By being hired as the new head girls basketball coach, Marcus McKinney is again fully invested at Wakefield High School, not splitting his time elsewhere.
McKinney has been a full-time teacher at Wakefield for 26 years and graduated from the Arlington school in 1989. For many past winter seasons, McKinney has been a head or assistant basketball coach at other metro-area high schools. When the position opened to return as the girls head coach at Wakefield, McKinney jumped at the chance.
Previously he was Wakefield’s head girls coach from 2000 to 2005.
“I’m very excited to be back,” McKinney said. “There are a lot of talented players here and they are eager to learn and have success. Being in this building is special.”
McKinney succeeds Jacqueline Beathea, who coached the Warriors the past two seasons. Wakefield had a young squad last season and struggled to win with a 3-18 overall record and an 0-13 mark against Liberty District opponents.
“We look forward to developing and teaching the players,” McKinney said. “We’re get everything started in a couple of weeks.”
When McKinney attended Wakefield, he played boys varsity basketball under former and the late head coach Bob Veldran.
After stepping away from the Wakefield girls head coaching job after the 2004-05 season, McKinney went on to coach as either a head or assistant at the Bullis School in Maryland, then in Northern Virginia at Edison, Annandale and Alexandria City high schools. His girls team won a league championship at Bullis. This past season, McKinney was an assistant coach for Wakefield’s boys freshman basketball team.
NOTE: When McKinney was the Wakefield girls coach back in 2002, his team was the last to defeat the Edison Eagles. Since that victory, Wakefield has lost 54 straight games to Edison, according to Wakefield sports historian Frank Haddock.
