HEBRON ESTATES – You can go home again.
Jessie Curry made that decision recently and last Friday he was announced as the new boys’ basketball coach at North Bullitt. Curry replaces Alex Young who stepped down at the end of the season after posting a 10-19 record in his sixth and final year at the helm of the Eagles.
Curry is a 2008 North Bullitt graduate. As a senior Curry led the Eagles in scoring under head coach Lee Barger, but that team struggled to a 6-22 record. Curry scored 52 points in a single game that season. The new coach will be reunited at North Bullitt with his backcourt running mate on that team, Christopher Downey, who is coaching the Lady Eagle program.
North Bullitt is home, but Curry has been teaching and coaching at Bullitt Central for the past decade. That made this decision very difficult. There were a few tears shed when the parting became official.
This is also a chance for Curry to return to coaching boys’ basketball after leading the Bullitt Central girls’ program for the past five seasons.
“It’s an opportunity to go back home,” Curry said early this week. “I’ve been lucky to have had the chance to coach here for five years with the girls and they mean a lot to me. It was a tough decision and a very tough time to tell them (of leaving).
“But it is both,” he added of returning to coach boys. “It is where I played. There were not many jobs that would open up that would get my attention.”
The moment that Young resigned, something that Curry said he did not see coming, the ball was in Curry’s court. He could stay or he could go. North Bullitt went through the process, but the minute that Curry put his hat in the ring, the outcome was known.
“It is Bullitt County so there are not a lot of secrets,” Curry said. “They (his players) knew it was an option. It was tough (to tell them he was leaving). They were upset and emotional and I was emotional.”
But after college, Curry spent almost a decade coaching at Bullitt Central. First, he coached the boys’ team for two seasons after replacing now Bullitt Central principal Joe Pat Lee as the head coach. After posting a 10-18 record during the 2016-2017 season as the head coach, Curry led the Cougars to a 20-13 season a year later, winning the 23rd District title.
The next season was supposed to be a banner season for the Cougars, and it was, but it was without Curry. He resigned just before that season began after a school-sponsored, off-campus event ended with alcohol issues. Present Bullitt Central head coach Shane Popplewell stepped in and led that team to a 23-11 record that ended with a four-point loss to Bullitt East in the semifinals of the Sixth Region Tournament.
But Curry had shown that he could build a program. After sitting out a season, Bullitt Central gave the young coach a second opportunity and this time he made the most of it with the girls’ program. After going 11-20 the season before he took the job, Curry led the Lady Cougars to five-straight seasons with at least 18 victories, including four seasons with at least 23 wins, the best stretch in program history.
Four times in those five seasons, Curry led the Lady Cougars to the 23rd District title, including two seasons ago when the team posted a program best-ever record of 25-9. Three times Curry led the Lady Cougars into the Sixth Region semifinals only to lose each time to Bullitt East.
This past season, the one season in which Curry’s Lady Cougars did not win the district title, might have been the coaches’ best. The program had lost six of the top eight players from that 25-win team and had just one returning starter. Still, Bullitt Central went 23-10 before losing to Pleasure Ridge Park in the Sixth Region tournament in what would be Curry’s final game at the helm of the program.
Curry will leave the Lady Cougar program with a 113-50 record. In the two seasons as the boys’ head coach, Curry had a 30-31 record.
Both of those Bullitt Central jobs started as the proverbial ‘rebuilding’ assignments. At North Bullitt, the new coach will take over a program that will lose just one player to graduation.
“It is good to go home,” Curry said when talk shifted to North Bullitt. “I’m excited for the opportunity, but it is bittersweet. The girls will excel.”
The new coach saw his new team play several times over the winter, mainly after the girls’ games and he said that he has already watched some film on the team.
“I know they have a good solid group returning,” Curry said. “They won ten games and have good kids coming back. It is a good opportunity.
“Twice I have taken over younger teams,” the new coach added of his stints at Bullitt Central. “This will be the first time I’ve taken over an older group. We’ll work this summer and by October we’ll know where we stand.”
The Eagles return two All-Bullitt County team selections in seniors-to-be Kaylen Alexander and Braxton Sievert along with an upcoming point guard in Rowen Burton. Those three, along with senior Jayden Reisser, were the backbone of last season’s team. However, Young struggled to find supporting players to round out the rotation. Plus, Sievert is working through issues with his back that are keeping him from playing baseball this spring.
Despite just being officially hired on Friday, Curry already has said that he will retain Travis Dunnavan as an assistant coach from Young’s staff. Dunnavan is a former Eagle player. The rest of the staff is still a work in progress.
Curry did say that for the upcoming summer that he will work with Hebron head coach Casey Bannon (who has ties to the North Bullitt girls’ program) on a combined youth camp that will be held in late July.