By John Rohlf, The Message assistant editor
Former collegiate athlete and NCAA basketball coach Jared Swanson is returning to the United States from Australia to lead the Reitz Memorial High School boys basketball program.
Reitz Memorial announced the hire of Swanson as the program’s next coach during a July 15 press conference at Reitz Memorial High School. In addition to his coaching duties for the Tigers, Swanson will teach at Annunciation Christ the King School in Evansville.
“We feel like we found a perfect spot here,” Swanson said at the July 15 press conference. “And I was here about a month ago. Really, really enjoyed my time here and super excited to get going. Super excited to move into this area. We really feel like the family environment of athletics, academics, of the community support that we will have here at Memorial is going to be just outstanding. And I really just can’t wait to get started.”
Prior to accepting the teaching and coaching jobs in the diocese, Swanson served as the General Manager and Director of Basketball at the North Gold Coast Seahawks Basketball Association in Australia, overseeing 4,000 members and 11 club branches.
In a press release sent by the school, Reitz Memorial Athletic Director Chad Dockery said Reitz Memorial is thrilled to welcome Swanson to the Memorial family. Swanson’s global experience, leadership and commitment to player development and character building make him a tremendous asset to the school and basketball program, he said in the press release.
“Jared has a very good history in regards to understanding the Catholic schools, understanding playing at the next level,” Dockery said at the July 15 press conference. “And not only developing players but also developing coaches.”
Swanson said he and his family were pretty picky about fnding the right spot. He said this is the place they want to be. He believes they “hit the jackpot.”
He stressed he and his family plans to be here “for quite awhile.”
“We’ve moved around a lot,” Swanson said. “I’ve moved my three kids who are going to be in eighth grade, sixth grade and third grade, they’ve moved a lot. We want to settle down and we feel like we’ve found the perfect spot to do that.”
Swanson noted the basketball program has been really successful over the past years and he wants to continue to build on that success. He said when walking the halls of the school, you see the success the school has seen in athletics, specifically with all of their state championships.
“You see all the success. The only one that’s missing is the boys basketball. And I want to add one of those for sure,” Swanson said.
Swanson said it is important to him for the basketball players at Reitz Memorial to represent themselves on and off the court at a high level. This will include teaching them about representing themselves, their team and the school.
“The big thing that I’ve come to learn is you’re representing all the other guys who have played before you,” Swanson said. “And they want us to succeed. Guys that played 20, 30 years ago, they want us to succeed here. And that’s going to be my big thing when talking to our guys and on a daily basis. We’re going to talk about that. About how we act, how hard we’re going to play, all of that too.”
Swanson replaces Heath Howington, who stepped down after coaching the Tigers for the past five seasons. Reitz Memorial finished last season with an 18-7 record, including a 7-2 record in conference play.