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Gabriel is back in the game

Blaine Gabriel is in need of a wardrobe makeover.

No, Gabriel, now 59 years old, isn’t changing who he is or what he’s about. Rather, he’s getting back to who he used to be.

The issue resides in his closet, which used to be stocked with an assortment of ‘Spartan’ red pullovers but didn’t have a scrap of ‘Buckeye’ orange.

“Absolutely none,” Gabriel said with a bark of a laugh. “Not a stitch of Nelsonville-York Orange and Brown in there.”

It’s time to go shopping. Gabriel was hired, officially by the school board, to be the next head boys basketball coach at Nelsonville-York High School on Wednesday night.

“It’s a restart, for me and hopefully for Nelsonville-York too,” Gabriel said.

Gabriel is no stranger to Athens County or the Tri-Valley Conference Ohio Division. He’s a 1978 graduate of Alexander High School, and later spent 24 seasons coaching basketball in the district.

He started by coaching the junior high teams. He finished coaching the Spartans’ varsity squad, and as the winningest coach in the school’s history. Over 11 seasons as Alexander’s head coach (2002-03 through 2012-13) he won 132 games; no coach in school history has won more.

Under Gabriel, the Spartans won four sectional titles (2006, ’09, ’10 and ’11) and won the TVC Ohio title in 2005-06. He was the District 13 Coach of the year twice, and also a TVC-Ohio Coach of the Year and the AP Division III Southeast District Coach of the Year once.

Gabriel’s term with Alexander ended after the 2012-13 season when then AD Nate Schiller passed on the chance to renew his contract. Told he wasn’t wanted by the district where he had forged the entirety of his coaching identity, Gabriel has spent the last six years watching has much basketball as possible.

And most of it was local. Gabriel became a fixture at big TVC games in recent years, showing up whenever there was a key game to be seen. When he wasn’t doing that, he was following his son Eric, a Division I college assistant coach under legendary NCAA coach Tubby Smith at High Point University.

Gabriel wasn’t done with basketball. He was just on hiatus. Settling back into a routine as a head coach won’t be difficult, he said.

“I was on the run all the time anyway. Tuesday here, Friday there, checking out some player or another for my son,” Gabriel said. “I saw a lot of basketball.”

But when approached with the opportunity to coach again at Nelsonville-York, Gabriel said it was time to get back to doing what he loves. That’s coaching the game and trying to have a positive impact on the students in his care.

He relishes the wins, sure, but it’s the invitations to weddings, the letters of recommendation that he’s been asked to write, that he cherishes.

“Running a program, building a program, to me that’s always been more than just wins and losses,” he said. “This is a chance to do that again.

“I just feel like now I’m at a point where it makes sense,” Gabriel added. “I’ve been pretty content, I really have, but this is a new challenge to take on.

“That’s part of the intrigue, right? I believe I can still do it, and do it the ways I’ve done it before. I’m going to try to be same head coach I’ve always been,” he continued. “We’ll see how it works out.”

Nelsonville-York needs stability in the boys basketball program. Gabriel will be the program’s third head coach in four seasons. The roster is projected to have fewer than five upperclassmen on the roster next winter.

Gabriel will replace Jamie Justus, who had a 14-32 record with the Buckeyes over the last two years. Justus was rehired for the 2019-20 season, but resigned this spring to take the head boys coaching position at Amanda Clearcreek.

A few phone calls, and weeks, later, and Gabriel was back in the game.

“It’s an opportunity to rebuild a program. It’s chance to see if I can still do this,” Gabriel said. “It’s a great school, and they support the heck out of the football program.

“Why can’t we do the same with basketball? Listen, if you coach long enough you’re going to have up and down years,” he said. “But you keep building. You keep making a positive impact.

“Hopefully it works out well for both of us.”