Mr. Creel Resigns
as Rams Head Basketball Coach
AreaSports.net
March 24, 2008
Fresh on the heels of a dramatic Elite 8 post-season run, the Doug Creel Era has come to an end. Mr. Creel submitted his resignation over the weekend as the head coach of the Mount Vernon Rams Boys Basketball team. He will remain at the school in his duties as the full-time Athletic Director for both the boys and girls athletic programs. His resignation was submitted to Superintendent, Terry Milt. Mr. Milt indicated that the process of finding a new head coach will begin immediately.
Mr. Creel has guided the Rams basketball program to a combined career mark of 240 wins and 130 losses (66% winning percentage) over a 13-year career as head coach. He passed legendary coach Stanley Changnon in career wins earlier this season. Mr. Creel is second on the all-time list at Mount Vernon behind Howard Ross, who coached for 15 seasons from 1921-1936. Mr. Creel also spent 9 seasons as the JV coach under Lee Emery, so he has spent a total of 22 years along the Mount Vernon coaching box.
During his 13-year tenure as head coach, Mr. Creel had only two losing seasons. His teams won 6 Regional Titles, 4 Sectional Championships, and made two appearances in the Elite 8. His squad in 1999 won 28 straight games and was nationally ranked by USA Today. The magical run by this year's squad into the Elite 8 was unexpected by many, but especially rewarding to Mr. Creel. The Rams finished this season at 18-12, after starting the year at 0-4. Along the way they won the Regional Tournament, Sectional Tournament, and got to within 1-point of Champaign Central with :34 seconds left during the Super-Sectional game at Springfield. He also coached two players (E.J. Randolph and Truvanty Badger) who were both voted to the First Team All-Conference squad this season in the South-7 Conference. One of them (Randolph) was also the unanimous MVP of the league.
