St. Louis ? After enduring a season on the hot seat and losing his job as a college basketball coach, Steve Robinson is enjoying life as a fan.

Well, sort of.

KU freshman Michael Lee listens to music in the KU dressing room. Lee kicked back during a break in practice Friday in St. Louis.

“My stomach was churning watching that game,” Robinson said Friday morning after watching his old boss, Roy Williams, guide Kansas to a 70-59 victory over Holy Cross on Thursday night in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

The come-from-behind victory didn’t dissuade the former KU assistant coach, and Robinson was back Friday afternoon at Edward Jones Dome to watch the Jayhawks practice in preparation for today’s second-round game against Stanford.

Thursday’s game marked the first time Robinson had watched the Jayhawks play in person since 1998, when Williams’ Jayhawks and Robinson’s Florida State team played at the same NCAA first-round site at Oklahoma City.

Unfortunately for Robinson, that was the last time he coached in an NCAA Tournament. He was fired by FSU earlier this month after his fourth straight losing season.

Robinson’s teams reached the NCAAs in his first three seasons as a head coach two at Tulsa and one at FSU. But Robinson, part of four Big Eight Conference championships and two Final Four teams at Kansas, was unable to duplicate the success he enjoyed at Kansas and Tulsa in Tallahassee. Ironically, the Golden Hurricane will play Kentucky today here for a berth in the Sweet 16.

Robinson, 44, said he had no regrets.

“Tulsa was a great opportunity, and I’m very appreciative of the people who gave it to me,” he said. “But if I didn’t move on, then I don’t have a chance to coach in a great league. I don’t look back.”

Though Robinson sustained a solid Tulsa program, he was unable to turn football-crazy Florida State into a basketball winner. Recruiting and coaching in the Atlantic Coach Conference were not easy tasks.

The Seminoles were 64-86 in Robinson’s five years, but the coach was proud of the foundation he built for FSU.

“Steve walked out of there with his head held high,” said Lisa Robinson, the coach’s wife. “He cleaned up the program.”

Cleaned up?

“Let’s just say there was a change in philosophy,” said Steve Robinson, who succeeded Pat Kennedy at FSU. “Wherever I go there’s going to be an emphasis on kids in terms of their conduct on and off the court and how it relates to the team’s success.”

Robinson, who has a 110-104 record as a head coach, hopes to stay in the profession. According to published reports in Tallahassee, he’s a candidate for head coaching jobs at Alabama-Birmingham, Bradley, West Virginia, Army and Boise State.

“I don’t know if I’m ready for that,” Lisa Robinson said with a laugh. “It’s probably the toughest job in the world in terms of being unappreciated, but he loves mentoring on and off the court.”

When, where and for how much are the pertinent questions.

“It’s about options,” he said. “If the best option is as an assistant coach, then so be it. I’m not a guy whose ego is so big that I couldn’t be an assistant or a head coach at a lower-level school.”

The Robinsons can afford to be picky, though. Florida State bought out the last two years of the coach’s contract for $250,000.

“We have to sit back and evaluate what possibilities are out there,” he said. “I love coaching. I think I was born to coach.”

If the right job doesn’t present itself, he could follow the lead of Jerry Green a former Williams assistant who was fired by Tennessee at the end of last year and take time off.

“He’s probably getting pretty good at his golf game,” said Robinson, who still has three children living at home. “Taking a year off and being a husband and father wouldn’t be bad at all.”

Credit Green for Robinson coming to KU as an original member of Williams’ staff in 1988. Green coached at North Carolina-Asheville when Robinson was an assistant at Radford. Years later, the former Big South rivals ran into each other on a flight from Chicago to Charlotte, N.C., while Robinson was recruiting for Cornell. Green suggested Robinson apply for KU’s part-time coaching job.

Robinson phoned Williams, who was busy packing up his Chapel Hill home and office, and was told he could have a 15-minute interview at the Dean Dome.

“Fifteen minutes turned into an hour,” Robinson said.

A day later, Robinson was a KU assistant.

Would Robinson consider coming home to Lawrence if the opportunity presented itself?

Robinson declined to speculate on that possibility.

His wife had this to say: “He loves Roy, and he loves coaching.”