BAYSIDE — Ron Jenkins, the former champion hoops coach at Bayside High School, said it himself: “This is a night I will never forget.”
Jenkins, who led the Bayside boys team to two state championships in the 1990s, even said it twice while his work was celebrated in February.
First it was during halftime of the Bayside Marlins basketball game on Friday, Feb. 9, when he was honored for his nomination to the Virginia High Scholastic League Hall of Fame and presented with a ball listing some of his accolades. The second time was in the intimate setting of a private dining room later that night during a celebration hosted by former players.
“This has been tremendous,” Jenkins said.
“Anytime you have that many people come out and present to me what you have presented to me, it is truly, truly tremendous,” he told former players, family, close friends and colleagues.
Of course, so is his legacy in Virginia Beach sports.
During the evening, Jenkins and others reminisced about the Marlins’ reign on the hardcourt, when they won back-to-back state championships in 1990 and 1991. Jenkins spent 28 years as a coach and 30 as an educator and mentor in his storied career.
“Being in that gym brought back so many memories,” Jenkins said. “It brought back the crowds, the cheers, the packed house on Friday nights when you had a line outside – and you had to get here at 5 p.m. before the girls’ basketball game for a 7:30 game to get a good seat.”
Jenkins played football and track at George P. Phenix High School in Hampton. He was a multisport athlete who played recreational basketball. He attended Norfolk State University, running track and becoming a student of basketball in the 1970s.
“Probably the most influential coach that inspired me was Charles Christian, former head basketball coach at Norfolk State University,” Jenkins said of the late hall-of-fame coach who won seven Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association basketball championships when the Spartans competed in NCAA Division II.
“I admired his organizational skills as well as knowledge of the game,” Jenkins told me. “I was equally impressed with his managing skilled players.”
Jenkins also admired a winning basketball coach in Maryland, Morgan Wootten.
“I went to his basketball clinic each year and had personal conversations with him in regards to basketball,” he said. “Coach Wootten taught me a lot, too.”
The first African-American boys basketball coach in Virginia Beach was Willie Braye at Kellam High (1973-76), followed by Johnny “Pep” Morris at Kellam, who won a girls’ state championship. Jenkins said the two coaches laid the foundations for him in 1985, giving him “shoulders to stand on.”
“I wanted a program that would utilize basketball as a tool which would motivate young men and women to reach their ultimate potential,” Jenkins said. “The love and passion for sports can be a great motivator. … I have seen so many instances where being on a team and striving to make that team successful brings out many unknown potentials.”
Jenkins told me some of his former players may not have had a father figure in their lives, but he worked to try to be a substitute father figure.
That approach led to lifelong relationships with people he has influenced on and off the court.
“I always tried to take the disadvantage and make it into an advantage,” Jenkins said.
He retired in 2014 after 42 years of teaching and coaching, which he called a bittersweet change.
“I knew I needed the time due to family concerns, but I missed the day-to-day interactions with students, faculty, and administration,” he said.
“I always felt that if you do your best to serve the students you taught, something down the road would come out of it,” he added, noting his appreciation for the recognition organized by Sean Bowers, a former student and player who advocated for Jenkins’ nomination, and others.
Jenkins’ influence on the game – and the people who played with him over the years – was clear among the many who came to celebrate his work.
Some of them, in fact, continue it by coaching.
“I would not have even chosen coaching as a profession had it not been for Coach Jenkins,” said Mario Mullen, who was a champion player at Bayside, starred at Old Dominion University and now teaches and coaches at Ocean Lakes High School.
The author is a writer and documentary filmmaker who grew up in Norfolk and lived in Virginia Beach for much of his life. He ran a production company, worked in college athletics and was curator at an art gallery in Virginia Beach for years.
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