Managing an association of a wireless device to an access point of a wireless network is disclosed. Probe requests are received from the wireless device at access points within the wireless network. The probe requests are forwarded from the access points to a network controller. The network controller selects an access point to connect the wireless device to, based on information available thereto. The selected access point is informed that it has been selected. A probe response is provided to the wireless device from the selected access point.