BOYS' BASKETBALL: Jones named new New Albany boys' basketball coach
Aug. 1—NEW ALBANY — Jason Jones may be new to New Albany, but he's not new to Indiana high school basketball.
"My dad's actually a Washington, Indiana native, so I'm familiar with Indiana and the tradition and the passion for basketball," Jones said.
Monday afternoon, the 45-year-old who has more than 20 years of coaching experience in Kansas, Colorado, Florida and Georgia was approved as the new bench boss of the Bulldogs.
"I have always been drawn to be in this area and I'm just thrilled to have the opportunity to lead a program like New Albany," Jones said.
He replaces Craig Teagle, who was hired in April then resigned in June — citing a "family medical emergency" — after never coaching an official game for the Bulldogs. Jones will succeed Jim Shannon, New Albany's long-time head coach who stepped down after last season.
"Obviously Coach Shannon was a fixture here for 25 years, which in today's coaching world, that gets rarer and rarer all the time," he said. "To see the impact he was able to have on the community, and the program, I'm just excited to be in a place that basketball's important to. I know everybody here wants what's best for the kids and wants to work, so those were two things that really drew me to that."
Growing up in Colorado, Jones was drawn to Indiana high school hoops at a young age after receiving a videotape of the 1988 state semifinals, which included such notable names as Chandler Thompson, Shawn Kemp and Damon Bailey.
"We started getting the Final Four sent to us on VHS every year," he recalled. "So I've watched every Final Four from '88 til it went to class basketball."
Jones is the son of a coach and is married to one too. His wife, Kim, whom he met at Sterling (Kan.) College, has coached volleyball. The couple have three children — daughters Karis and Taelyn, along with a son, Easton. Karis is a junior at Texas Tech University while the family moved Taelyn into Butler County Community College, where she'll play volleyball, on Sunday. Easton will be a sophomore at New Albany.
"Everybody just talks about the passion of the fanbase, how important it is to people here," Jones said.
After his approval at Monday's special New Albany-Floyd County Schools board meeting, he talked a little bit about what those fans can expect to see from his team on the court.
"I think there's two things we really pride ourselves on, that's just playing as hard as possible and playing as unselfish as possible. I think if you can do those two things you're typically going to have some success," Jones said. "You always want to be great defensively and (at) rebounding, it gives you opportunities to be in games no matter what and just really frees kids up to play with creativity and freedom of movement on offense and put them in positions to be successful, that's always our goal."
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