By By Marty Stamper / EMG sports assistant
July 10, 2002
Former two-time East Central Community College men's basketball coach Jay Bowen has been named Coordinator of Basketball Operations for the Ole Miss men's basketball program.
Bowen takes over for Grant Pate, who was promoted to assistant coach on June 13.
Bowen had to decide whether to leave Austin Peay State University after just one year or stay at the Clarksville, Tenn., school and turn down the chance to return to Mississippi.
Bowen's role will involve him with basically all phases of basketball except recruiting.
Bowen left East Central in August of 2001 for an assistant job at Austin Peay. The Governors were 14-18 for the 2001-02 season and were 8-8 in the Ohio Valley Conference.
As fate would have, Austin Peay is on Ole Miss' 2002-03 schedule.
This is his second stop at Ole Miss as Bowen was a graduate assistant to Ed Murphy for a year before taking the ECCC head job for the first time in 1989. He also served as an assistant at Armstrong State College in Savannah, Ga., and at Christian Brothers College in Memphis.
His first stint at East Central saw the Warrior teams go 30-17, including a 21-6 mark in the 1990-91 season.
He left the Decatur school for a five-year stint as an assistant coach at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Ga.
From there, Bowen was the head boys' basketball coach at Jackson Academy. The Raiders went 33-2 and won the Academy AAAA state championship in the 1996-97 season.
Bowen returned to ECCC for three years before joining Austin Peay last fall.