DJ Wyrick: Fairfield Basketball

After playing four years for Tyrice Walker at Miami Hamilton, DJ Wyrick knew he wanted to go down the path of coaching-- and what a path it’s been thus far.

“(Walker) is really one of the reasons I wanted to get into coaching,” said Wyrick. “He was a great coach. He was really good at developing relationships with players. That lit a fire in me, to want to become a coach… That relationship (with Walker) made me think about a career in coaching.”

Now, over a decade later, Wyrick is in his second season at the helm at one of Ohio’s biggest high schools: Fairfield.

After playing at Miami Hamilton, Wyrick began a graduate assistantship at Wright State University under Brad Brownell (who currently is the head coach of Clemson). Wyrick spent two years as a GA at Wright State, then transitioned into an assistant coach for the Raiders which he held for five years.

In 2015, Wyrick was 29 years old, married and wanted to start a family. So he made the move from college assistant to high school.

“In college, you can’t be a really good dad and a really

good assistant coach,” said Wyrick. “It’s just not going to happen.”

The young coach started looking around and found himself as the head coach of the Aviators at Vandalia Butler-- as Wyrick put it ‘the rest is history.’

His first year at Butler, the Aviators won just four games. Which doubled their total from the year before, but was an upgrade from the two-win benchmark set the season before he got there. He didn’t have another losing season at the helm, as averaged 17 wins over the next three winters.

Now that he is at Fairfield, he is drawing from experiences with his college mentor to get the Indians to the next level.

“(Walker) had a great feel for presenting what everyone’s role is on the team or what everyone needed to do to help the team succeed,” said Wyrick. “Honestly, that’s a big challenge right now at Fairfield, is getting our guys to buy into that. That’s a challenge for every high school coach.”

The Indians went 7-16 last year, with their hallmark win coming in the form of beating their rival Hamilton on the road and at the buzzer. Though the overall season was not where they wanted to be, they still improved their GMC win total from five to six. Wyrick knows there is plenty of work to be done.

“Hopefully we will continue to improve on that, especially this year,” said the head coach of the Indians. “We have talent this year, there is no doubt about it. We need to get our culture together, we need some leadership and we need to handle adversity.”

It’s not just Walker that Wyrick has learned a great deal from. Brownell was instrumental in his basketball education.

“From an X’s and O’s standpoint, I’ve never been around anything like that,” he said. “Those years under him was like getting a doctorate in basketball. (Brownell) was on a different level.”

Wyrick has the background, the experience and the track record to get the Indians back to where they were early last decade when they went to state and won the Greater Miami Conference. It’s only a matter of time before he does it, but it’s not about the wins and losses for him-- it’s about the players.

“Coaches have a huge responsibility because we can really impact kids,” he said. “You have a big-time duty to hold kids accountable in all aspects. Whether that’s their grades, or being on time or doing the right thing. But I like that part of it because they may not listen to the teachers all the time, or mom and dad but they’re going to listen to their coach. It’s a great responsibility to have.” 2021 will be an exciting season for the lauded GMC, and Wyrick plans to have his team right in the thick of things as they hope to vastly improve from last year.

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