Chris Graham new Wellston boys basketball coach

[Keyser_sozeThrice]

Congratulations to Chris Graham on his hiring as the new Wellston boys basketball head coach.

Below is the report for the weekend Times-Journal.



Graham hired as new Wellston boys coach

Former WHS standout takes over for Derrow

By PAUL BOGGS

Sports Editor

WELLSTON — As of this past week, the Wellston High School boys basketball program has officially begun to move forward.

A month following the tragic and unexpected death of quarter-century coach Jim Derrow, Chris Graham has been hired as the new bench boss of the Golden Rockets.

Graham got the official nod in a special meeting of the Wellston City Schools Board of Education on Monday night.

“It’s an honor to take over the program. I feel like I can step in and may not fill Coach Derrow’s shoes, but continue a good tradition. I want to pass Coach Derrow’s dedication and passion and hard work onto these kids,” said Graham in an interview with The Jackson County Times-Journal. “I told Coach Derrow when I was his assistant coach that I wasn’t much of an assistant. I was more of a head coach than an assistant coach. And he agreed at the time. We kind of laughed about it at the time. But I thought he (Derrow) was going to be around here (Wellston boys basketball coach) forever. I think we all did.”

Graham inherits the Wellston boys program after the prominent Derrow — the school’s boys basketball coach of the past 25 seasons and all-time winningest coach in the sport — passed away on May 16.

Graham, along with newly-hired Wellston head baseball coach Jonathan Ervin, eulogized Derrow at his funeral service.

Derrow guided the Golden Rockets to 286 career victories in 24 full seasons and two games of the 2008-09 campaign.

Under his tutelage, Wellston won three Tri-Valley Conference championships, including outright titles in 1989-90 and 2002-03.

He captured six sectional championships as well, including three consecutive from 1989 thru 1991 with his final one coming this past season.

Graham, a shooting specialist and standout at Wellston in the late 1980s, played on two of Derrow’s three TVC championship teams.

He graduated in 1990, but has coached in Derrow’s program for nearly a decade, including eight years at the junior high level after one season as a varsity assistant.

He was also the varsity assistant on the baseball squad in Derrow’s first three seasons (2007, 2008 and 2009) as the Golden Rocket skipper.

The 2007 squad shared the TVC-Ohio championship with Alexander and Meigs, as the 2009 club captured the Division III district runner-up.

But basketball is what Graham will focus on exclusively now.

He said he “takes to heart a lot of what we did in the early years of Coach Derrow’s program.”

“We want to carry on Coach Derrow’s tradition, and I want to bring some of my own personality to it,” said Graham.

Derrow’s teams of the late 1980s and early 1990s were affectionately nicknamed the “Runnin’ Rockets” because of their distinctive up-tempo style of play.

The current Rocket roster returns intact minus one graduated senior, and is coming off an 11-11 season which included the program’s first sectional championship since 2003.

Speaking of 2003, that was the last year (2002-03) in which Wellston won at least a dozen games (15) as it also captured its most recent TVC-Ohio championship.

Graham’s goal is to “try to get out and run the ball a little bit more.”

“Coach Derrow taught these guys how to run these half-court sets. We’re trying to keep as minimal change as possible for the kids, but we’re also trying to run the ball a little bit more,” said Graham. “I honestly feel I’m stepping into a great opportunity.”

Graham is familiar with his varsity players, “having been around them since second grade.”

“They are a great bunch of kids. I’ve been around them since Pee Wee football and up through the ranks of junior high football and basketball. I’ve attended all of the (varsity) basketball games previous to getting this job,” he said.

When asked what he learned most from Derrow, both as a player and a coach, Graham said “persistence, hard work and dedication.”

“Those are three big words that these youngsters this year need to learn. You just don’t get better overnight. A lot of kids just want things to come to them, and it doesn’t happen that way. It takes time and it takes a lot of hard work. And in the summertime is when you get better,” he said. “A lot of these young men play football also. But we have open gyms and I expect them to be at the open gyms and put in the hard work and extra effort. That’s what it is going to take to be a champion. A lot of them have that mentality, which is good.”

Graham believes his players, though they will never forget what Coach Derrow taught them, “seem to be pretty excited” about moving forward.

“Hopefully, we’ll have a good year,” said the new WHS mentor.

Graham will continue to teach seventh-grade science at Wellston Middle School.

He said the coaching staff will return intact as well, which includes — for the upcoming academic year — volunteer varsity assistants Tim Dyson, Terry Gill and Rob Ervin.

Derrow’s son, Brant, will be the reserve coach, with Chris Wallis returning as the freshman coach.

Graham said statistician Roger Scott and scorekeeper Roger Rader, Derrow’s scorekeeper for all 25 seasons, return also.

“Everybody that was in the varsity program last year is back. The only change is me for Coach Derrow,” he said.

Wellston will also be the only team in the TVC-Ohio with a new head coach this season.

sports@timesjournal.com

[Ironman92]

Best of luck to Coach Graham and the Wellston program.

[Rocket Proud]

Congratulations to Coach Graham. He is a great fit. Thanks Keyser for the story. He has great kids on his team that will represent Wellston to the best of their ability. I think the Rockets will keep improving from Coach Derrow's influence and Coach Graham's leadership.

[gorockets2]

Who were the others that applied for this job? I thought the younger Derrow might get it, seems he's been there awhile.
Any way good luck to the new coach and the rockets this season.

[Solomon]

congrats to young mr. graham.