“Coach Jack Jensen is a great man. In my opinion, there is no one that can teach you life lessons through sports like Jack,” said Chris Kosiba, a former member of Coach Jensen’s basketball team and a current assistant women’s basketball coach for Guilford College.
A lot can be said about Jack Jensen’s coaching accomplishments. He has been a member of the Guilford College coaching staff since 1965. He is one of just two coaches in NAIA history to win National Championships in two sports (Basketball, 1973, Golf !989). He was inducted into both the NAIA and the Guilford College Hall of Fame’s. He coached four basketball players that progressed into the NBA. The list goes on and on and continues to grow.
But what is most impressive about Coach Jensen can be characterized by the people he remains to inspire and guide on the course and off, his players.
“If we need anything he’s always there to get it for us.” said Clint Fields, a senior on Guilford’s Golf team. “He’s always there for school, helping us with classes or giving us rides if we don’t have a car.”
Ricky Gandhi, a freshman and India Native on the Golf team, said “I had a lot of changes to face and I was really apprehensive about how I was going to fit in here, but Coach Jensen was there to help me in anyway” said Gandhi. “Every time I had a problem I could not resolve, Coach Jensen was there to help solve it.”
Coach Jensen’s character, as witnessed by my own experience with him, is magnetic. He is in my opinion a very kind and humorous person who cares about the well being of his students and all the people that are fortunate enough to know him.
M.L.Carr, a former NBA player and member of the Guilford College Board of Trustees said of Coach Jensen, “As much as he’s achieved, he still can’t accept the fact that he’s a great coach. I have both respect for him as a person, as well as a coach.”
Coach Jensen resigned as coach of Guilford’s basketball team in 1999, but he still coaches an impressive Golf team that finished up the Fall season with a second place finish at the Tom O’Briant Memorial. Jensen’s team won three of the six tournaments entered this season and finished no lower than fifth while competing against as many as 24 other colleges and universities.
Coach Jensen lives in Greensboro with his wife, Marsha, and their two children. Laura graduated from Guilford in 1997, while Dennis is a junior baseball player at Guilford.
Said Kosiba’s, “He’s the reason I came here. He made me want to play for him because he’s such a nice guy. He helped me see a bigger perspective, a bigger scope of the world. He helped me grow up.”