GIRLS BASKETBALL: Jenny Schmutzler resigns position as Chambersburg's coach

Like many people who are faced with a difficult decision, Jenny Schmutzler made a list of pros and cons.

The decision she had to make was whether or not she wanted to come back for her fourth year as the head girls basketball coach at Chambersburg.

The cons won.

Schmutzler handed in her resignation to CASHS athletic director Jeremy Flores on Tuesday, and let her staff and team know her decision Wednesday.

"In three years I feel I've done all I could, and maybe somebody else should have a chance to do better," Schmutzler said. "I don't know that my heart is truly in it now, and that wouldn't be fair to the girls – that's something I'd never do to them."

The Trojans finished 3-19 this season, and in her three years Chambersburg had an overall record of 13-50.

While that's obviously not a good record, it's not that far off from the previous 16 years, when the Trojans were 140-235, a winning percentage of .373. During that time, Chambersburg reached the playoffs only twice.

"She was passionate about the program and she put in a lot of time," Flores said of Schmutzler. "She wants to see it succeed and we want the same exact thing.

"From my perspective, we want this to be an extremely successful team, but we know that will not happen overnight. I'm excited to have an opportunity to essentially start from scratch. We have to provide the support of the school district to help give the next coach the resources to let them succeed. And we need support from the community to make this work, no matter who the coach is."

That community support was clearly not always there for Schmutzler. A group of people went to the school board last year to call for her dismissal.

Schmutzler said, "I think I'd like to coach again, but it probably won't be at the varsity level. I do like coaching the girls who are there, but I just didn't like all the attitude and extra stuff that goes along with it, and having to deal with all the egos. It took the passion out of coaching.

"Honestly, I have to give a lot of respect to the people who have been able to coach for so many years."

Schmutzler believes several factors have worked against the Chambersburg program for years – the strength of the Mid Penn Commonwealth Division and the fact that the number of players committed to basketball as their No. 1 sport is not as high as some of the Trojans' opponents.

"At one point this year, both Cumberland Valley and CD East were ranked nationally," she said. "If CV wins the state title again this year, that would be three for our division in just a few years. But on teams like that, most of the players are playing in AAU programs in the offseason and playing at a high level."

Schmutzler's point is that players who want to play on those teams have plenty of competition just to make the varsity roster. Such has not been the case at Chambersburg.

"I do see good signs, however," she said. "I've heard of five or six of our younger girls talking about playing AAU, and that's important. I talk to other coaches and bottom line, you have to get the girls to do that. We can have open gyms here, but then we're not competing against other good players.

"But we do have some good talent coming up. We only lose one senior from this team (Jenn Grove) and we had moved some ninth-graders up to varsity and JV this year. So those other girls coming up won't just have a position given to them, they'll have to compete for it, and that's what we need."

The new coach will also have to get the players to believe in working on their games, even if it's by themselves.

Schmutzler said, "I think sometimes our girls think they are working hard, and they don't understand when I told them they were not working hard enough to be able to compete at this level."

Flores said he will put a committee together to review all the applicants.

"We will hire the best candidate," he said. "We are committed to this basketball program. But the community has to realize that they need to be patient and if they're not behind the new coach, then it'll be hard to turn this program around."