Franklin County's Mike Holt, standing in front, talks to a group of players during a timeout in this photo from the 2018-19 season. Holt was promoted from assistant coach to head coach of the boys basketball program Friday following the resignation of Isaiah Phillips, right.
Mike Holt will be taking over the position of head coach for the boys basketball program at Franklin County High School after the resignation of previous coach Isaiah Phillips.
Phillips’ resignation was announced in a press release sent out by FCHS Principal Dr. Roger Alsup Friday, and the same press release named Holt as the new head coach.
Phillips resigned from his position with the Rebels to become the athletic director and head boys basketball coach at Smyrna Middle School. He went 17-34 in two seasons as head coach of the Rebels.
Holt joined the FCHS boys basketball program as an assistant coach for Phillips in 2017. He said that he will be operating the team in a similar way to how Phillips did which will provide consistency for the players.
“I think the transition between me and coach Phillips is not going to be that dramatic,” Holt said. “I feel like we’ve just got to get a continuance of what we’ve been doing and add a few things.”
Holt said that he prefers to run a continuity offense which centers on trying to find the best possible shot to maximize scoring.
“In high school basketball, possessions are very big. Our goal is to always get one point per possession,” Holt said.
Defensively, Holt said his team will work with a variety of defenses to keep opposing offenses on their toes.
Holt has also been the head coach of the softball program at FCHS for the past two years and he will remain in that position. He said that he has been in situations where he has coached multiple teams at once previously in his career and it is all about finding a proper balance.
“I’m going to have to do a very good of timing things, having it organized where I could go from one to the other,” Holt said. “I’m going to have to get some good assistant basketball coaches and they’re going to have to help out with some things. It’s a challenge that I love.”
Holt extended his thanks to Dr. Alsup, FCHS Athletic Director Don Rhoton and Franklin County Director of Schools Stanley Bean for allowing him the opportunity to run both programs at the same time. He also thanked Phillips for giving him the chance to coach with the Rebels as an assistant before the recent job change.
Holt started his basketball coaching career at a small high school in South Dakota before attending the University of Wisconsin-Platteville to earn his master’s degree. While there, Holt worked as an assistant coach under future University of Wisconsin head boys basketball coach Bo Ryan.
Following graduation from UW-Platteville, Holt worked at Motlow State Community College as the head girls basketball coach for six years. He then spent six years as the head boys basketball coach at Lincoln County High School.
His most recent stint before coming to Franklin County was as the head boys basketball coach at Grundy County High School.
The Rebels will begin their first season with Holt as the head coach in November.