I'm not sure if the Yellow Jacket boys basketball program could have found a better head coach than Jody Bass, who was chosen to replace Scott Curran on Friday.
There were rumblings from Jacket backers for Mansfield Timberview head coach Eric McDade, who is a Denison alum. But McDade is coming off a state tournament appearance and there was basically no chance he would leave his current position.
Curran, an up-and-coming coach when he took the Denison job five years ago, inherited a struggling program and brought stability as the team improved to its current state -- three straight playoff appearances with advances to the second round each trip.
So when Curran left to oversee the fledgling Byron Nelson program, the coach following in his footsteps was going to be charged not just with maintaining the current success but try and get the Jackets to the next level.
Enter Bass, whose first victory at Denison will be the 400th of his career. He has been successful at all three previous stops, including last season at Flower Mound Marcus -- where his team won the district title and 21 games before losing to powerhouse Duncanville in the second round.
Bass' crowning achievement came in 1998 when he led Highland Park to a state runner-up finish and his teams have reached at least the fourth round of the playoffs -- the region semifinals -- five times.
That's good news for a program which had never made it to the third round. Bass will face pressure immediately as Denison returns three starters from a 21-win team that upset fourth-ranked Carrollton Newman Smith to open the playoffs. He inherits a backcourt with Division I potential but a front line that has been short on height for the past few years.