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With word coming earlier this week that Cherokee Trail boys basketball coach Morgan Gregory Cougars fans are wondering who might be next in line to lead the program.
ǰ that Cougars athletic director Steve Carpenter said has already “attracted a lot of local attention”, one qualified candidate is from out of state. James Silas, who is one of eight players to have his number retired by the San Antonio Spurs, is planning on moving to Colorado from Texas and applying for the gig. He’s currently house shopping in the south metro area.
“I’ve been around kids for so long, and at one time I’d been offered the opportunity to coach the first G League team the Spurs had in Austin, called the Toros,” Silas said. “I wasn’t ready then — I prefer to coach the youth and show them what I know at that age. I’m ready to do that now.”
Silas played for the Spurs for eight seasons from 1972-81, including five in the NBA after the team moved from the ABA. After his retirement, he spent time in the game at various levels — “I’ve been dipping and dabbing with the coaching for a long time” — in addition to directing the for the past two-plus decades.
The program, which provides outreach, education and leagues for at-risk young men, showed Silas the reward of working with an up-and-coming generations of ballers.
“Coaching today isn’t just coaching — players are coached on the game, but there’s a lot of teaching that can be done through the practices and the summers,” Silas said. “There’s a lot the kids can gain if there’s somebody there willing to give it to them.”
His son, Xavier Silas, is who now lives in Aurora and recently founded the Cherokee Trail feeder program Give Sports — a move Carpenter noted is necessary in order to keep pace in the prep basketball landscape.
“I applaud that — we need solid feeders, because any good basketball team needs a feeder out there that’s in congruence with what the high school is doing,” Carpenter said.
Xavier said Give, which will lay the base for the varsity team he hopes will soon be under the direction of his father.
“It was one of those things where we felt like we could do something special in this area, because Cherokee Trail’s kind of on an island out there in southeast Aurora,” Xavier Silas said. “And my dad already has a basketball legacy — but this is what he wants to add on.”
So could the man once widely known as “The Late Mr. Silas” — for his tendency to play his best when — revive a program that had its first losing season in four years this winter?
If given the chance, he’s optimistic.
“Success is about kids knowing what you want, what you expect and what they need to do,” Silas said. “Once they do that — and once they show they want to work hard to get that done — it’s not that complicated. I’m hopeful I’ll get the opportunity to instill those kind of philosophies.”
Carpenter said he expects to advance into the interview process by around early April, and that multiple committees will be involved in raking through a field of candidates that already includes a mix of local head and assistant coaches.
