Ronny Thompson

Ronald Thompson (born 1969) is an American former college basketball player and coach and current Emmy Award-winning broadcaster for Comcast SportsNet, based in Bethesda, Maryland. He is the son of Gwen Thompson and former Georgetown University head coach John R. Thompson, Jr., whose children also include a daughter, Tiffany, and John Thompson III, who also is a former Georgetown head coach. Born in Washington, D.C., Thompson spent his formative years on basketball courts in the Boys & Girls Clubs throughout the Washington metropolitan area. He contributed on Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) teams in the Washington, D.C, region and played high school basketball for coach Stu Vetter at Flint Hill School in Oakton, Virginia. In 1992, Thompson graduated from Georgetown University as a four-year basketball letterman with a degree in sociology. After a brief stint as a trading assistant with Prudential Securities in New York City, he became an assistant coach, first at the University of Oregon from 1993 to 1994, then with Loyola College in Maryland from 1994 to 1996. His career in professional sports began as a video coordinator for Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown and the Philadelphia 76ers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) in 1996; shortly afterward, he became a 76ers scout. In 1998, Thompson returned to Georgetown as an assistant coach under his father from 1998 to 1999 and then under head coach Craig Esherick from 1999 to 2003. He then was an assistant coach at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, Arkansas from 2003 to 2006. Thompson accepted the head coaching job at Ball State University in April 2006. In his one season as coach of the Cardinals they finished a disappointing 9-22. Following the season, controversy developed surrounding a potential NCAA investigation into the basketball coaching staff attending voluntary player workouts outside of the regulated practice dates. The Ball State newspaper reported that on Sunday, June 24, 2007, "men's basketball coach Ronny Thompson was greeted at his office with seven note cards that simply read 'liars, cheaters, [racial slur].'" Thompson resigned as men's basketball coach in July 2007, later claiming that he had been in a "racially hostile work environment." Ball State later exonerated Thompson of rules violations, apologized, and awarded him a $200,000 settlement.