Coach from Las Vegas dreams of spot on Chris Beard’s staff at UNLV
On Aug. 28, 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King ascended the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and told more than 250,000 civil right supporters about his recurring dream.
When word got out that Chris Beard was going to be the new UNLV basketball coach, a 45-year-old man from Las Vegas named Che’ Jones wrote a letter and attached a resume about a dream he has, more modest in scope. He wants only to be an assistant basketball coach at UNLV.
A lot of guys have dreams. Most guys give up on them by the time they hit 45.
Not Che’ Jones.
Has he heard from the new coach? Not yet. Perhaps he never will. Jones isn’t sure Beard even received his email. He sent it to his attention at Arkansas-Little Rock. It was so profuse, it’s possible it crashed the server down there.
It took the charlatans on the University of Nevada Board of Regents and his own athletic department nearly two weeks to introduce Beard as coach. So it’s also possible Jones’ email got lost in cyberspace during the interim, or the internet is now on its way out, having been replaced by a newer technology.
It took two pages to list all of the places Jones has been in chasing his basketball dream. It’s like that Johnny Cash song, except he never has been to Texarkana or Kalamazoo.
Las Vegas High in his hometown; Columbus State Community College, Columbus, Ohio; Urbana University, Urbana, Ohio; Silverado High School, Las Vegas; Las Vegas Venom, new ABA; Casper College, Casper, Wyoming; Albion College, Albion, Michigan; Glen Oaks Community College, Centreville, Michigan; Northern Arizona, Flagstaff; Phoenix College.
He and Beard have a similar coaching arc. Here are the places Chris Beard has been in pursuing his dream: University of Texas, Austin; Incarnate Word, San Antonio; Abilene Christian, Abilene, Texas; North Texas, Denton; Fort Scott Community College, Fort Scott, Kansas; Seminole State Junior College, Seminole, Oklahoma; Texas Tech, Lubbock; South Carolina Warriors, new ABA; McMurry University, Abilene, Texas; Angelo State, San Angelo, Texas; Arkansas-Little Rock; and now, finally, UNLV.
Beard was at UNLV, sitting at a table, for more than two hours Friday while charlatans discussed whether he should be basketball coach. Chris Beard probably had a dream, too — that he could be excused to use the men’s room.
Beard and Che’ Jones don’t have as many stickers on their guitar case as Johnny Cash. But they’ve beaten junior college bushes, and they were coaches in the new ABA, the one without Dr. J and Rick Barry and Mel Daniels and even Billy Paultz, whose nickname was “The Whopper.”
If anybody can relate to taking a circuitous route to achieve one’s basketball dream, it would be Chris Beard.
The new coach may not read these words, either — he has to deal with the Mayflower people, and that takes time. Or he might be back in the junior college hinterlands trying to find a big man after the charlatans made him sit way longer than necessary, causing him to get a late start on recruiting. The Wi-Fi can be spotty in the junior college hinterlands.
It was Frank Nails who sent me a copy of Che’ Jones qualifications to be an assistant coach. Nails used to coach football at Las Vegas High. He was so successful they named the football field for him. He is what you call a fine judge of character.
His cover letter was more succinct than Jones’ resume. It said Che’ was a former Las Vegas High School student who has made his high school and his hometown proud.
A couple of years ago, he cut down the nets with Phoenix College after the Bears won the national juco championship.
If Frank Nails says it, it’s good enough for me.
Will it be good enough to sit on Chris Beard’s bench? Probably not, because sometimes — most times — in college basketball, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know, and Che’ Jones does not know Chris Beard — and Chris Beard must know a lot of basketball people who would make fine assistant coaches, considering all the places he has been.
I read where he’s almost through putting a staff together and now is waiting for the charlatans to make it official. So by the time practice starts in October, his staff may be announced.
Just before Jones finished telling me about his dream via cellphone from Phoenix, I asked if he would be willing to break down film, if that’s all that Beard (or another Division I coach) had. He said he would do anything if it meant getting a foot in the door.
Even at 45, he said he would be willing to start in the mailroom and work his way up.
“You know when guys fall, and they need somebody to mop the floor — I would do that,” Che’ Jones said, and he said it with such conviction that I believed him.
Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski