After six seasons as the boys basketball coach at Reynolds, Terrance Dickens is returning to the Portland Interscholastic League.
Dickens, who played at Grant and assisted at Benson (2015-20), has been hired as the coach at Cleveland. He replaces Sam Glasgow, who went 50-53 in four seasons, including 6-19 last season.
“I'm excited to get to the PIL and Cleveland and see what I can do over there,” Dickens said. “Cleveland's always had kids that played hard. No matter who was the coach there, they always had kids that would get up in your face and play hard-nosed defense.”
Dickens took over a Reynolds program that was coming off three consecutive 20-loss seasons. The Raiders struggled to get their footing in the tough 6A Mt. Hood Conference, but last season improved to 8-17, their most wins since 2014-15.
“It was great out at Reynolds,” Dickens said. “I really loved working with the administration and the parents and the kids. I did six years there, and I just think it was time to move on and see what I could do over here.
Dickens praised Reynolds players for their effort against a difficult schedule in the MHC.
“The kids showed up every day,” Dickens said. “They never quit. I made it fun for them. It was hard for those guys, losing and that, but they kept coming every day, and that's what kept me going.”
Reynolds showed promise last season with the addition of one of the state's best freshmen, 6-foot-4 wing Jordan Smith, who set a state freshman record with a 55-point game and finished with a 22.2 average. Smith transferred to reigning 5A champion Parkrose in the spring.
Cleveland hired Dickens on June 28, after summer league games, and he has yet to meet his players. He believes Cleveland has the foundation in place to build a strong program.
“They're a nice, tight community with a good youth program all the way down to the elementary level,” he said. “That's what I like, right there, to get these kids to stay home. A lot of kids go over to Central Catholic or Benson because they're right in that area. But if we can get our kids to stay home and go to Cleveland, I think we can do something over there.”
Dickens finished his high school career at David Douglas before playing at a junior college in northern Nevada. He got into coaching with Trail Blazer camps in the 1990s and became head coach of the Portland Chinooks of the International Basketball League. That led to a five-year stint under Earl Clark at Benson.
Dickens lives in Milwaukie and works for Clackamas County in foster care for developmentally disabled youth.
In 2024, Dickens started the annual The Best of The Best tournament, which features 6A league all-star teams in a two-day event in the week after Memorial Day at Reynolds. It started with four teams in 2024 and included eight teams the last two years, including a 5A all-star team.
Rare change at David Douglas
Since the David Douglas program started in 1956, the Scots have had only five head coaches in Dan Torrey (1956-58), Truman Osburn (1958-77), Jim Kitchen (1977-89), Stan Woodfill (1989-2004) and Chad Reeves (2004-26).
This year, Michael Kafoury becomes the team's sixth head coach. He succeeds Reeves, who went 275-261 in 22 seasons.
“It feels amazing to go into a situation where they’ve taken such good care of their coaches in the past and their coaches have done such a great job to get the kids to work hard and listen,” Kafoury told PortlandPreps.com.
Kafoury, a Cleveland graduate, is a first-time head coach. He coached at Grant under Robert Key for five seasons before Key left to take the job at West Linn in 2023.
Kafoury said he will favor a more free-flowing offense, as opposed to the sets David Douglas has run over the years. The Scots finished 7-17 overall, 3-11 in the Mt. Hood Conference last season.
“I think part of it is just teaching kids how to read the game and play the game more instinctively and not so much based on a predetermined idea of how we’re going to attack someone,” Kafoury said.
Toney resurfaces at Clackamas
Former West Linn coach Tyler Toney is the new coach at Clackamas, where he has replaced Ryan King.
Toney, a 1999 West Linn graduate, went 52-28 in three seasons (2016-19) as coach at his alma mater, including a third-place finish in the 6A tournament in his first season.
Before becoming West Linn's coach, Toney spent five seasons as the team's assistant coach under Eric Viuhkola, helping lead the Lions to four consecutive state championships from 2013 to 2016.
Toney's first head-coaching job was at Portland Christian, where he went 92-24 in four seasons (2003-07). He guided the Royals to the 2A quarterfinals twice.
He assisted at Warner Pacific University and was the coach for one season at 2A Riverdale, going 8-16 in 2010-11.
King went 155-86 in two stints covering nine seasons at Clackamas. Last season, the Cavaliers finished 18-11 and lost in the quarterfinals of the 6A tournament.
jerryu@osaa.org
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