Our state is starting to become our own "Cradle of Coaches."
State natives Nick Saban, Rich Rodriquez, Mike D'Antoni, Jimbo Fisher, Jim Grobe, Tommy Bowden and others are nationally known coaches in some of the most visible coaching positions in the nation.
There is a younger generation of coaches from our state on the way, too.
Two weeks ago, I wrote about former George Washington High guard Erin Lindroth. Today, a name to remember is young basketball coach Jon Perry, a Milton native.
Perry played his high school basketball at Cabell Midland. In 1997, he was the starting point guard for the Knights and led them to a berth in the State Tournament. They lost an entertaining quarterfinal game to heavily favored Rafael Cruz and Wheeling Park.
It was a well-rounded Cabell Midland team that also featured Curtis Collins, Matt Osborne, Jackie Cantley and Lee May.
Following his high school graduation in 1997, Perry had an interest in coaching college basketball ... and he wanted to do it at the highest level possible.
So, he looked for an opportunity to play at the Division I level. He received no scholarship offers, so he looked for the best spot to try and play as a walk-on.
What he found was a rebuilding program at East Tennessee State in the Southern Conference, with Ed DeChellis, a first-year head coach who had an affinity for West Virginia players.
As an assistant coach at Penn State from 1982-84 and 1986-96, DeChellis had success recruiting Mountain State players for the Nittany Lions. During his second tenure at Penn State, the Nittany Lions recruited Matt Gaudio, the state player of the year from Brooke, and former Logan star Greg Bartram.
In his first year at ETSU, DeChellis - who coached at ETSU from 1996-2004 - offered walk on opportunities to Perry and former Huntington High standout Andy Huckabay.
"I developed a love for basketball at an early age like most kids that grow up in southern West Virginia," Perry said. "But, I had a little more of an inside look. My dad (Don) was an academic counselor for Marshall's great teams under Rick Huckabay in the mid-80s.
Our state is starting to become our own "Cradle of Coaches."
State natives Nick Saban, Rich Rodriquez, Mike D'Antoni, Jimbo Fisher, Jim Grobe, Tommy Bowden and others are nationally known coaches in some of the most visible coaching positions in the nation.
There is a younger generation of coaches from our state on the way, too.
Two weeks ago, I wrote about former George Washington High guard Erin Lindroth. Today, a name to remember is young basketball coach Jon Perry, a Milton native.
Perry played his high school basketball at Cabell Midland. In 1997, he was the starting point guard for the Knights and led them to a berth in the State Tournament. They lost an entertaining quarterfinal game to heavily favored Rafael Cruz and Wheeling Park.
It was a well-rounded Cabell Midland team that also featured Curtis Collins, Matt Osborne, Jackie Cantley and Lee May.
Following his high school graduation in 1997, Perry had an interest in coaching college basketball ... and he wanted to do it at the highest level possible.
So, he looked for an opportunity to play at the Division I level. He received no scholarship offers, so he looked for the best spot to try and play as a walk-on.
What he found was a rebuilding program at East Tennessee State in the Southern Conference, with Ed DeChellis, a first-year head coach who had an affinity for West Virginia players.
As an assistant coach at Penn State from 1982-84 and 1986-96, DeChellis had success recruiting Mountain State players for the Nittany Lions. During his second tenure at Penn State, the Nittany Lions recruited Matt Gaudio, the state player of the year from Brooke, and former Logan star Greg Bartram.
In his first year at ETSU, DeChellis - who coached at ETSU from 1996-2004 - offered walk on opportunities to Perry and former Huntington High standout Andy Huckabay.
"I developed a love for basketball at an early age like most kids that grow up in southern West Virginia," Perry said. "But, I had a little more of an inside look. My dad (Don) was an academic counselor for Marshall's great teams under Rick Huckabay in the mid-80s.
"My mother (Roseanne) was a great cook. Occasionally players such as Jeff Battle, Robert Eppes, Jeff Guthrie and others over for dinner, and I hung on every word they said.
"I also remember meeting (former Kentucky star and current Arkansas coach) John Pelphrey when he came to dinner at our house on his recruiting visit. This big limousine pulled up to our farm and it was like the President was coming to town.
"The atmosphere was so exciting in Huntington at that time. I loved all the fun of going to a packed Henderson Center, traveling to Asheville for the Southern Conference tournaments and the huge crowds and police escorts, waiting at the airport when the team came back from wining championships. I was hooked."
Perry was a walk-on player at ETSU while DeChellis was rebuilding the program. He watched and learned how the foundation was laid.
Following his playing career, he stayed in Johnson City and worked as a student assistant and graduate assistant coach. He also got to enjoy some of the fruits of the coaching staffs labor.
In Perry's last two seasons with the Buccaneers, East Tennessee State went to the NCAA Tournament and came within a basket of upsetting one of Skip Prosser's Wake Forest teams and one Bob Huggins-coached Cincinnati teams.
When DeChellis got the head coaching job at Penn State, Perry went along. He served as the video coordinator for the Nittany Lions, and just recently was promoted to director of basketball operations.
"It has been a rebuilding process at Penn State and it is not easy trying to rebuild a program in a major conference," Perry said. "If you do it right, it may not be a quick process. We are trying to build a program with four-year players and the type of student athletes that live up to the Penn State standard. We are now getting to the point where we have 8-10 players who can compete at the Big Ten level.
"For me, everything I have done has helped me grow as a coach.
"And, I have also learned that college athletics is a business. In my new position as Penn State's director of basketball operations, I am also learning the business side of things."
If you grow up on a farm in Balls Gap behind Milton, chances are you learn the value of hard work. Former Mountain State Athletic Conference athlete Jon Perry is working hard to make his mark in college basketball coaching.
Former Marshall radio voice and West Virginia native Frank Giardina is a contributing columnist to the Daily Mail and Sunday Gazette-Mail, and host of the nationally syndicated radio show, Sports Spectrum. Contact him at fgiard...@rbc.org.
