Sam Harris, the dean of coaches in the TranSouth Conference, begins his 16th season at the helm of the Trevecca program. Harris has led the program to four NAIA National Tournament appearances and a pair of TranSouth Championships. Four of his players have been selected as NAIA All-Americans, five have been named honorable-mention all-American, two have been elected to the TNU Athletic Hall of Fame, two have been named TranSouth Player of the Year, and many more have been selected all-conference. Harris has led three teams to the NAIA Sweet 16.

Harris, Trevecca's eighth men's basketball coach, has eight consecutive winning seasons, with a 41-19 record in TranSouth Conference play and an overall record of 93-39 for the last four years. This past season he surpassed the 400 career win milestone. He now has 410 career wins with 249 of those wins coming at Trevecca.

Harris, in his 26th season as a head coach on the collegiate level, has rebuilt three programs in his career. He has led all three schools to the conference title and post- season play after taking over a program that was below .500 the year before he was named head coach.

A 1978 graduate of Olivet Nazarene University, Harris starred alongside his brother Steve Harris, while playing for former Trevecca coach Frank Wilson at Olivet. After graduation Harris was an assistant coach at Judson College in Elgin, Ill. He inherited a program that was 15-110 during the previous six years and by the third year led the team to a 18-10 record. In his fourth year, Judson produced a district championship and a berth in the NCCAA National Tournament and a 24-7 finish.

In 1984 Harris moved to NCAA Division-1 Central Florida as an assistant coach and then moved to Valparaiso University as an assistant before taking the head coach position at Messiah College in Grantham, Pa., in 1988. Harris took a 6-82 program and won the conference championship in his third season with a 15-10 record. For his efforts he was named the MAC Conference Coach of the Year.

Sam and his wife, Donna, have two sons, Tyson and Christopher, and live in Brentwood.