Aztecs Basketball Club is delighted to announce the recruitment of former Thames Valley Tigers, Guildford Heat and Surrey Scorchers assistant coach Russell Purvey as the new head coach at the club.
The experienced play caller who retired from top flight basketball at the end of the 2016-2017 season after more than 20 years coaching in the British Basketball League and even had the opportunity to coach against some of the top teams in Europe in the ULEB Cup, has decided the time is right to ‘slow down’ and concentrate on coaching closer to his home in following years of travelling up and down the country weekend after weekend. That is when Aztecs came calling.
Aztecs chairman, Chris Giles commented on the appointment:
‘When I heard that Russell was ‘retiring’ from coaching basketball at Surrey Scorchers, I knew he wouldn’t want to step away from basketball forever and so I took the opportunity to reach out to him to see if he would be interested in coaching closer to his home in the Wessex League with Aztecs. Fortunately, he agreed!’
He continued
‘Last season, we realised that our men’s teams suffered from not having non-playing coaches and we took it to be our number one priority as a committee to look to rectify that and I think that Russell’s coaching style and personality is a great fit for the club.
We welcome Russell and his son Ollie (former player at Aztecs before injury forced him into an early retirement) hope that under their guidance, we will be able to replicate the recent success seen on the women’s side of the club with the men.’
Chris went on to add:
‘We are actively in talks with other interested parties in becoming coaches for our other men’s teams and hope to be able to make further announcements soon’
Watch this space..
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