The Virginia Commonwealth University men's basketball program
welcomed two new members to its family on Wednesday with Head Coach
Shaka Smart announcing the additions of Jamion Christian and
Michael Morrell to his coaching staff.
Christian comes to the Black & Gold sidelines after spending the past three years at William & Mary, while Morrell will serve as the Director of Basketball Operations and joins the Rams after spending last year as an assistant coach at Charleston Southern.
"We are extremely excited about Jamion and Mike joining our staff," Smart said. "Both are highly talented young coaches, who come from strong backgrounds of success."
Morrell and Smart have a history together, working side-by-side during the 2007-08 campaign at Clemson on Oliver Purnell's staff. This past season, the Tennessee native was Charleston Southern's academic and scouting coordinator, and handled the recruiting duties in the southern part of the country.
"I couldn't be more excited about the opportunity to come to VCU and rejoin Coach Smart," Morrell said. "I have great respect for him as well as the entire VCU basketball program. I'm looking forward to getting to work and helping this program continue the great tradition that is VCU basketball."
As a part of the VCU basketball family, Morrell will handle the operations side, overseeing team travel, scheduling, supervising the graduate and student managers and much more. He takes over for Kyle Getter, who was named an assistant on Mike Jones' staff at Radford.
Morrell served in the same capacity from 2008-10 at Clemson, helping the Tigers to three consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances.
Prior to Clemson, Morrell spent two years at Kings College in Bristol, Tenn. Serving as an assistant, he helped guide the Tornadoes to one of the best season's in school history in 2006-07, posting a 23-11 overall mark.
Morrell was quite an athlete himself, playing four years of basketball and four years of golf at Milligan College in northeast Tennessee. He scored over 1,400 points during his basketball career, a number that still ranks among the top-10 in school history.
He earned his bachelor's degree in history from Milligan in 2005.
