Brad Norman meets his new CHS basketball squad
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Brad Norman, who will take over as Chester High School's new basketball coach next school year, was in Chester recently to meet with his squad and announce several summer opportunities for hopeful basketball players. Norman, from Dongola originally, attended Shawnee College for two years where he played basketball. He graduated from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale in 2008. He coached at Dongola after college winning a grade school regional and in three years coaching high school he won 16, 18 and 11 games respectively. In 2008 his team won the Crab Orchard Tournament. He was named the Coach of the Year in the Cain Citizen Newspaper and he was runner-up for the ABV.com Coach of the Year award in 2008 losing out to Shane Hawkins, former Pinckneyville High School and SIU-C Saluki standout. In 2008-09 he coached track and was assistant coach for baseball at Shawnee High School and in 2009-2010 he was assistant varsity basketball coach of at Shawnee. This past year Norman was assistant basketball coach at Century High School and he served as assistant baseball coach at Anna-Jonesboro High School. Beginning in the fall of 2011 he will teach driver's education at Chester High School and he will lead the Yellow Jackets Boy's Basketball program. He intends to be involved with the Little Jackets Basketball Program here in Chester and he will lead several basketball sessions this summer at CHS to prepare for the 2011-2012 season. June 11 the varsity team will compete in the Goreville Shootout. June 13 the team will take part in the Dick Corn camp at McKendree University. His team will play hard and fast he intends to run, press and trap. "Basketball is my passion", states Norman. "Sports is like life and I still play the game of basketball myself." Norman proudly claims that he is an SIU-C saluki fan, a Chicago Bulls fan, a St. Louis cardinals fan and a St. Louis Rams fan. Shown here Norman speaks to interested players at a home room meeting at CHS.