The lure of returning to coaching and living so close to home has pulled Kyle Shipp away from Shelbyville High School’s athletic department.

The assistant athletic director was hired as Hauser High School’s new girls basketball coach. He will take over a program that went 25-45 over the last three seasons under head coach Chad Evans.

“They pushed really hard,” said Shipp Tuesday night after the announcement broke on Twitter. “They came up with a really good package. (The school) is one mile from my house. My girls will go to school there.”

Shipp anticipates raising his two daughters within the Jets program.

“My two girls (ages 7 and 5) started basketball a couple of years ago and they took a liking to it,” he said. “I can organize the feeder program and travel program and enjoy watching them play the game. That was a major positive to this.”

Leaving Shelbyville was not an easy decision, though. He is near the end of his second year with the athletic department after an eight-year coaching career at Whiteland High School.

Shipp went 90-99 as Whiteland’s girls basketball coach from 2013-2020 with a best season of 19-5 in 2018.

Hauser finished 10-13 this past season with just one senior on the roster. Gabby Johns averaged 6.5 points and a team-leading 8.4 rebounds per game.

Shipp believes he can build around a trio of players in rising junior Madelyn Poe and rising seniors Kyliegh Parrott (9.5 ppg, 3.5 rpg) and Adriana Musallami (6.9 ppg, 4.0 rpg).

Poe led Hauser in scoring (16.6 ppg), assists and steals and was the team’s second-leading rebounder at 5.1 rpg.

“There is the possibility to make a splash in my first coaching year,” said Shipp. “They have a couple of nice returning players.

“There is not much traditional success in basketball but volleyball and softball are very strong so there are athletes there. They need a culture shift and with hard work, we can change that.”

Increasing enrollment has moved Hauser into Class 2A for the next two-year tournament cycle. The Jets will compete in Sectional 45 with Milan, North Decatur, South Ripley and Switzerland County.

Shipp will finish out the current school year at Shelbyville before moving on to Hauser and a summer filled with basketball workouts.