The Angelo State men’s basketball program announced the addition of Preston Ingram to its 2017-18 coaching staff.
Ingram, who hails from Springfield, Missouri, will be joining the Angelo State staff from Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas. He is joining a staff that has already led the Rams to a sweet sixteen appearance during the 2015-16 season and two consecutive appearances in the Lone Star Conference tournament finale, as well as top 10 national rankings in each of the past two seasons.
“Our program immediately took a step forward when we hired Preston,” commented ASU Head Basketball Coach Cinco Boone. “He is an absolutely terrific person who will be a great role model for our student-athletes. He is coming from one of the best division 2 conferences in the country and he has a variety of coaching experiences that make him such an outstanding coach. He has a great reputation in the coaching world as a man, a recruiter, a relationship builder, and instructor on the court. We are ecstatic to add him, his wife Shanna, and their two beautiful kiddos to the Ramfam!”
“I am excited to have the opportunity to come to Angelo State and be part of the culture and the coaching staff that Coach Boone has built over the past two seasons,” said Ingram. “Being able to join a program that has had such great success that is a part of the Lone Star Conference in itself is a great feat. I am looking forward to helping the team to take the steps to win each and every single day and work towards that goal of a championship.”
The new coaching addition has spent the past four seasons at Pittsburg State University in the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association, as the Gorillas’ top assistant coach. During his time in Pittsburg, Kansas, Ingram assisted the program in obtaining its first ever MIAA Conference Tournament Championship in 2015 with the largest margin of victory in tournament history. While overseeing the team’s defensive play, the Gorillas held teams to a 65.1 points per game average. Ingram recruited and coached multiple conference award winners and four Provost’s Awards Winners for academic excellence during his tenure in Pittsburg, Kansas.
Preceding Pittsburg State, Ingram was the assistant at Avila University, an assistant coach at Evangel University (Springfield, Missouri) where he worked under NAIA Hall of Famer Steve Jenkins, and has also coached AAU basketball for the past 13 years. He spent five years with the Nike EYBL program Mo-Kan KD Elite out of Kansas City where he coached both youth and high school teams.
As a player at Evangel, Ingram was a member on the 2001-02 NAIA-II National Championship basketball team that posted a 35-1 record while maintaining the No.1 ranking in the nation throughout the season. During the following 2003-04 season, Ingram was selected as the team’s defensive player of the year.
The new coaching addition earned his bachelors in marketing and management in 2004 from Evangel University. He then followed with a master’s of science in human health performance and recreation from Pittsburg State University in 2016. He is joined by his wife Shanna, daughter Mya (3) and son Sebastian (5 mo).
