Blytheville’s Jamison signs with Greyhounds

Last Friday, Blytheville Chickasaw senior guard Treay Jamison signed a National Letter of Intent to play for the Arkansas State University Mid-South Greyhounds.

“Obviously, he’s been a great player for us. He’s filled the stat sheet for two years. He’s always been the top two or three in scoring and rebounding,” Blytheville head coach McKenzie Pierce said. “I think he averaged 14 points this year and four to five rebounds. On the floor he’s been a great player but he’s been a great example at what real hard work does. He came in as a junior, it took him to January to really get in the rotation and by state tournament time, he was one of our best players, if not our best offensive player. Then, obviously, he was one of our best ones this season. He’s been great for us. Before I got here it had been five years since we made the state tournament and had a winning season. So, he’s been a big part of the foundation of having back-to-back winning seasons and good years and two state tournaments berths and two 5A East runner-ups. So he has been a big part of getting this program turned back around. I’m just proud of him. He understands just signing something on a piece of paper isn’t the end, it’s the beginning of the ultimate goal and so I have high hopes for him. I know he’s going to go down there and work hard and everything else will take care of itself. There getting a glue guy, a blue-collar guy. He’s going to get somebody that isn’t afraid to work. Kind of like I told Coach [Parker], he definitely could but I don’t see him being their leading scorer for the next two years, but I definitely could see him getting rebounds, steals, score points or whatever it takes to win. Whatever Coach ask him to do, he’ll do, that is just what type of person he is. I think that’s what makes him a high commodity these days; everybody wants to go score, but Treay will go do whatever he can to help the team win.”

Greyhounds head coach Chris Parker explained that with losing all five starters off of last year’s team, Jamison will have the chance to come in and compete for minutes next season.

“Treay’s the kind of kid that whenever I saw him play he just plays so hard and as a college coach we’re looking for things that you can’t teach and, boy, it’s hard teaching to play as hard as he does every second that he is on the floor. So that is the thing that stood out, but the other thing is that he is a high character kid. He’s been great to communicate with and finding communicators nowadays can be a challenge as well. That’s two big things that really stood out for me,” Parker said. “We’ve only got two freshmen coming back to be sophomores next year and two of them are forwards. So we’ve got all three guard positions that are wide open. We lost all five starters. I’ve told Treay, the same that I’ve told all of the freshmen we have signed. The opportunity is there for you to come in and grab some minutes but that’s going to be up to you. A lot of that is going to be determined by this summer and how hard some of these guys want to really work and improve and come in ready to go.”

Jamison gave all the credit to his coaches, teammates and the Blytheville School District for helping him make it to the collegiate level.

Jamison added,“Coach Pierce and my teammates, they have been with me and helped me out. I was failing in school, I had to get that up and I had to grind everyday. Just the atmosphere of Blytheville High School, of my coaches and teammates and everybody always pushing us to do better.”