prior to his arrival in Athens, Goins spent the past three seasons at Boston College. He also sports stints on the staffs at Clemson, Quinnipiac, Yale and Dartmouth over the last 11 years.
Boston College has increased its win total during each of Goins’ season with the Eagles, culminating with a 20-16 finish and a bid to the NIT in 2024. Boston College reached the round of 16 in the NIT and in the process secured the Eagles’ first 20-win campaign and first postseason victory since 2011.
Goins was an assistant coach at Clemson for two seasons from 2019-21, helping the Tigers secure a bid to the 2021 NCAA Tournament. While at Clemson, he oversaw the development of the Tigers’ backcourt standouts Tevin Mack, Al-Amir Dawes and Nick Honor.
From 2017-19, Goins was on the staff at Quinnipiac. During the 2018-19 season, the Bobcats finished 16-15 to notch their first winning record in five years. Quinnipiac also received a bid to the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) in 2019, just QU’s fifth postseason appearance ever. Goins helped to develop three all-conference guards for the Bobcats, including first-team All-MAAC selection Cameron Young.
Goins enjoyed a trio of successful seasons at Yale from 2014-17. The Bulldogs finished 22-10 overall and 11-3 in his year in New Haven to secure the Bulldogs’ first Ivy League title since 2002. Yale improved to 23-7 overall and 13-1 in league play during the 2015-16 campaign, both school-record win totals. The Bulldogs won the Ivy League championship outright to garner the program’s first NCAA Tournament bid in 54 years. Yale, a No. 12 seed, then upset fifth-seeded Baylor in first round of the NCAA Tournament, the first tourney victory ever for the Bulldogs.
Goins’ collegiate career began at Dartmouth in 2013-14, where he helped the Big Green to their highest win total in 15 seasons.
Originally from Greensboro, N.C., Goins received his bachelor’s degree in Sports Management from St. John’s in 2008. While an undergrad, Goins served as a practice player for the men’s team and helped with women’s practices as well.
Goins and his wife, Stephanie, have two children: a son, Anthony “Trey”; and a daughter, Reese.
Director of Operations Bill Comar
Comar, a veteran coach and administrator at the collegiate level, joins the Pack after spending last season at Cincinnati as chief of staff.
He has been a part of programs that have made 18 postseason appearances, including 12 NCAA Tournament berths,
Comar came to Cincinnati after spending three seasons at Ball State as special assistant to the head coach, first under James Whitford and then two seasons under Michael Lewis.
Comar, who has worked with three teams who have advanced to the Elite Eight, had direct oversight of all-non coaching personnel within the Ball State program and managed relationships with academics, compliance, financial aid, housing, business office, scheduling, and equipment, in addition to athletics and the university as a whole.
Prior to working at Ball State, he was part of staff at Indiana that recruited three straight Indiana Mr. Basketball recipients and had three straight winning seasons surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic.
At Dayton (2011-17), his efforts helped a program earn four NCAA Tournament bids and three seasons of national rankings. The 2014 squad advanced to the Elite Eight and the program won back-to-back Atlantic 10 titles in 2016 and 2017.
Comar also was on the UD staff from 1998-01 overseeing the operations of the program and serving as an assistant coach. Among the accomplishments during his tenure, the Flyers earned their first national ranking since 1974 during the 2000-01 season and first NCAA Tournament berth in 10-years.
During his time at Xavier as director of operations from 2001-08, the Musketeers made six NCAA Tournament appearances, won four conference regular season championships, three conference tournament titles and two Elite Eight appearances. In addition, the program saw David West capture NCAA Player of the Year honors in 2003.
Comar also served as an assistant coach at Loyola-Chicago (2008-09) and began his career in administration at Miami (Ohio) before moving over to a role coordinating the team’s academics. He spent over a year as the director of strategic development for Pro Camps Worldwide (2009-10), which assists professional athletes and high-profile college coaches with the development of their personal sports camps and related events.
The Wilmette, Ill. native played three seasons of college basketball at Kenyon (Ohio) College. He starred as a prep at New Trier (Ill.) High School. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Kenyon in 1993 and with a master’s degree from Miami in 1995.
He and his wife, Liz, have two daughters, Camille and Emily.
