ODU coach Jones retires after 32-year career

Old Dominion coach Jeff Jones is retiring, the school announced Monday.

The school announced in January that Jones was stepping away for the rest of the season due to health issues. He suffered a heart attack during the team’s trip to Honolulu for the Diamond Head Classic and then began treatment for prostate cancer for the fourth time.

Jones has been at Old Dominion since 2013, leading the Monarchs to the NCAA tournament in 2019 after winning both the Conference USA regular season and conference tournament championships.

He spent 13 seasons as the head coach at American before heading to ODU. During his time with the Eagles, Jones went to two NCAA tournaments and won four Patriot League regular-season titles.

Jones started his coaching career at Virginia, where he played his college ball from 1978 to ’82. He was an assistant for the Cavaliers for eight seasons after graduating, and then replaced Terry Holland in 1990. He won an ACC regular-season championship in 1995 and guided Virginia to five NCAA tournament appearances. The Cavaliers made an Elite Eight run in 1995 and won the NIT in 1992.

He finishes his 32-year head coaching career with a record of 560-418.