On Wednesday, Reservoir High School announced the hiring of boys basketball coach Darnell Myers.
Myers brings a wealth of coaching experience both as an assistant and head coach. In the latest edition of Varsity Q&A, he spoke with the Howard County Times about the position and his vision for the program moving forward.
Editor’s note: Questions and answers have been edited for clarity.
Why was this the right opportunity for you?
No. 1, it’s a head coaching position. I’ve known the athletic director, Marcus Lewis, for a long time when we worked together at Oakland Mills. He had said he had a position open for a head boys basketball coach and asked if I would be interested. I told him that I would have to think about it. I thought about it and looked at the pluses and the negatives and then I went up and interviewed with him and accepted the position.
What made you want to be a head coach once again?
I came to Sherwood with coach T.M. Sheahin to be his associate head coach. Both of us had head coaching duties together. I just ran the majority of the defenses and out-of-bounds things. Coach Sheahin ran the offense. Tom and I have been good friends for a long time, even when I was the head coach at Springbrook. When I was going from Springbrook, then he asked me to come to Sherwood. I took a position in the school and then came there to help him out. It really wasn’t so much being an assistant; it was just a head coach working with another head coach.
How much are you looking forward to once again being a head coach?
I’m looking forward to it. I’m bringing some good people with me and some people who were already at Reservoir. I don’t think it’s a big challenge. You’ve just got to make sure that you have the right things in the right places. Making sure the young men understand the system and understand about academics because that’s the most important thing to me. As long as they go to school, get good grades, represent their families, the school and themselves as young men, I think that’s the most important thing. The X’s and O’s I know very well and I don’t think that will be a problem. I’m going to a school where young men are going to have to meet me and understand my system and some ways that they used to get away with things they’d do and it’s going to change.
How would you describe your coaching philosophy?
No. 1, play hard, play hard, play hard, and play defense. I believe in defense. I believe that defense wins basketball games. I think if you’ve got good fundamental skills, it’s going to lead to good offense and defense. With the kids that I have coached and the things that I bring to the table, I think it’s really good. Reservoir hasn’t won a county championship or state championship. I have been in all of those situations — so I’m trying to bring that kind of winning attitude to them — so they can be comfortable that they can go ahead and compete with the other schools that they play against.
What did you learn as an assistant under John Thompson at Georgetown?
At Georgetown, you learn a lot from Coach Thompson. You’re talking about a Hall of Famer who won a national championship and is one of the winningest coaches in NCAA men’s basketball. You learn about academics. You learn about having good people around that work with you. You just learn the philosophy and the types of things of how intense and the level he wanted his players to play at. The defenses that they played and how hard they worked on defense to make them a very good defensive team in the country. I listened and I learned. That’s the most important thing with Coach Thompson. In practices and games, you observe the things that he’s done that can help you as a coach. Then you ask questions, but with the assistants that he had at Georgetown, you learn from them. I learned a great deal from those assistant coaches, just as well as I listened to what Coach Thompson was teaching.
What lessons have you learned throughout your coaching journey?
I had a really good friend of mine where I was his assistant for a long time, Fred Brown, who used to coach at Episcopal High School, who I learned a great deal from. Then, Tom Crowell, who was the head coach at Sherwood before he went to Springbrook when I went there as his assistant and won three state titles. The preparation of how you run your practice and your offseason program, how your conditioning and weightlifting programs are. All the things that I learned from those guys built up and made me a successful head coach when I took over at Springbrook. Even when I took the job at the Barrie School, they hadn’t won too many games. Then, all of a sudden within three years I had them winning the PVAC championship and they won 30 games that year. All of the things that I learned from those coaches, it led on to make me very successful as a coach.
How do you hope to turn around the Reservoir program?
I didn’t take the job just to come there to win five games. I took the job to get there to win a state championship. My thing is that if we can get the type of players that come in and work hard. Four or five years ago, Reservoir went to states with coach Mike Coughlan. I’m trying to get them back at that level. I know it’s not going to be done in one day or one year. But I think we can get it done within two or three years that we can get them up on that track.
