{"id":53826,"date":"2018-12-11T16:14:58","date_gmt":"2018-12-11T23:14:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/?p=53826"},"modified":"2018-12-11T16:14:58","modified_gmt":"2018-12-11T23:14:58","slug":"chris-ball-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/chris-ball-football\/","title":{"rendered":"Flagstaff bound: Chris Ball selected as NAU football coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Northern Arizona University Athletic Director <strong>Mike Marlow<\/strong> announced this week that <strong>Chris Ball<\/strong> will be the new football coach for the Lumberjacks.<\/p>\n<p>Ball, who will be the 30<sup>th<\/sup> head coach in Lumberjack history, was previously the defensive coordinator at the University of Memphis. Marlow said Ball\u2019s coaching experience, which includes stints at Arizona State, Washington State and Alabama demonstrate the ability to effectively recruit in Arizona and throughout the West Coast.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<strong>President Cheng<\/strong> provided very clear direction\u2014find the best football coach for NAU who is genuinely dedicated to the student-athletes he coaches, mentors and guides through this important time in their lives,\u201d Marlow said. \u201cAdditionally, she asked that I find someone who can still the blueprint and culture necessary to make NAU football a sustainable championship contender. In Chris Ball, I am confident that we have achieved the president\u2019s goal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Marlow hired Ball after an extensive, three-week search that included the use of a professional consultant; he considered an extensive list of interested candidates. Ball replaces longtime coach <strong>Jerome Souers<\/strong>, who is taking on a new role focused on athletic fundraising and Native American initiatives.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nauathletics.com\/staff.aspx?staff=249\">Learn more about Ball\u2019s coaching history.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"search-results-excerpt-link\" href=\"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/chris-ball-football\/\">Northern Arizona University Athletic Director Mike Marlow announced this week that Chris Ball will be the new football coach for the Lumberjacks. Ball, who will be the 30th head coach in Lumberjack history, was previously the defensive coordinator at the University of Memphis. Marlow said Ball\u2019s coaching experience, which includes stints at Arizona State, Washington&hellip;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":53827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-staff"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}