James Jones’ name is back on the lips of college basketball fans in these parts once again. Coaching your team into the NCAA Tournament has a chance of doing that. Guiding Ivy League champion Yale through a heart-stopping first-round win over fourth-seeded Auburn makes it a certainty.
Oakland’s take down of Kentucky may have headlined the first day of the Big Dance and the Bulldogs’ 78-76 stunner against a Tigers squad that was ranked No. 7 nationally in the final AP poll was the talk of Day 2. It propels 13th-seeded Yale into the second round for just the second time and first since its epic 79-75 upset of Baylor in 2016.
Jones, who grew up in North Babylon before his family relocated to Dix Hills for his final two years of high school, will be taking his 13th-seeded Bulldogs up against San Diego State, last season’s national runner-up and the No. 5 seed in the East Region, on Sunday in Spokane, Wash.
There were phone calls from Long Island not too long after Yale scintillatingly turned away two shots in the final seconds — a frenetic defensive stand — to preserve the victory. But the calls didn’t come from where one might expect. One was from Pamela Katz, his fifth-grade teacher, and another was from Richard Hogan, who taught 11th grade English at Half Hollow Hills West. He counts both as inspirations to the coach as a youngster.
“[Katz] was my favorite teacher,” Jones said via Zoom from Spokane Arena. Of Hogan, he added “[he] kind of inspired me as much as anybody.”
“This is basically what we do in basketball, teach,” said Jones, who is in his 24th season at Yale and has taken it to four NCAA Tournaments, all since 2016.
He told a story about Katz coming to his defense from across the hall when his sixth-grade teacher was hollering at him, asking her to step out of the room and dressing her down.
“That moment, having someone protect me at the age of 12, just gave me a lot of confidence in myself to go and to do and to be [myself],”…
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