Hall of Fame
Jack Hissom was involved in Eastern athletics for 14 seasons in two different sports. He started his EKU career in 1967, serving the men’s basketball team as assistant coach while also serving as the team’s freshman team coach. He began his coaching career as head basketball and baseball coach at Lees Junior College in Jackson, Kentucky, in 1957, highlighted by his 1961-62 Lees basketball team that went 25-7 and qualified to participate in the KJCAA Regional Tournament. In 1959-60, he was selected as Basketball Coach of the Year for the Kentuckiana Junior College Conference.
He began the baseball program at Lees in 1960 and his team was 11-0 and advanced all the way to the semifinals of the national junior college tournament at Iowa Falls, Iowa.
In 1962, he began to coach at McCreary County Central leading that team to its first ever 12th Region basketball championship and a spot in the Sweet Sixteen. Hissom was later inducted into the 12th Region Boys Basketball Coaches Hall of Fame.
As one of head coach Guy Strong’s two assistant coaches, he was personally responsible for recruiting some of the current EKU basketball Hall of Fame inductees. In his role as freshman coach, walk-ons were given an equal opportunity to excel along with scholarship signees. During his tenure as Eastern’s freshman team coach, he compiled a six-year record of 67-41. This stint was highlighted by the 1968-69 Colonel freshmen team that went 12-6 and averaged more than 90 points per game. A former Marine and a devoted family man, he helped shape the moral compass of those in which he came in contact.
In 1972, he switched sports and was named EKU’s head baseball coach. In eight seasons, the Colonel baseball teams went 122-116-8 and won two OVC Eastern Division titles. His 1978 squad finished 13th in the nation with a .328 team batting average. He performed his duties at EKU under the old system in which coaches’ contracts included half-time academics and half-time coaching.
In 1995, he was inducted in to the Lees Junior College Hall of Fame. He was selected Marine of the Year in 2014 and is listed on the Hall of Fame Plaque located in EKU’s Chapel of Meditation. As a member of the Marine Corps Honor Guard that presents the American Flag to a member of the deceased veteran’s family at the funeral, he participated in more than 350 military funerals.
