Columbia HS girls basketball head coach Chuck Keegan. beams as the team finishes a practice session on Monday, Dec. 5.
WEST ORANGE, NJ — Chuck Keegan has been named the new West Orange High School head boys varsity basketball coach.
Keegan served as the head girls varsity basketball coach for the past five seasons at Columbia High School in Maplewood. This is his first time coaching a boys team.
In a phone interview with the West Orange Chronicle on Tuesday morning, July 31, Keegan said he was excited to be the new Mountaineers head coach.
Keegan is quite familiar with WOHS. He is entering his fifth year as an assistant varsity coach for the WOHS football team, which won its first state sectional championship in program history last fall under head coach Darnell Grant. Keegan is an offensive line coach and special teams coordinator.
“I’m ready to go,” said Keegan about being the new Mountaineers boys basketball head coach. “As far as the program is concerned, I think there is a lot of potential there. I’ve had a chance to watch them on film and over the last few years, being an assistant football coach at West Orange High School, see some of those players in person and things of that sort. I think there is a lot of potential there, a lot of things I am excited to work with. I’m looking forward to it. I think it’s a diamond in the rough, so to speak.”
Keegan also will be a special education math teacher at Roosevelt Middle School. He was a teacher in the Maplewood–South Orange school district for the past 20 years. The Maplewood resident spent the past three years as a teacher at Columbia HS after being at South Orange Middle School for 17 years.
Keegan’s goal for the basketball program is to see his players improve.
“The goal is to always create an environment and a place where kids can improve on their talent and improve on their skill, and come out of my program better than when they entered,” Keegan said. “If we have that focus and if we have the energy of always improving, trying to have some fun while we are doing it, wins-and-losses-wise, those things will start to take care of themselves, as far as that’s concerned.”
West Orange athletic director Stephan Zichella is excited to have Keegan as the new coach.
“Coach Keegan is a veteran coach with a proven track record of leading young people,” Zichella wrote in a text message to the West Orange Chronicle. “Coach Keegan is an exceptional role model, and works tirelessly to develop all aspects of our student-athletes.”
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