BUCYRUS — The Redmen boy’s basketball team has a new coach in Scott Gifford. Gifford is the head coach No. 44 in Bucyrus history for the boy’s program. Though Gifford has never been a head coach, he does bring 20 years of coaching experience to the bench.
Gifford is a Crawford County native and resides in Galion now, after recently moving back to the are. Gifford graduated from Galion in 1992, he played basketball while he was a Tiger.
“I’m from Galion, so I’m from the area,” explained the newly hired Scott Gifford. “I’ve been kind of wanting to get back to home since my family is from here. I’ve always been kind of looking for job openings in the area, then one opened up.”
After graduating from Galion, Gifford went into the Marines where he stayed for over 10 years. The Galionite led the JROTC team at Ohio State in the early 2000s.
“I earned my bachelors degree in history at Ohio State, while I was there I led the JROTC program as well,” Gifford said.
During that same time Gifford spent some time coaching basketball in the Upper Arlington School District. Following that Gifford was away from the game a bit, operating a business that he eventually sold.
“I sold that, and pretty much now I just work around basketball.”
It was in 2017 that Gifford got back on the sidelines again. Steve Mohr, head coach at Wynford, brought in Gifford to be an assistant coach. That gig lasted for two years.
Next up was a three-year ride as a lead assistant at London High School. London went 21-3 during the 2018-19 season, then 17-8 during the 2019-20 season. While at London, Gifford was able to coach Trey Woodyard, who went on to play Division I basketball at Valparaiso. Woodyard transferred to the University of New Hampshire. Woodyard was one of Ohio’s better high school prospects coming out in 2021.
Gifford has his fair share of coaching experience and believes it is his time to make a push to be a head coach.
Bucyrus finished 3-20 this past season, and Gifford knows the turnaround will not be easy. Going in to his first season, Gifford knows what he wants from his team.
“ [I want us to] be competitive in all of our games and have a shot at winning.”
