Longtime Kingwood High School head basketball coach Royce Huseman recently announced his retirement from Humble ISD at the May board of trustees meeting.
“I’ve coached for 32 years and they’ve all been at Kingwood,” he said. “First as the junior varsity coach in 1985 and in ‘91 I was head coach.”
Huseman described his retirement as a retirement from public education. He has already taken a coaching position at Covenant Preparatory, formerly Northeast Christian Academy, in Kingwood.
“They’re building a brand new school and a brand new gym and they wanted to start fresh with a new coach and just kind of get the program going,” Huseman said. “Right now it is a very small school. This year they had just seven seniors in the whole high school.”
Huseman said Covenant Preparatory is trying to get their athletics top-notch and they are building a new facility near Kingwood Park High School.
While at Kingwood, Huseman turned the basketball program from competition into a perennial powerhouse. He led the Mustangs to 12 district titles, eight regional appearances, three regional titles, three state playoff appearances and a UIL state championship in 2005. The Mustangs have struggled to reclaim that glory in recent years following the creation of Kingwood Park High School in 2007.
“When they opened [Kingwood Park] up we were really good,” Huseman said. “Over time it definitely made a difference. Any time you go from picking your team from 3,500 kids down to 2,500, it makes a difference.”
Huseman said Kingwood has been the smallest school in its division for the past eight years.
Both of Huseman’s sons are also high school coaches. His oldest son, Kolby, is currently head coach at Klein Oak High School after coaching at Kingwood Middle School and Kingwood Park for a short time. The youngest, Collin, is the junior varsity coach at Memorial High School. Both of his sons graduated from KHS and played basketball for their father.
Atascocita junior varsity coach Monte Cole will be taking over the Kingwood basketball program.
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