CADIZ — As it pertains to coaching positions, things can certainly happen quickly.

Chace Smith will clearly attest.

Smith was hired as the new girls basketball coach at Harrison Central during Thursday afternoon’s Harrison Hills School District special board of education meeting. He takes over for highly successful head coach Nick Yourkovich, who stepped down just days ago to accept an assistant principal’s position at Harrison Central.

“I honestly didn’t see this coming,” Smith said. “Nick and I had several conversations about summer plans, open gyms and things and it was business as usual.”

Then, however, Justin Clifford stepped down from the aforementioned assistant principal’s position to take the Director of Athletics job at St. Clairsville, creating the opening.

“Nick applied and things happened from there,” Smith said. “I was called by an administrator, had a brief conversation, asked some questions and accepted the position with gratitude. It really all unfolded in a 24-hour period.”

Smith — a 2002 graduate of Harrison Central High School — is entering his first foray as a high school varsity head coach. However, he’s not new to leading a program. He spent more than three seasons as the head coach of Ohio University Eastern’s women’s team before COVID hit and the school ceased all athletic programs.

Once that transpired, Smith landed a position as a top assistant to Yourkovich, which is where he’s spent the last several seasons.

Prior to coaching at OUE, Smith had two years of experience coaching at the junior high level.

“Each (coaching) stop you make and each coach you work for, you take a little bit of those and tuck things away to help you down the road if you get the opportunity to be a head coach,” Smith said. “I’ve been around a lot of good, quality coaches to form a foundation of what I want to do personally and for the program.”

Smith played three seasons of basketball at Harrison Central and played his junior season at Bridgeport.

After high school, he played two seasons at Ohio University Eastern and then went to Athens to complete his undergraduate degree in history with a minor in sociology.

He was hired in 2018 as a member of the Harrison Central faculty after spending time working as a probation officer.

“Even when I was young, I knew I wanted to teach and coach, but I got into a different field (out of college) and stayed there for a while,” Smith said. “I ended up going back to get my certification (to teach).”

One of Smith’s main objectives is continuing the youth programs.

“I am huge on starting kids young because that’s how success comes,” Smith said.

“If we don’t have kids falling in love with basketball by the time they get to us at the high school level, it’s tough to ignite that fire.”

The opportunity to take over for Yourkovich, who guided Harrison Central to a pair of OVAC titles and a Buckeye 8 North crown, is something that Smith doesn’t take lightly.

“I’ve been around a lot of good coaches, but Nick is one of the best,” Smith said.

“He put 13 years of blood, sweat and tears into this program. He’s really helped me in making this transition smooth and easy.”

Since Smith has been around all of the players and involved with the program, the transition should definitely be smooth. He plans to hit the ground running this week with open gyms and a skills camp for youth starting on Tuesday.

“We are hosting a 14-team shootout and we’re going to a shootout at Mount Union and we’re playing in the Follansbee high school girls league with games every Monday, so there isn’t any rest for the weary,” Smith said.

Smith’s already landed Kara Kenny as an assistant coach and he plans to continue to build the staff.

Chace and his wife, Erin, have two daughters — Bailey and Ella. They’re entering the eighth and sixth grade, respectively.