Jason Ellis has been named the head coach of Marietta High School boys basketball program. (Photo by Stewart Photography)

MARIETTA — In his playing days at Marietta College, Jason Ellis became known for taking over games with his scoring prowess.

Now, he’s hoping to take over games at Marietta High School, but in a different capacity. The Tigers have hired Ellis as their new boys basketball coach.

Ellis coached middle school boys basketball last year and also served as an assistant for the MHS girls basketball team under head coach Ali Shane — who is also his fiancee.

“This is an incredible opportunity,” Ellis said. “When I moved here nine years ago to play at Marietta College, I figured out quickly how special this community is and how connected they are with sports. It seems like a ton of people want to support the basketball programs in this area. This job is something I’ve always had in the back of my mind that I’d like to do. I’m super excited and ready to get the ball rolling.”

Ellis takes over for Austin Gardner, who guided the Tigers to a 75-21 record in his four years at the helm. Last season, Gardner helped lead MHS to its first district championship since 1977. Marietta, though, graduated several key players from that team, including all five starters in Trey Hawkins, Zaiden Wittekind, Owen Riley, Logan Grosklos and Lucas Miller.

Key returnees include Trenton McVey and Graesyn Moat, who both played big minutes off the bench throughout the year.

“Losing eight seniors is always tough,” Ellis said. “It’s a young team. It’s going to be a whole new look and everybody’s going to be in new roles. It’s going to be different, but it’s a great group.”

One thing a Jason Ellis-coached basketball team always will lean on is toughness.

“For this group to win, we’re going to have to be the toughest team on the floor,” he said. “You’ve got to be tough, do the little things and be disciplined — that’s how you win basketball games. Graesyn is a guy who can get buckets. He’s going to be in a bigger role and will probably be the main focus of the defenses we play against. Trenton’s a dog. He’s one of our two seniors and I’m excited about what I’ve seen from him. We have a lot of good pieces, they just need a little teaching. Hopefully we can put it all together by the time November comes.”

Ellis is a 2017 graduate of Marion Harding High School.

He then spent five years at Marietta College, finishing his career with 1,569 points. As a Pioneer, Ellis shot 47.4% from the floor, 41.7% from 3 and 86.9% from the foul line in his career.

Ellis helped lead MC to the Final Four in 2021-22, a year in which he was named first team All-American, joining AJ Edwards as the only Pioneers to earn such recognition in program history.

Ellis played for head coach Jon VanderWal, who helped turn Marietta into an NCAA Division III powerhouse, and then coached as an assistant under VanderWal for three years.

“I learned a lot from the coaching staff I had as a player,” Ellis said. “You see everything that goes into the game — learning your Xs and Os, game-planning, learning how to connect with players, getting the best out of them, motivating them. Every year I kept learning more and more under Coach VanderWal and his staff. It’s shaped who I am. They set me up with the tools and discipline to be able to lead a program.”

VanderWal’s teams at MC hung their hat on playing fast and getting up and down the court. While Ellis would ideally like to implement that kind of style with the Tigers, he also acknowledged that as a high school coach you sometimes have to be able to adapt.

“It’s hard to say every year is going to be the same,” Ellis said. “Obviously I do want to play fast, get out and run and get easy buckets, but what I’m really counting on is having five guys on the floor who are going to fly around and get stops. I want to hold teams under 40 points. I want to be tough and be able to guard. You can win a lot of games by locking teams up. Hopefully we can do that first and then figure out the offense from there.”

Another former Pioneer, Brennan McKean, will be on Ellis’ coaching staff at MHS. Troy Francis and Wyatt Miracle also return to the Tiger bench.

“I love Marietta, and I’m not just trying to build a high school program — I want to build a Marietta City Schools basketball program,” Ellis said. “It starts with the youth programs. I want it all to be connected. I want people who grow up in this area to want to play Marietta basketball, people who love basketball and have a passion for it, and just kind of build a whole basketball environment that everybody wants to be a part of.”

Contact Jordan Holland at jholland@newsandsentinel.com.