McKee Let Go at Ross

   Kelly McKee, who coached the Ross School boys basketball team to a county Class D championship two years ago and who made the playoffs this past winter, was fired recently by Ross’s athletic director, Jaye Cohen.

    McKee, who launched Ross’s boys basketball program “13 or 14 years ago,” said Monday he was “shocked” to learn, by phone, that Cohen was letting him go, “especially considering that the day before he led me to believe I’d be coaching again, patted me on the back, and gave me the practice schedule for next season.”

    Aside from the bad taste his dismissal had left in his mouth, McKee said, “Everything else has been positive. Ross is a great school, the kids are great, I was so fortunate to have had the time I did there. I have no idea why I was fired. He just said he’d decided to go in a new direction. I thought it was very, very unprofessional.”

    Cohen, when questioned, declined to go into what had been said at the meeting between him and McKee, saying only that he thought McKee was “a really good guy and was well liked,” but that he thought it was “time for new blood.”

    McKee’s successor, said Cohen, is to be Kevin O’Halloran, the longtime former Pierson coach, who has been coaching Ross’s junior varsity.

    McKee, who has been coaching basketball since 1974, said he would like to continue doing so.