Ronald Ross (born February 11, 1983) is an American retired professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

player and coach. He played internationally for a number of years but he is best known for his collegiate career at

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public university, public research university in Lubbock, Texas, United States. Established on February 10, 1923, and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the flagship instit ...

Playing career

High school

A native of the

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, Ross starred at

Hobbs High School Hobbs High School (HHS) is located in Hobbs, New Mexico, United States. It had a student population of about 1900 students as of 2017. In addition to Hobbs it serves Monument, New Mexico, Monument, Nadine, New Mexico, Nadine, and North Hobbs, ...

Hobbs, New Mexico Hobbs is a city in Lea County, New Mexico, United States. Its population was 40,508 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, increasing from 34,122 in 2010. Hobbs is the principal city of the Hobbs, New Mexico micropolitan statistical area ...

. He was an integral part of three consecutive state championships from 1999 to 2001, including an undefeated campaign as a

sophomore In the United States, a sophomore ( or ) is a person in the second year at an educational institution; usually at a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of Post-secondary school, post-secondary educatio ...

in 1998–99 (27–0). Hobbs High School won the 1999 and 2001 state championships at the

University of New Mexico The University of New Mexico (UNM; ) is a public research university in Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States. Founded in 1889 by the New Mexico Territorial Legislature, it is the state's second oldest university, a flagship university in th ...

's famous home court, The Pit. And while Ross performed well throughout his prep career – having been named ''

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s New Mexico State Player of the Year as a

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– he found himself without any four-year college scholarship offers. In one game that season he recorded 38 points, 8 steals, 8 rebounds, 7 assists and 5 dunks.

College

Ross decided to walk on to the Texas Tech basketball team as a

freshman A freshman, fresher, first year, or colloquially frosh, is a person in the first year at an educational institution, usually a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of post-secondary educational in ...

in 2001–02, in spite of his mother's urging to attend one year of

junior college A junior college is a type of post-secondary institution that offers vocational and academic training that is designed to prepare students for either skilled trades and technical occupations or support roles in professions such as engineering, a ...

instead. It was

Bob Knight Robert Montgomery Knight (October 25, 1940 – November 1, 2023) was an American men's college basketball coach (basketball), coach. Nicknamed "the General", he won 902 NCAA Division I men's basketball games, a record at the time of his retire ...

's first year at Tech and he needed talented walk-ons to begin building his roster. It took until Ross'

junior Junior or Juniors may refer to: Aircraft * Ekolot JK-05L Junior, a Polish ultralight aircraft * PZL-112 Junior, a Polish training aircraft * SZD-51 Junior, a Polish-made training and club glider Arts and entertainment Characters * Bowser Jr., ...

year to earn a scholarship, however. Years later his mother said, "I had to support him. It was expensive and hard at first, but I'd have to say it's worked out." The year he earned his scholarship saw him more than double his scoring average from 4.5 as a sophomore to 10.1 as a junior. He started 31 of 34 games played, and rounded out his season averages with 3.1 assists and 1.5 steals. Knight made Ross a team

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when he became a senior in 2004–05. Ross was known for his work ethic and later that season garnered praise from Knight, who said "He's an all-time example to kids as to what they can do with what they have." He again substantially increased his scoring average, netting 17.5 points per game to along with 5.5 rebounds, 3.0 assists, and 2.6 steals per game. The 6th-seeded Red Raiders advanced to the NCAA tournament's Sweet Sixteen behind Ross' great play. In the opening round win against 11th-seeded

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

, Ross scored a then-school record for points in an NCAA Tournament game with 28 (later surpassed by

Jarrett Culver Jarrett Ryan Culver (born February 20, 1999) is an American professional basketball player for the Osceola Magic of the NBA G League. He played college basketball for the Texas Tech Red Raiders. Early life Culver was born to Regina and Hiawatha ...

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

). In the next round against 3rd-seeded

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, he scored 24 points, including a go-ahead three-pointer with 1:06 remaining as well as two free throws to clinch the Red Raiders' two-point win. Ross garnered several individual accolades. For

Big 12 Conference The Big 12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. It consists of 16 full-member universities (3 private universities and 13 public universities) in the states of Arizona, Colorado, Florida ...

honors he was named to the All-Big 12 first-team and the All-Defensive Team. Nationally, he was named the winner of the

Chip Hilton Player of the Year Award The Chip Hilton Player of the Year Award was presented by the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) to an NCAA Division I men's college basketball player who was a senior and who had demonstrated outstanding character, leadership, inte ...

, given by the

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

to a Division I player who demonstrated outstanding character, leadership, integrity, humility, sportsmanship, and talent. Ross finished his collegiate career with 1,174 points.

Statistics

Professional

Following Texas Tech, Ross went undrafted in the

2005 NBA draft The 2005 NBA draft took place on June 28, 2005, in the Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York City. In this draft, NBA teams took turns selecting amateur college basketball players and other first-time eligible players, such as players fro ...

. He quickly found a spot playing for Castelletto Ticino in

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, Italy's second-tier league. After one year he returned to the United States to play in the

Continental Basketball Association The Continental Basketball Association (CBA), originally known as the Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League, and later as the Eastern Professional Basketball League and the Eastern Basketball Association, was a men's professional basketball m ...

(CBA) for the Butte Daredevils, and then in the

USBL The United States Basketball League (USBL) was a professional men's spring basketball league. The league was formed in 1985 and ceased operations in 2008. The USBL started in 1985 as one of the first basketball leagues to play a late-spring to ...

for the

Albany Patroons The Albany Patroons are a professional basketball team that plays in The Basketball League (TBL). Previously, the team competed in the Continental Basketball Association (CBA) and in the United States Basketball League (USBL). The Patroons won ...

. During his time with the Patroons he earned All-USBL first-team honors and was also named the league's defensive player of the year. Overall, Ross' professional career spanned 13 years (2005–2018) and included stops in Italy, Germany, Israel, Croatia, Greece, France, Cyprus, and Romania.

Coaching career

Texas Tech head coach

Chris Beard Christopher Michael Beard (born February 18, 1973) is an American basketball coach who is the head men's coach at University of Mississippi ( Ole Miss). He also previously served as head coach at Texas, Texas Tech, Little Rock, Angelo State, a ...

offered Ronald Ross a position as a graduate assistant in 2018–19. Beard had been an assistant coach under Bob Knight during Ross' college playing career, and there was much mutual respect. Ross took the position, and in his first year the Red Raiders made it to the NCAA national championship game for the first time in school history, but lost 85–77 in overtime. He coached one more season, but upon the conclusion of 2019–20 he resigned, opting to leave the coaching profession to instead to pursue a career in business. He relayed his resignation to the public via

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, posting "Coaching has been a blessing and I’m confident in my capabilities to be great at it, but I’ve always been intrigued by business and I’m simply just motivated to conquer a new quest and pursue something different!"

References

External links