From left, United Shore chief legal officer Adam Wolfe, leadership coach Mateen Cleaves, president and CEO Mat Ishbia and business innovation specialist Charlie Bell pose for a photo in the Breslin conference room at United Wholesale Mortgage headquarter in Pontiac, Friday, Feb. 28, 2020. 02282020 Unitedshore 2 Junfu Han/Detroit Free Press, Detroit Free Press via Imagn Content Services, LLC

Spartans Ishbia, Cleaves Reunite in Phoenix

Originally posted on Michigan State Spartans on SI
By Tom Cavanaugh | Last updated Jul 11, 2025 9:00 AM ET

The bond of the Michigan State Spartan family is once again well represented as former college basketball legend Mateen Cleaves was recently hired as a player development coach for the Phoenix Suns, per John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 FM.

Coincidentally, the majority owner of the Suns, Mat Ishbia, is a former teammate of Cleaves. The two played together on head coach Tom Izzo's 2000 national championship team that defeated Florida.

The Suns hired Mateen Cleaves as a player development coach, per @Gambo987.

Cleaves, who spent six years in the NBA, was a teammate of Phoenix owner Mat Ishbia at Michigan State. pic.twitter.com/B2dWgdPKkf
— Evan Sidery (@esidery) July 10, 2025

This is the second job that Ishbia has awarded Cleaves, as he was hired on as a leadership development coach in 2019 at United Wholesale Mortgage (UWM), the company that Ishbia is currently the CEO of and was founded by his father, Jeff Ishbia.

Cleaves will now move into a coaching role with a top NBA organization after several years in the mortgage industry, in a more motivational-type role.

He will now assume the player development role which essentially is helping the current NBA talent to improve on the things that are most crucial to their success. Cleaves will meet with video analysts to break down the weaknesses of players and work with them outside of game time. '

He should thrive in this role as he was a former NBA player himself. Cleaves was drafted 14th overall to the Detroit Pistons in the 2000 NBA Draft, playing six seasons. Being able to adjust to the new style of NBA basketball may be the only thing that he lightly struggles with in his new role.

For Ishbia, this is not the first former Spartan that he has hired to join the Suns. Among those were his hiring of Spartan alum Jordan Ott as the team's next head coach and his promotion of former Michigan State staffer Brian Gregory to general manager. Ott was also a video coordinator on Izzo's staff and was also a grad assistant.

Who knows, maybe down the line there will be other alums that earn a position on the Suns staff as a coach or in the Suns' front office. Ishbia is a true Spartan and makes sure to take care of the ones that he knows share the same values and allegiances as he does.

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