Austin Baumgarner and the Smoky Mountain boys will have a new basketball coach for next season.
SYLVA- Smoky Mountain stuck with what it knew in hiring its next boys basketball coach.
Longtime assistant and athletic director Adam Phillips was announced by Jackson County Schools on Monday.
“He spent 10 years as (former coach) Jimmy Cleaveland’s assistant, so Adam has learned from the best,” Smoky Mountain Principal Jacob Buchanan said.
“Adam has earned the respect of our players, our parents and the community.”
As Buchanan said, Phillips has been part of the best-ever decade for the Mustangs program. They won seven of the past eight WNCAC or Appalachian Athletic Conference championships under Cleaveland, who resigned last week with a 243-38 record.
Cleaveland was named the Co-Western North Carolina Athletic Conference Coach of the Year this past season after the Mustangs (25-4) won a piece of the regular-season championship and the WNCAC tournament. It was their seventh regular-season conference championship in the past eight years.
Cleaveland’s 2009-2010, 2013-14 and 2014-15 teams reached the 2-A Western Regional championship game.
Cleaveland remains the last coach to lead an area team to a NCHSAA boys basketball championship (Pisgah’s 2-A run back in 2005).
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