Former local high school hoops coach lands top job at St. Thomas University men’s basketball

Author: Zach Oliveri
Published: Updated:

Zach Moss has the opportunity he’s always dreamed of, leading a men’s college basketball program as the head coach. Now, Moss, who is from Naples, is now the head coach at St. Thomas University, after spending the past three seasons as the team’s associate head coach.

“It’s been a long time coming,” Moss said. “Definitely exciting but yet weird. Actually the weirdest part is like calling people I used to call is like associate head coach now it’s like I am the head men’s coach. So it’s been been a nice little change.”

Moss always knew he belonged coaching basketball, even from a young age.

“I started coaching basketball when I was, my sisters team when I was like 12-13 years old,” Moss said. “This is the only thing I wanted to do with my life.”

Moss continued to coach at the high school level in Collier County for nine years. He was at Palmetto Ridge High School in their first season.

“We took freshmen that were 0-21 and get beat by 60 every game and then their senior year going into the Elite Eight going to the regional final,” Moss recalled.

After stops at Barron Collier and St. John Neumann, Moss made the jump to Ave Maria University, where he spent nine seasons as an assistant. Then, he joined the staff at St. Thomas University.

When asked about the sacrifices that helped him the most to get to his dream, Moss explained, just being on the road recruiting you know, being home three weeks and literally seeing my kids maybe 10 minutes a day. You know because I’d be gone before they would you know or only see my daughter when I take off taking the VPK and then drop off and immediately at the office and practice games or whatever. “

He went on to say, “that is like fuel cause like alright if you’re going to do this, like you can’t mess this up.”

Moss is ready to make the most of this new opportunity.

“There is an expectation here to be competing for championships and I kind of like that that’s that’s the environment I want to be in so that embracing that,” Moss said.

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