Successful homecoming for W.Virginia Wesleyan Jonas Jackson

NCAA Division II West Virginia Wesleyan College coach Jonas Jackson, a native of Boston, is the first African-American head coach in the history of the West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC). WVWC Director of Athletics Ken Tyler originally named Jackson the interim head coach this summer, and that part of the title was removed before the Bobcats (5-0) 37-26 win at Lincoln University of Pennsylvania on Saturday.

Buckhannon, West Virginia -- Jonas Jackson is a long way from home, in more ways than one.

A long way from Harwich Street in Dorchester, and his late grandmother, Sallie Jones. A long way from Hiawatha Road in Mattapan, and Elsie Jackson, his other grandmother, now 85. Two strong, caring women who raised the quiet boy on the tough streets of the city.

A long way from Lewenberg Middle School, the BNBL courts, and Simco’s on the Bridge. Those memories resonate in his soul.

Nor has he forgotten the countless individuals at Lincoln-Sudbury Regional who stepped forward, starting with football coach Tom Lopez, who saw promise in the Metco student, and gave Jackson a push and guidance. Line coach Gary Justason and his wife, Nancy, welcomed the wayward teen into their home when he had no place to live.

And that is why his trip back to the area, albeit on a bus that departed Buckhannon, W.Va., Thursday at midnight, means so much to the 32-year-old Jackson. The 1997 L-S graduate will return as the head coach of West Virginia Wesleyan College for today’s nonconference matchup at Bentley University (Waltham, Massachusetts), a pair of Division 2 football programs that lit up the scoreboard with 50-point efforts in their openers last week.

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