Photo by Erin Nelson.
Gavin King, the new head basketball coach for the Lady Patriots at Homewood High School.
Gavin King is aware that many of his answers come across as “coach speak,” words and clichés that are commonplace in sports when it comes to how teams approach games and seasons.
The most common cliché among basketball coaches is to say they want their team to “play fast,” regularly beating the opponent down the floor and scoring easy baskets. The problem is, that is easier said than done.
But the new Homewood High School girls basketball coach is intent on following through on his words.
“We want to play an aggressive, up-tempo, intense style,” he said. “A lot of up-and-down, fast breaks, a lot of pressing, just an exciting style of basketball. A lot of coaches say they want to play that way. To do it takes a lot of work.”
King was hired at Homewood in the summer after four successful years as the girls coach at Childersburg. While at Childersburg, King led the team to back-to-back state final four runs. In both of those, King’s team fell to the eventual state champions by single digits. One of those runs was a 33-win season, which set the Childersburg program record. His teams won 102 games over four years.
Before Childersburg, King spent time as an assistant coach at Pinson Valley High and Erwin Middle. He hails from Oneonta and earned his college education from Wallace State Community College and Athens State University.
The opportunity at Homewood is strictly to lead the girls program, after leading the girls and helping with the boys teams at Childersburg.
“Coming here has allowed me to focus on just the girls and put 100% of my time into that. I’ve really enjoyed coaching girls and had a good little run at Childersburg. I’m excited to continue coaching girls basketball,” King said.
Playing an up-tempo brand of basketball effectively on the offensive side requires a commitment to defense as well. King said the Lady Patriots will hone in on being the best man-to-man defensive unit possible and will employ the full-court press.
“We definitely are going to incorporate some zone and zone pressing, but we’re going to focus on man,” King said. “In order to do that, you’ve got to be in great shape. That takes your whole team, not just your starting five.”
In a few short weeks, King has been pleased with how well the Lady Patriots have adapted to a new system and the offensive and defensive philosophies he has been installing. Homewood has also showed encouraging signs during summer exhibition games.
“They’ve picked up on a lot of stuff very quickly,” he said.
King said the makeup of his initial roster at Homewood is going to be largely underclassmen. That’s fine with him, considering that the Homewood Middle School teams have been successful in recent years.
“The younger girls are very confident. We’ve got a huge group of freshmen coming up that had a great year last year,” he said. “They almost feel like they belong. They know how to work hard, they know the game, they’re skilled and they’re tough.”
