NC State will have a full complement of assistant coaches to hit the road this weekend.
NCSU coach Kevin Keatts hired UMass assistant coach Brett Nelson to replace Joel Justus, who had departed to Ohio State after the Wolfpack’s Final Four run.
Nelson brings a wealth of experience both as an assistant coach and head coach since he got into coaching in 2007.
Nelson has been at Marshall (2007-10), Arkansas (2010-2011), Drake (2011-13), Ball State (2013-14), Marquette (2014-19), Holy Cross (2019-23) and UMass. At Holy Cross, he was the head coach, where he went 27-84 overall and 21-49 in the Patriot League.
Nelson worked under a pair of Billy Donovan assistants, with Donnie Jones at Marshall and John Pelphrey at Arkansas.
Nelson was a McDonald's All-American coming out of St. Alban's High in St. Alban's, W.Va., and picked Florida and Donovan. He was ranked by Recruiting Services Consensus Index (RSCI) at No. 7 overall in the class of 1999.
Nelson averaged 11.0 points and 3.1 assists per game, shot 39.8 percent on three-pointers and started 77 of 129 contests with the Gators. He averaged a career-high 15.3 points and shot a blistering 45.3 percent from three-point land his sophomore year in 2000-01.
The first past NC State connection is that he worked under coach Mark Phelps at Drake, with Phelps a former NCSU assistant coach under Herb Sendek — same family tree as Donovan and Keatts via current St. John’s coach Rick Pitino. Donovan worked for Pitino at Kentucky and Keatts did the same at Louisville.
At Ball State, he worked under coach Billy Taylor, who is now the head coach at Elon. Nelson returned to work with Phelps for a year, and also with former NC State point guard Justin Gainey at various times at Marquette under coach Steve Wojciechowski.
The most recent assistant coach stop was at UMass under Frank Martin.
The lone spring evaluation period is this weekend from Friday-to-Sunday, with Nike, Under Armour and adidas having events across the country.
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