Davis has hired a staff, arranged a four-game, three-day trip to Cancun, Mexico, for his team over the Labor Day weekend and put together a non-conference schedule for the 2003-2004 season.

Because of the journey to Cancun, it’s going to be a short summer for the coaches and players.

"You’re allowed 10 days of practice prior to the trip," Davis explained, "so the tentative start to training camp will be Aug. 17."

Davis, who hasn’t coached since his 1998-99 Iowa team had a 20-10 record, figures to know a lot more about his Bulldogs following that camp and the games in Mexico.

Davis certainly isn’t accustomed to that sort of thing. He was hired with the idea that 10-20 records will soon be a thing of the past.

"We’re going to try to move into the top level as fast as we can," Davis said. "Drake is going to try to be a player. But, to do that, you need better talent."

Davis said USA Today is doing a story this week detailing the return to major-college coaching of Dick Bennett, Billy Tubbs and himself.

"That should give (us) a little boost in terms of recruits," Davis said. "They think (we’re) going to be more a player and that maybe Drake is coming out of the wilderness. It all helps. We’ll see."

It was a coaching buddy who suggested to Davis that he take his players to Cancun over the Labor Day weekend.

"We’ll be able to take our nine returning scholarship players, two walk-ons and four incoming recruits," Davis said. "We’ll leave Friday after classes, and play four games on Saturday, Sunday and Monday against Mexican National teams."

In the past, Davis has used foreign trips as valuable tools to get his Iowa teams ready. Historically, Davis’ squads have come out of the gate fast.

For instance, the Iowa team that went 30-5 in Davis’ break-in season of 1986-87 got off to an 18-0 start after making a trip to the Far East during the summer.

That brought back memories.

"When I first took the job at Iowa, Jim Zabel (of WHO) came over to talk to me," he said. "Jim was doing my coaches’ (TV and radio) shows. "He said, ‘I really think I should be going on this trip to Korea and China. So would you tell Bump that I should go along?’"

Bump was Bump Elliott, who then was Iowa’s athletic director.

"So I went to Bump and said, ‘Bump, I’m just getting to know Jim. He has given his heart and soul to the program. Why don’t we take him on the trip?’ So Bump agreed to do it.

"But Jim had to room with Mike Hlas of the Cedar Rapids Gazette. Zabel later said, ‘What did you do to me?’ And I thought Mike felt the same way. Talk about the odd couple."

Not only is Tom Davis the head coach, Keno Davis (his son) is an assistant and Chris Davis (no relation) is also on the staff. Chris is a holdover from the Kanaskie era.

"When I first met with Chris, I told him pretty bluntly that I didn’t think I’d hire him—or words to that effect," Tom said. "But the more I looked at resumes and the tremendous list of candidates I had, I looked at what Chris was doing and could do and realized he was the man for the job."

The other assistant is Chad Buchanan, a graduate of West Des Moines Valley High School and a former graduate assistant at Iowa when Davis was there. He most recently has been assistant coach and director of operations for the Kansas City Knights of the American Basketball Association.

"He volunteered his services in our basketball office while getting his master’s degree," Davis said. "He worked in our camps, and I remember using him on coaches’ shows. Whatever we needed doing, Chad Buchanan was there."

After wondering if all of Kanaskie’s players would stick around, Tom Davis said there will be no defections.

"Is that good news or bad news?" I asked him.

"I’ll let you know about Labor Day," he said. "I like the kids. I think it’s good news because I want to give them every chance."

Davis said he plans to have a Grey team at Drake like he had at Iowa. The Grey team consists of reserves who form the scout team.

Davis said there are "two significant walk-ons coming in—exciting young guys who are happy to be part of this program. I think they’ll give some competition for spots. I can’t give you their names until they’re enrolled."

One of the walk-ons, Davis said, is a student with a 3.8 grade-point average.

"When did you apply to Drake?" Davis asked him.

"The day after you were named the coach," the kid said.

"Now, the next step is can we do that with scholarship players?" Davis said.

"I don’t know that the contracts are in, so it won’t be totally announced yet. But the home highlights are the games against Iowa State and Colorado State. Colorado State is supposed to be very good. Mike Mahon (Drake’s athletic department spokesman) was telling me stuff that I didn’t know about how good they are.

"He scared me a little. They have four starters back from a team that gave Duke a real good game in the first round of the NCAA tournament. That’s a pretty good recommendation."

The highly-anticipated Drake-Iowa game will be played Nov. 25 at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City. It will be Davis’ first visit to the arena since his final game as the Hawkeyes’ coach, and it’s expected that the cheers will be loud for him that night.

"It’s going to be a respectable schedule—the best we could do given the time we had," Davis said.

But getting games is not easy.

"I talked to one coach from a top league," Davis said. "I called him about a home-and-home schedule. He said, ‘We flat-out will not play any school home-and-home if you’re not in the top six leagues in the country, and the Missouri Valley Conference is not in the top six, in my mind.’

"That’s what we’re confronting. I have to admit I probably did the same thing at Iowa when I was there. But I didn’t say it. I don’t know if I even thought about it."