Lfd. Alum Nathan McKinnon set to take over boy’s basketball program

Littlefield native, Nathan McKinnon, was recently promoted to Head Boy’s Basketball Coach at Littlefield High School.

Born and raised in Littlefield, McKinnon graduated from LHS in 2003. He attended Lubbock Christian University where he played three years of basketball, before graduating with his Bachelor’s Degree in Exercise and Sports Science.

Coach McKinnon finished up his eighth year as the Boy’s JV Basketball Coach this season.

“The first year I came on staff, there wasn’t a spot available, so during my first year I helped with football, basketball and was the JV Coach as a volunteer coach, because there wasn’t a spot available,” He explained. “I ended up getting on staff the next year and was the junior high coach for two years before moving up to be the JV Boy’s Basketball coach.”

Coach McKinnon has coached on the staff of Coach Clint Conkin, Coach Bryan Braddock and Coach Rob Ogle.

“It was really three different styles, three different methods, I learned something from all three of them,” he stated. “ Coach Conkin and Ogle were more defensive minded, while Coach Braddock was offensive minded. It allowed me to gain a lot of information working under them. I took some stuff I liked from each of them, took some stuff I didn’t and kind of pieced together my own philosophy and beliefs.”

When talking about the philosophy he brings, Coach McKinnon said, “I feel like you need to adapt to your players; when I was in school and the years after we’ve had some big guys, more recently Tyree [Jones] and Chris [Brown], so we were able to run that two post style of offense. Now, we don’t have those type of guys, but we’re fast; so I want us to be uptempo and I want to press. I want to be able to spread the floor and run, we’re going to be a fast, crazy uptempo type of team.”

He added, “Defensively, I love man-to-man defense. There will be some times we will go zone, because of our size, but I played for Coach Bryan Huseman and Barry Kimball and they were die hard man defense guys. They instilled that in me, so I’m not going to give up on man-defense, we’re going to be a man-to-man defensive team, but we’re going to be able to go zone too.”

Coach McKinnon talked about what made him decide to get into coaching, saying, “Always in the back of my mind I loved sports. When I graduated I had plans to be an athletic trainer so that I could be around athletes. Then I got to LCU and I broke a vertebra in my back playing basketball and went to a chiropractor and had dreams of doing that. After I got my degree I took a break, I didn’t want to go back to school right then.”

He added, “Always in the back of my mind I thought coaching would be really cool. I was working at a car dealership and decided I was going to go for it. I started my teaching stuff online and started talking to some people and everything just kind of fell into place. A spot opened up at Littlefield to teach, Coach Huseman allowed me to help with football and basketball and then the following year we had somebody leave and all of the cards just fell into place like it was meant to be.”

Coach McKinnon discussed what has kept him at Littlefield all of these years, rather than leave, saying, “Littlefield is home.”

“I love the town, I love the people here, I already had a relationship with the kids, because I went to school with a lot of their family, so there is that connection,” he explained. “Once I got here and started rolling, it was home to me. I got offered some head coaching jobs over the years and I turned them down to stay here for this one, so I’m very thankful to get this opportunity, because this is where I want to be.”

The coach talked about what it means to him to be able to spend his whole coaching career to this point at Littlefield, saying, “It’s pretty cool.”

“It’s not something that to many people do in the coaching world, you tend to bounce around a lot, you don’t run across to many people who have one destination,” he said. “The coaches before me have been at several different schools, it’s not a profession that people spend their whole career at one stop.”

He added, “When I got into it I realized real quick that there is a big difference in being on this end of things, so those first few years were eye-opening. Even playing basketball in college and being around it my whole life, it’s different when you’re on the bench running a team and making these decisions, it was a learning experience, but it has been fun and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it.”

Coach McKinnon talked about some people who’ve inspired him along the way, saying, “My favorite athlete is probably Michael Jordan. He is probably the best ever. Watching him growing up, I was a little kid and I really liked watching him. I also liked watching Kevin Garnett, as I got a little older and Jordan retired.”

He added, “Coaching wise, Coach Huseman was a big inspiration for me. When I started working here with him as the AD, he helped me, he was honest with me, he worked with me, so he inspired me and Coach [Brent] Green has been really solid and really good to me. I’ve also spent the last 11 years working side-by-side with Mitch McNeese. He has been a huge inspiration to me; the way he runs his program, his beliefs, they really model the way I want to coach as well. Another thing about Littlefield is that this coaching staff is really close. We stick together and everybody helps each other out.”

McKinnon and his wife, Jennifer have been married 14 years in July and they have two children: Travis (7) and Jessa, who is four going on five-years old.

On time off, they like to go on vacations and take the kids to zoo’s and aquariums.

“I love to fish, but don’t get to do it very often,” he laughed. “I grew up camping, my parents had a camper growing up, they have a motor home now, so I like going to camp grounds, as well.”

Coach McKinnon talked about what he is most looking forward to about taking over the Boy’s Basketball Program, saying, “We’ve got really good kids here; they get after it, they play hard, they want to be good, they’re constantly asking me to open the gym so that they can go shoot, we’ve got kids who want to be successful, and it is easy to coach that.”

He added, “You can’t coach effort. You can fix minor details and skills and things like that, but we’ve got kids, who want to do it. I love that. I’ve known a lot of these kids for a long time and it sure is fun to watch them succeed.”