The Bryan girls basketball team won’t have much of a learning curve with its new head coach as current varsity assistant Treasure Jackson was announced as head coach Monday on Bryan ISD’s social media.
Jackson has spent the past two seasons with the Lady Vikings. Her first season as the freshman team’s head coach, while she was a varsity assistant this past year under former head coach Chris Jones.
Before that, she spent two years at Stephen F. Austin Middle School as the head coach of the girls basketball and cross country teams. She also was an assistant track coach.
For Jackson, the position is her first head coaching position at the high school level in her career.
“Man, it feels really good,” she said. “I’m really excited to keep working with the group of girls that I’ve been working with the past couple of years and just continuing what me and coach Jones have been working on since I’ve been here.”
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She interviewed two weeks ago, and this past Wednesday, she got the good news.
Jackson added that she hasn’t gotten to share the news with the whole team yet until school is back in session, but the girls that have been coming to summer workouts know who their new head coach is.
“They were very excited, but not surprised,” Jackson said. “They were hoping that was going to be the case, so they’re excited to keep rolling with me and doing what we do every day [which is] working hard.”
Jones had been the girls basketball head coach for the last five seasons after spending eight seasons as the boys head coach.
He told The Eagle on Monday that he will still teach at Bryan but is just stepping down from coaching.
“Oh, I’m very happy for her,” Jones said. “She’s a hard worker and she puts in the time. She does her homework, and she puts in the preparation, and I think it’s a great opportunity for her. She’s going to make the most of it.”
Jackson says she’s learned a lot from Jones and plans to carry over a lot of his teachings into her head coaching career. One of the most important things she took away from him was how to run practice.
“The main thing is how to structure practice with practice plans and how to keep everything on the minute and get the girls working the entire duration of practice, so that you don’t have to have such a long practice,” Jackson said. “You can have a short practice but get everything done intentionally.”
She said that Jones had been talking about stepping down toward the end of the school year. Jackson felt like she was going to be perfect for the job since she had been working with the team the past two years and could continue what Jones had been doing.
Last season, the Lady Vikings went 27-6 overall and were second in District 12-6A, boasting a 10-2 record.
The Lady Vikings had their season end for the second consecutive season by Cedar Hill in bi-district, falling 65-37.
“Honestly having the dog in us,” Jackson said of what teams can expect from Bryan. “We’re going to be really tough on defense this year and we’re going to be flying around the court, going for loose balls, just running and gunning the entire game. That’s what I want everyone to know when they play us. They’re going to have to run and they’re going to have to be fighting some dogs the whole time.”
