By Tom Nader

Publisher and Editor

Alex Blake is determined to prove to his players and community that basketball can once again be relevant at Field High School.

Pending board approval this month, Blake will become the sixth coach to lead the Falcons’ boys basketball program in the last 10 seasons.

During that span, no coach has led the program for more than two consecutive seasons since Tyler Boyle (2013-16) and a new coach was introduced for four straight years between 2017 and 2021.

“I am extremely excited for this opportunity, and I am very passionate about it,” Blake said.

With that passion comes a vision for where Blake would like to take the program.

And how to get it there.

For starters, to turn around the program, Blake said he will refuse to overlook the simplest ingredient: Hard work.

“Myself included. We have a lot of work to do, but we can do it if we do it together,” said Blake, who is a 2008 graduate of Southeast High School.

Blake joined the Falcons’ staff for the 2020-21 season as a varsity assistant under then-head coach Derek Widuck. He acted as the freshman coach and varsity assistant in 2021-22 and then was the varsity assistant in 2022-23 under Steve Beshara, who announced his resignation last month.

Accountability will be another one of Blake’s foundational pillars in an attempt to change the culture of the program.

“We need to have players not only hold themselves accountable, but their teammates, too,” Blake said. “And not just in the gym, but in the classrooms and in the community. We need players that show up and work hard because they care about the teammates around them. That is what is going to change things for us.”

It is a belief system that Blake has watched work, because he played inside similar systems during his high-school career with the Pirates led by head coach Bob Dunn.

It fostered a love for the game that remains to this day.

“Basketball was a game I fell in love with, and I still love to play it, but I found that I really enjoy coaching the youth, too,” Blake said. “Just being the gym is a fun place to be. The game of basketball has meant so much to me and now I am fortunate to have an opportunity to create the same atmosphere. I won’t take that for granted.”

Blake’s Falcons will search for an identity throughout their summer workouts, which will give the new head coach the chance to evaluate his roster and adapt his offense and defense accordingly.

At the base, though, Blake wants his team to play aggressive defensively that can spark transitions to an uptempo motion style offense that will occasionally explore the idea of even working guards into the low-post area for high-percentage shots.

Blake’s varsity staff will include Nick Pollack as the junior-varsity coach, along with Noah Dockus as a varsity assistant. The seventh- and eighth-grade positions have yet to be determined.