Women's Basketball: Carey Hires Assistant
June 12, 2003 09:52 AM | General
June 12, 2003
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - West Virginia University head women's basketball coach Mike Carey announced today the hiring of Chester Nichols as an assistant coach. Nichols will begin at WVU on June 23; he replaces Sara Farmer who is returning to the high school coaching ranks.
Nichols comes to WVU from the Adidas/Premier Players, an AAU organization in Ocala, Fla., where he has spent the past year as the head coach of the Florida Starzz and chief evaluator of the Rookie Sensations.
A native of Ocala, Fla., Nichols brings seven years of coaching experience with him to West Virginia. While an assistant with the women's squad at Central Florida Community College, he helped coach one NJCAA All-American and three all-Mid Florida conference players while also being named the Mid Florida conference's assistant coach of the year in 2002.
Nichols began his coaching career at Greenville High School in Greenville, Ill., where he was an assistant with the varsity boys team from 1996-97. He then moved on to coach at Vanguard High School in Ocala, Fla. At Vanguard, he was also responsible for directing the nationally recognized Kingdom of the Sun Holiday Classic.
In 2000, Nichols helped guide Dunnellon (Fla.) High to its first Final Four in school history.
A 1997 graduate of Greenville College, Nichols played three seasons of varsity football while pursuing his degree in special education.
"I am excited about the tremendous opportunity in front of me at West Virginia," Nichols says. "I am walking into a situation where success is on the rise, and words can't express the excitement I feel about coaching at WVU."
"We're very excited to have Chester join our program," says Carey. "He brings a lot of recruiting experience and knowledge of high Division I quality players with him to West Virginia."
Nichols is married to the former Sherrice McClellan. The couple has two children, Malik, 5, and Jalen, 2.
