Demetrius Poles, Rowan women’s basketball coach and former Delsea Regional High School superstar, has died at 50

Demetrius Poles, 50, of Glassboro, women’s basketball coach at Rowan University, former superstar player at Delsea Regional High School, longtime professional player and coach in Europe and western Asia, popular recruiter, and mentor, died Saturday, May 20, of heart failure at Inspira Medical Center Mullica Hill.

At 6 feet, 8 inches, Coach Poles towered over most people he knew, and his achievements on the basketball court were equally imposing. He won two college conference championships as Rowan women’s coach and was named coach of the year in 2020 and 2023.

He tipped in the winning shot in a semifinal game to help Rowan win a 1996 national men’s championship and was a freshman all-star at St. Joseph’s University in 1992. He played seven pro seasons in Europe and western Asia after college, coached men’s teams in Sweden and Italy for 10 more years, and was a European men’s coach of the year in 2013.

“He is one of the smartest individuals I have ever met,” a colleague at Rowan told the campus newspaper in February. “He understands the game. He can see things before they even happen.”

It all started at Delsea. Coach Poles was the star player on the high school’s 1991 state championship team and everybody’s South Jersey Player of the Year. His coach called him the greatest passer ever, and he averaged an amazing 26 points and 17 rebounds per game as Delsea went 28-1.

He was inducted into the South Jersey Basketball Hall of Fame in 2017, and Delsea retired a jersey for the first time ever, his No. 44, in 2020. “The Crusaders have lost a legend,” Delsea officials said on Twitter. “But his legacy will live on.”

In 2017, Coach Poles told The Inquirer that his mother, Linda Carter, was his best coach. “My mother raised us, me and my brother, to believe that you can do whatever you want in life,” he said. “She always told us, ‘Don’t limit yourself. Don’t put barriers on yourself.’”

So he didn’t. Coach Poles used his work ethic and engaging personality off the court to become a successful recruiter and mentor in Europe and throughout South Jersey. He coached young players at basketball camps and clinics, scouted scores of prospects in gyms around the world, and honed his skill in reassuring worried parents that their college players would excel with him.

He became assistant men’s coach at Rowan in 2013 and assistant women’s coach in 2016. He recruited some of the school’s best players, both men and women, and was promoted to women’s head coach in 2019.

He went 62-22 in three seasons with the women — Rowan’s 2020-21 season was canceled due to COVID-19 — and paid attention to team culture as much as its record. “Demetrius was a man of great substance,” John Giannini, Rowan’s director of athletics, said in a tribute. “Goodness, in all ways, defined him.”

Coach Poles told The Inquirer in 2017: “I love to coach more than I liked playing. You learn so much as you get older.”

Born Feb. 24, 1973, in Woodbury, Demetrius Allen Poles grew up in Glassboro and played three seasons at St. Joseph’s before transferring to Rowan for his final collegiate season. Nicknamed Mete, he played and coached in 16 countries over 17 years in Europe and western Asia after college, retiring as a player in 2003 due to worn-out knees.

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He married and had sons Jelani and Jayden. After a divorce, he married Sandra White in 2022, and they lived in Glassboro. “He was compassionate and caring,” said his wife, who met Coach Poles at a basketball game in 2017. “He was about impacting people’s lives and being an example.”

Coach Poles liked to fish, and he put together an eclectic playlist that included music from nearly every genre. He swam in the Dead Sea when he played in Lebanon, enjoyed Italian food and nature walks, and doted on his sons.

“That’s what drew me to him,” his wife said. “He put his sons before himself. He was caring, loving, and affectionate.” In February, Coach Poles told the Rowan campus newspaper: “I have a beautiful wife, and she saved my life, and she saved my kids. My kids, my family at home, they keep me going.”

Coach Poles earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice at Rowan in 2014. He was diagnosed with cancer in 2020, contracted COVID-19 in 2021, underwent back surgery, suffered kidney failure, and developed a heart condition last year.

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“My team was behind me the whole time,” Coach Poles told The Inquirer’s Mike Jensen in March. His players said in a recent Facebook post: “To know him was to love him. Demetrius embodied the best in all of us.”

His wife said: “He was passionate and resilient. He said, ‘I’m going to beat this.’”

In addition to his mother, wife, sons, brother, and former wife, Coach Poles is survived by his stepfather and other relatives.

Services were Friday, June 2.

Donations in his name may be made to the Rowan University women’s basketball team, in care of the Rowan Foundation, 201 Mullica Hill Rd., Glassboro, N.J. 08028.