Geneseo State '95
Ninth Season
Jim Fox has been an assistant coach on Bob McKillop’s Davidson basketball staff during some of the program’s most successful seasons.
Now in his ninth year as a Davidson assistant, Fox has been on the bench as Davidson compiled an 173-72 overall record, 115-24 versus teams in the Southern Conference, won four conference tournament championships, played in four NCAA tournaments and two postseason NITs.
“It’s no coincidence that our program has enjoyed consistent success since Jim Fox joined our staff in August 2001,” Coach McKillop says. “Jim has developed into a superb recruiter and coupled with his understanding of the game, he has become a very valuable member of our staff.”
Fox, a native of Levittown, N.Y., spent five years as associate head coach at St. Dominic High School in Oyster Bay, N.Y. He served one year as the school’s athletic director, and as the head coach of the freshman team, directed the St. Dominic frosh to an impressive record of 55-1 and four consecutive Catholic High School championships. He also taught government, economics and criminal justice and psychology at the high school.
Fox graduated in 1995 from the State University of New York at Geneseo College, earning his degree in political science. Fox’s father retired as a chief U.S. Probation Officer, and his mother retired as a school principal at a Catholic elementary school on Long Island. In his off time, Fox’s father ran a youth basketball program on Long Island, and Fox began coaching in the program when he was still in high school.
Coaching was in his blood, but so was federal law enforcement. He interned with the U.S. Secret Service between his junior and senior college years and seriously thought about joining the service as a career. Fox saw how much his father loved basketball and enjoyed the work, which influenced him to give coaching a try, which he did at St. Dominic. He’s glad he did.
In addition to coaching at St. Dominic, Fox was also head coach and director of the Long Island Lightning AAU Basketball Club, where one of his players was Matt McKillop, Coach McKillop’s son and a three-year starter at Davidson who graduated in 2006. Fox coached more than 20 young men who went on to play college basketball.
Fox’s father now runs the Island Garden, where Coach Fox and his brother, Jeff, have their own basketball camp for two weeks each summer - the Fox Offensive Skills Basketball Camp.
Fox has had a long acquaintance with Coach McKillop, first meeting him when McKillop was a highly successful coach at Long Island Lutheran High School. When McKillop offered Fox a job at Davidson, he quickly accepted.
“I knew Coach McKillop as a person and a coach,” Fox says, “and I knew working for him and learning from him would be great for my career. Coach lets his assistants get involved in all areas of coaching. The work ethic in the Davidson program runs from the coaches to the players. Everyone is working towards a common goal: to get to the NCAA tournament and be successful in it.”
Fox is single and lives in Davidson. His brother, Jeff, is a lawyer, and his sister, Jen, is a nurse. His parents travel to see Davidson play several times each year. Coach Fox loves golf, tennis, politics and rooting for his beloved New York Yankees.
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